Colors Flee into the Darkness

Documenting The City at night, such as this image of Nagoya, Japan preparing to celebrate its simulacrum of a Western-style Christmas, reminds me of Kracauer's observations:

"In the Luna Park, of an evening, a fountain is sometimes displayed illuminated by Bengal lights. Cones of red, yellow and green light, continually recreated, flee into the darkness. When the splendour is gone, it turns out to have come from the wretched, cartilaginous structure of a few little pipes. The fountain resembles the life of many employees. From its wretchedness it escapes into distraction, lets itself be illuminated with Bengal lights and, unmindful of its origin, dissolves into the nocturnal void."

(Siegfried Kracauer, The Salaried Masses: Duty and Distraction in Weimar Germany, 1929/30)

Fly-Fishing Cowgirls

From Alberta in the north of the continent to Texas in the south, there exists a prominent Western (like the film genre) culture that surpasses national borders. Its rodeos, fly fishing, hunting, and even tongue-in-cheek cowboy style itself are tied closer to the Land than the often-prominent rootless cosmopolitanism of urban environments. 

Being "city folk" myself, and, at the same time, coming from a different--Eastern European--background, to boot (pun, sorry!), this culture strikes me as exotic and fascinating as visiting Kyoto for the first time.

This weekend, I've documented its trailer-riding, fly-fishing, cowgirl-dressing ladies:

Oh, and I'm totally into the boots. 

In the Woods

Recently, I photographed a wedding reception in the middle of the woods for a friend. The experience reiterated two things that were obvious to me already:

   1) Holy bleeping bleep! I really love photographing FOOD; 

   2) The best kind of portraiture is documentary.

Below is one of my favorite images from the event, though the presence of a tail (attached to a rather obedient dog) between the two lovely lady observers makes me biased. Slightly. 

Blast(beat) from the Past (I)

I've decided to create a feature called Blast(beat) from the Past. The latter will be about, you guessed it, live band photography. 

At the tail end of the 35-mm-film era (as a default, that is), I was a tough girl, running around between gigs, shooting photos, and taking names. I did both black-and-white and color, developed, and printed everything in a dark room. As I was studying photography at that time, I considered this "practice."

My teachers were often horrified. 

Older and, hopefully, wiser, looking at these images now, I realize that some are good, and some leave much to be desired, that certain bands were worthwhile, at least within the realm of popular culture at large, and others--well, not so much. Yet there is something rather endearing about the low-res scans (some even have dust--from the scanner--I was very careful in the darkroom!), flash-generated colors, gritty hole-in-the-wall venues...

First installment: EXHUMED (2001 (?) / 2004). 

And don't worry, I will (try) not (to) reminisce in later posts. 

 

Smoking Man

Watching a rather inane street performer, his lips curled in contempt (or, perhaps, naturally), he maintained an unblinking stare--this smoking man of Arbat.  Of course, his eyes were concealed by his sunglasses and his "Lenin" cap, but, for some reason, I was convinced of it.

And as he watched on, I watched him, admittedly pleased that I could detect his smoke through my viewfinder. Then I took a second to review the existent photos, and pointed the camera back up. 

He was gone.