lens-artists: my go-to-places

Dawns’ light

Sutcliffe rarely left Whitby [a port and resort community on the Yorkshire coast], where his portrait studio kept him busy, and said that he was ‘tethered for the greater part of each year by a chain, at most only a mile or two long.’  To most modern photographers this would seem a crippling restriction, but Sutcliffe gradually realized that it was an asset to him as a photographer since it forced him to concentrate on the transitory effects that could transform familiar scenes. …photographers should always aim for something more than ‘mere postcard records of facts.’ ‘By waiting and watching for accidental effects of fog, sunshine or cloud,’ he advised, ‘it is generally possible to get an original rendering of any place.  If we only get what any one can get at any time, our labour is wasted; a mere record of facts should never satisfy us.’

cited: Frank Meadow Sutcliffe, The History of Photography Series, p 8

Horsetooth Reservoir

Journeys with John invites lens-artists to “share where you go or what you do to help lift those spirits when this old world starts getting you down”.

life’s passages … 72

O for a friend–that we might see and listen together! 
O the beautiful dawn in the mountain village!– 
The repeated sound of cuckoos near and far away.
~The Sarashina Diary (1009-1059)*

*cited: Trans: A S Omori & K Dot, Diaries of Court Ladies of Old Japan

Leica V-Lux 5: f/4 …. 1/125 s … 146 mm … 640 ISO

life’s passages … 52

life is a never-ending river…sudden moments of a stilled pond, languishing through time; riding whitewater rapids; falling waterfalls, bubbling creeks; uniting raindrops on a windowpane. Passing through life, seeking to rejoin with a vast unknown, and then again, evaporating into clouds that release into another stream of searching…searching…searching.

Are you in the waves of vast oceans?

Are you in the scent of flowers?

Are you in the spring’s early morning?

Are you in the touch of the afternoon’s sun rays?

Are you in the ever-changing clouds that tells stories of old?

Are you in the sound of melting snow?

Are you in the rustling movement of tumble weeds?

Are you in the colors of a brand new box of 72 Crayons? Or an old one?

Are you in the season of Autumn? Spring? Summer? Winter?

Are you in the wings of butterflies?

Are you in the vibrations of honey bees?

Are you in these questions?

Are you in the morning chanting sangha?

Are you in the scent of sun-warmed pine needles?

Are you in the uniting of water drops?

Are you in my searching, searching, searching?