X-T3

Cycles

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BY BERT STEPHANI

I used to live near these fields and I walked them often for a couple of years to get some air, think, forget, despair, hope or just be. I liked how things changed with the seasons but as soon as I entered the second annual cycle, I got bored because it was like watching a movie again just after finishing it the first time. What's the point of life if it's just a constantly repeating pattern?

It took a while before I started noticing the subtle changes that came with each cycle. I saw wildlife that wasn't there a year before, the puddles on the path were in different places, there were new sounds, unfamiliar faces and so much more. 
This morning, when I walked these fields again for the first time in a couple of years, I noticing that these small changes are all it takes to transform an area over time. 

Nature is wise teacher, small changes do have an impact. Our actions aren't pointless, so let's make them count.


All Still

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By Patrick La Roque

January is usually a quiet time of year, but 2019 is different. My calendar is filled with judging, writing and shooting assignments, including a few days in Toronto at the end of the month for a rather important gig. Combined to holidays that were little more than a seven-days-a-week-xmas-playlist blur, the sense of renewal and opportunity for reflection are missing this time around.

I’m meditating again (or trying to...the brain is one crazy nervous beast) and over the past weeks I’ve searched, actively, for images that would bring me peace. Therapy through photography. It’s much too easy to get caught up in busyness otherwise—as Kevin and Dominique both expressed very well in their last essays.

So here’s some stillness...an illusion, while we gather our thoughts.

Cruise Control

BY BERT STEPHANI

My headlights always seem to be switched on this time of year. Every morning my car greets me with the ping that warns me for slippery roads despite the new winter tires. I can see a roller coaster year in my rear view mirror and there is that nagging realization that only a fundamental change of course can avoid the view of yet another roller coaster year ahead.

For now I'm going to push the cruise control button, lean back and find joy in the few rays of sunlight that make it over the horizon and through the clouds. I have to have faith that at some point I'll be ready to exit the traffic flow and enjoy the change of speed, the sound of tires on rough tarmac and an unknown but clear view through the windshield. 

Poker Night

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By Patrick La Roque

Inevitably, there’s playing—cards or water guns, a board game of some sort. This time tradition won the draw and out came the brushed metal suitcase. Serious stuff.

I stood on the sidelines, lurking—the eternal bystander. I watched as individuals fought for supremacy. One family, two nations.
If only the world were so simple.

Rubicon

“A limit that when passed or exceeded permits of no return and typically results in irrevocable commitment.”

By Patrick La Roque

I don’t understand anything anymore. How facts suddenly become fluid and the educated suspect. I don’t understand the hypocrisy, this failure of empathy, hellbent on the annihilation of others. I don’t understand the messianic appeal of an indecent, cruel and profoundly imbecilic buffoon on anyone, let alone millions of people. Not now. Not after almost two years of verifiable lies and daily obscenities. Not after bomb threats and the murder of innocents. And yet, enough Americans still stand and cheer at those “political rallies” to stoke the fires. Sparks to dry kindling. Hatred and vilification elevated to spectacle and bloodsport. Lock her up. Lock him up.

Lock everybody up.

Tomorrow the future will shift, one way or another. And if the pendulum doesn’t swing back towards decency, if unhinged anger, racism and conspiracies should win against truth, respect and civilized discourse...a new world order will be complete. Because unlike 2016, this time the choice will have been made with eyes wide open, with the full knowledge of what the man truly is—and what he stands for. This time, it will signal validation.

There’s a river ahead, red with blood, burning crosses lining the banks on the other side. Move away, please. Regardless of political leanings, help steer the ship back.

I still want to believe in humanity.

October 16, 2018 at 8:56 AM (Otterburn Park, Canada)

By Patrick La Roque

So here we are. This will be my last post for the Chronicle 90 project, as the experiment comes to a close in a few days. There will be a necessary post-mortem in the weeks ahead, discussions about the results and how each of us dealt with the project’s premise. But we’re not quite there yet.

I spent Friday on the streets of Montreal as part of a 3-day workshop, flexing my eye while discussing photography. I’m not fond of this city anymore. Part of it is the common fatigue that stems from living somewhere your entire life, but I’m used to shaking off that sort of familiarity. No, my feelings go deeper. Montreal is a city destroyed, gaping and boarded up. It’s a promise repeated but never realized, in a constant state of re-assembly, choked by construction sites where no one ever seems to work. Where barricades fall on sidewalks and orange cones multiply like some infectious disease, gnawing at the broken skin.

I should document this reality but I can’t. I’ve tried many times over—it never works. The scope never translates. So I keep framing up and around the scars, looking elsewhere. Hoping we’ll eventually get our city back.

October 9, 2018 at 10:08 AM (Otterburn Park, Canada)

By Patrick La Roque

Every day we attach pieces of ourselves to others. To the people we love, to our parents, to the pets we adopt and care for...to our children, most of all, even as they race away into the unknown. Sometimes a small part of us will remain hidden, bound halfway around the globe—as we stretch across this universe, our skin ever thinner and more fragile. Vitruvian men, quartered and stoned.

These intimate spaces and moments we inhabit will fade. We will face regrets and limitless joys.
And we will face change.
We will always face change.

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29 September 2018 at 8:52 am (Cologne, Germany)

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BY BERT STEPHANI

I’m so proud and grateful that I was asked to speak for Fujifilm at Photokina again. They have let me play with the GFX50R, I get copious quantities of food and beer. On top of that, they even pay me for taking some pictures on a stage for 40 minutes each day, using cheap IKEA stuff as modifiers. I’m in a nice hotel and I get to hang out with friends and heroes. And yet it’s hard, exhausting and relentless. The stress to be on stage, the intensity of the conversations, the e-mails that have to be answered, the late nights and the ever present noise are getting to me. Yesterday Pat and I took it easy, went for dinner in the hotel restaurant and added some extra hours of rest to our schedule. Today is the last day, one more presentation and I intend to squeeze the last drop out of the friendships that will become virtual again from tomorrow on.

September 24, 2018 at 15:50 pm (Motherwell, Scotland)

“But I knew that someday I was going to die. And just before I died two things would happen; Number 1: I would regret my entire life. Number 2: I would want to live my life over again.”
— Hubert Selby Jr

That quote by Hubert Selby Jr made a big impact when I first heard it many years ago and it has stayed with me ever since. It’s been rattling around my head recently, thanks to this Chronicle 90 project that we are currently on. I’m sure all 7 of us (our eighth member will join us at the end of the project) have analyzed our lives through this experience and most have realized just how uneventful our lives are. Sure we can all blog about the exciting things that happen once in a blue moon, but mostly it just feels like putting your foot to the floor in first gear while sitting in a carpark full of snow. But I know I will want to do it all again someday.

This week: Kids on holiday, but with plenty of homework, Lots of driving, a trip to the cinema, a storm that caused a fair bit of damage, a notebook that just isn’t filling up as fast as it used to, and of course the X-T3. But now it’s time to hit publish on this post and start prepping my gear for tomorrows shoot.