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Life of Byron

Life of Byron

We’ve been away.

It’s been quite a while since I posted an essay here—but also, we got out of town for a few days.

If you’ve visited Australia, you’ve probably heard of Byron Bay; it’s one of those towns whose reputation precedes it—beautiful beaches, surfers with Kombi vans, a relaxed lifestyle, music festivals, did I mention the beaches?

And yes, all of that is true, which is why when a friend very kindly offered his house for a week, we jumped at the chance to have a bit of summer in winter. (Yes, this is what Byron looks like in winter!)

Stark, Harsh

Stark, Harsh

Summer in Sydney is a test of how well you can avoid the harsh sun. We haven’t had any days over 40° (yet) here this year, it’s still possible though.

But what I find fascinating about those days when the sun beats down is the absolute starkness of the light, the contrast it creates—and its effect not just on people but the whole environment…

Robert's Letter of Intent

Robert's Letter of Intent

It’s been a while.

To be honest, it’s been SO long, I had to look up my own essays on this very site to see when the last one was, and what it was about. (It was June 2021, actually.)

We’ve all been distracted, diverted, disturbed from our usual patterns. Work has started up, work has shut down, work has started up again only to be shut down again…

Headless

This image, from Robert Catto’s essay Broken Threads was my starting point for this essay.

This image, from Robert Catto’s essay Broken Threads was my starting point for this essay.

Why is it that the head, and particularly the face, has so much importance in people photography? Convention states that the face should be the bright, in focus and get to be center stage in the composition.

A couple of Robert’s pictures of headless statues made me think about the importance that is generally put on the head/face in photography. While the rest of the body can tell the story just as well or even better. I’ve never been afraid to make a picture that doesn’t include the head but until recently I also never deliberately set out to not include the head in pictures.

So in the last couple of days I tried to do just that when taking pictures around the house.

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In the last few months, I’ve been also busy figuring out and creating a new body (pun not intended) of work. And one of the the aspects that I’ve been experimenting with is not including the face of the subject.

So what are your opinions on headless photography? Is it acceptable? Is it still portraiture?

Broken Threads

Broken Threads

I got a message recently from my sister in Toronto, to say that our dad’s gravestone had been installed in the cemetery where we laid him to rest one snowy day last year, before the pandemic began.

She’d also found an older family plot, in a different part of the same cemetery, and had spent a day there cleaning up the monument—and unearthing the stones of some of our ancestors that had been covered in dirt and grass, over many years…

Park Life

Park Life

My biggest chance to shoot has been when my nephew (for whom we’re a support bubble) has come to stay for a few days. Eager for any opportunity to go out and shoot and with my newly purchased X-E4 to try out he has been my little muse for these government-enforced dry spells. And, whilst my ever-patient nephew has generally accepted my photographing pretty much his every movement with a winning-smile (or at worst, a disdained stare), there is just one caveat on which he insists … “PESE CAN WE GO TO THE PAAAARK DADA?”

Over The Rainbow

Over The Rainbow

A little while ago I found an essay online, written by my grandfather.

I never met him, he died in 1960, almost a decade before I was born; but through an accident of timing, he spent WWI in a German prison camp. Instead of becoming a concert pianist, which is what he was studying there at the time, he became a psychologist and professor, and wrote a book about the society that sprang up in the camp in the years he was held.

Later, while working for the Canadian government during WWII, he wrote for Maclean’s magazine about how difficult it was going to be for the soldiers and prisoners returning from the war, the trouble they would inevitably have returning from that experience to “polite society”, and how their imaginations of life back at home after all that time away would inevitably lead to disappointment with the real thing.

I think that’s what the return to relative normalcy will be like for all of us, as the pandemic starts to get under control around the world…

Definition 047 | Wild, Wild Life

Definition 047 | Wild, Wild Life

If you’ve been reading my essays for a while now, you might know a bit about my family in Canada—the birders of Southern Ontario, that’s them.

One of my sisters sent me a photo of the decorations going on their tree this year over there, which naturally enough included a lot of bird-related ornaments, gathered over many years. My dad and my uncle used to have a boxing day tradition of shopping for new ornaments, so the collection was pretty expansive by the time we were kids—and we had to be a bit careful around all that Czechoslovakian blown glass, I can tell you. But I think we did okay; most of it survives and is still being used by them & their own (careful!) kids today.

Not having kids, a tree, or ornaments here in Sydney myself, I decided to do pretty much the opposite of what I usually do for one of these essays: I took my longest lens, and my largest camera, and went looking for actual birds I could capture, and send to my mum over in a wintry lockdown in Toronto, to give her a bit of colour and summer light to enjoy for a while…

Definition 040 | Chasing A Phantom

Definition 040 | Chasing A Phantom

If you were to stop by my apartment, you might think I was mildly obsessed. And you’d be right—but it’s not quite what you’d think, at first glance.

There might be a Phantom of the Opera poster on the wall. You could find a Phantom action figure, lurking on my desk. And, sure, I do have six (SIX?!) copies of the film—many of which actually contain two versions of it.

But, I promise you—there will be no songs about him, no Broadway or London cast renditions of anything. This isn’t the Phantom you’re thinking of; well, probably not, anyway…

Definition 034 | Don't Get Around Much, Anymore

Definition 034 | Don't Get Around Much, Anymore

Like most of us, I’m finding this year hard.

I’m well aware that it could be worse, of course—Sydney (and New South Wales, and Australia) are comparatively speaking doing extremely well, with new cases under 20 per day for months now; meanwhile, to our south, Melbourne is in their second lockdown after case numbers went over 500/day for weeks on end.

But still, between my father’s passing earlier in the year, and the fact that the entire industry I’ve spent my career in is closed indefinitely, it’s hard to know what my purpose is at the moment. Mostly I try to stay safe, which means rarely leaving the house aside from walks in a nearby park or grocery shopping; so I see the same few blocks, and not much else…