“Light and Dark” — A canyon wall lit by reflected sunlight is seen through a dark section of canyon narrows, Death Valley.
Having photographed in the red rock canyons of Utah, I suspect that I have a bias toward that sort of beautiful, warm-toned landscape. In Death Valley I often look for, and enjoy finding, canyons with similar smooth surfaces… though that Utah red rock isn’t something you’ll see very much here. The narrow canyon in this photograph is perhaps more typical of the Death Valley landscape, with much rougher and more angular rocks.
I have written frequently about how wonderful canyon light is and how much it contrasts with the harsh and brilliant light of the desert landscape outside the canyons. In the deepest and narrowest sections the shadowed light becomes quite blue since the blue of the sky that is the main source of illumination. In this photograph we see the contrast between those blue foreground shadows and the warmer colors of the more distant canyon wall that is more open to the light.
This is one of those “shoot fast” street photography images that I sometimes like while traveling. It happened so quickly that I barely remember the act of making the photo. My recollection is that we were walking along a street in Bruges, Belgium when I spotted this group and fired off a frame. I think there might be several ways to “see” this image…
One is simply compositionally — the arrangement of figures and colors, the direction of their attention, the pointing hand, the one fellow standing slightly apart from the other three people, a parallel between the body positions of the two at the right/left extremes, and the physical contact between the two in the middle. I think it also conveys something important about the experience of travel — the possibility of being astonished, the public innocence about that experience, and more.
Thanks, Brenda. I especially appreciate the comment on _this_ photograph as it is a big of a challenge for some of my landscape fans to make sense of the street photography stuff! :-)
“Bicycles and Red Door” — Parked bicycles in front of a hotel with a red door and a flowering bush, Montpellier.
What is it about bicycles? They turn up as photographic subjects all the time, on their own and as characters in street photography. (One for my favorite photographs by Henri Cartier-Bresson features a bicycle.) It probably has something to do with things they represent or are associated with: a slower pace, the sensations of wind as you ride, closer contact with our surroundings. That is all preamble to this “bicycle photo” of mine, made on a street in Montpellier, France.
If I recall correctly, this may have been our last morning in this charming city before we left France and moved on to Zaragoza, Spain. While the title mentions the bicycles and they are prominent in the frame, I think that photograph is more about the lovely, soft light and the colors of the red door and the fascinating green plant growing next to it.
“Weathered Street Art” — The weathered and worn figure of a man, on a wall in Montpellier, France.
There is a fine line when photographing things like this between appropriation of someone else’s creative work and making the image because the placement and weathering themselves provide independent visual interest. In short, I’m not big on simply photographing what other people create, but I do seek out and photograph things like this bit of weathered street art found on a wall in Montpelllier, France.
I suspect that it has or had some meaning or message that isn’t apparent to me — either because I lack the cultural context to see it or because it has been weathered to the point where it is no longer apparent. For me, that weathering itself is part of the attraction. In this case, the bits that remain suggest something like a genie emerging from a bottle.
Photographer and visual opportunist. Daily photos since 2005, plus articles, reviews, news, and ideas.
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