People on and around Anglesey are invited to help rediscover a huge sculpture by artist Paul Davies at the Llyn Alaw reservoir.
Volunteers needed to help ‘re-discover map of Wales’ sculpture
Father Bill Atkinson’s Road to Sainthood Now Includes 3 Bronze Sculptures
Supporters for the canonization of Father Bill Atkinson are memorializing his legacy with three bronze sculptures.
‘Such rare and magnificent beauty in city life’: Himanshu Roy’s best phone picture
Himanshu Roy was walking his dog, Rio, through his home area of Vesu, part of the Indian city of Surat, when he saw the man and the elephant.
“We don’t often see elephants here; Vesu is a very developed and residential area,” Roy says. “She and her owner had just arrived for a diksha ceremony, when a person renounces their wealthy life and donates everything they have to follow a spiritual path.”
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After rushing home to drop off Rio, Roy returned. “The foggy morning weather and the dust from the ground couldn’t have been more perfect for creating a striking image; I emphasised both in the edit, as well as converting it to black and white.”
Roy credits his iPhone with enabling such spontaneity. “Of course, phones and digital cameras each have their pros and cons – both can help you create amazing photos if you use them well,” he adds.
Reflecting on the image now, Roy says it evokes in him a range of emotions. “Such rare and magnificent beauty in city life makes me feel happy, hopeful, joyful. It inspires me to show the world that beauty can be found in even the most unexpected places.”
“Then an almighty great shouting match took place” — Have photographers become selfish and unimaginative?
A year or two ago I was shooting long exposures on the beach at Swanage in Dorset, England. Rolling waves, wooden groynes and sparkling, pristine sand in my foreground. I had about ten feet of billiard table smooth, unspoilt sand in front of the camera and about thirty feet of empty beach behind me.
A gentleman walking along the beach looked at me, looked at the camera and then proceeded to walk in front of me and through my shot, ruining the sand as he went. He knew full well what he was doing, the self-satisfied smug look on his face said it all.
I know as a photographer on a public beach I do not have any right to stop people walking where they want to walk, but do good manners, common sense and decency not have a part to play in this?
When I started out in photography, if you saw a person with a camera, you walked behind them. You just did. If there was no alternative you would pause, catch their eye and proceed when indicated to do so. Things have changed, it seems, especially post-Covid.
There now seems to be an attitude of “Me first, I have a right, no one else matters and if I ruin another photographer’s shot, all the better because I have the shot, they don’t.”
I was witness to an extraordinary scene on the coast last summer when a group of about five photographers set up to shoot a sunset view. Another photographer set up about fifty yards away, just minutes later. He then demanded that they move so he could get his shot because he was there first. He wasn’t. He stood hands on hips, like a demented tea-pot, for about twenty minutes. The light was poor and the tide indifferent, I’m not sure the shot was worth ranting and raving for.
What is it about beaches? I have been shooting in Iceland, again, pristine sand with icebergs in front of me, fifty yards of empty beach behind and yet a group of photographers marched through the shot in search of their own location. I can’t believe they did not know what they were doing, unless of course they were completely ignorant of what someone with a tripod and camera was trying to achieve.
Surely, at any given location there is enough room for a number of photographers to work without falling over each other. I have been in Venice and seen a workshop group set up in a row in St Marks Square to shoot the dawn. Not five minutes later another workshop group set up about twenty yards in front of them and then an almighty great shouting match took place as to who was in the right. St Mark’s Square and the canal side isn’t exactly a small area, and I’m sure with a bit of imagination there was enough room and viewpoints for everyone. If someone is there first, work around them.
The ultimate confrontation I have witnessed happened at The Green River Overlook in Utah, USA. It is a spectacular and very popular spot and arriving early is always advisable. A beautiful dawn glowed on the horizon and the crowds slowly gathered. Just as the sun was about to break the horizon, a latecomer to the party announced his presence with a loud ‘morning all’ and proceeded to set up not only next to another photographer who had been waiting patiently but overlapped his tripod so that the cameras were virtually touching.
A viewpoint a few yards away would allow for the same shot, there was no foreground, they were stood on the edge of an eight-hundred-foot drop. An argument ensued, with a lot of pathetic pushing and shoving, just feet away from the edge. Is it really worth it?
I try and work on the basis that if someone else is at a location before me, I will work around them and give priority to them. It often happens that it forces you to look for a different or alternative viewpoint.
If you ask or make a polite inquiry as to where you can work without interfering with another photographer’s shot there is usually no problem at all. It does seem, however, that on the whole, non-photographers are much more sympathetic to our plight and are happy to wait for a minute or two or do a slight detour. That is, unless, you are shooting on a beach in Swanage, Dorset.
Former miners in Easington Last Man Standing exhibition
SimonHill HonFRPSA photography exhibition has recorded some of the last surviving former miners at three coalfields.
Last Man Standing is on show at Easington Social Welfare Centre in County Durham.
North East photographer and gallery owner Russell Smith said the project was born from a chance conversation about the many miners who had died young.
“When you’ve got guys passing away at 50, 35, or 60, we’ve got an ever diminishing pool of experience and stories,” he said.
Mr Smith said woman who visited one of his galleries sent him an old NCB (National Coal Board) donkey jacket and a letter detailing her miner father’s death at 50.
This inspired him to create a community project, as part of an MA at the Northern School of Art, looking at the remaining miners from the Blackhall, Horden and Easington collieries in East Durham, which closed in the 80s and early 90s.
Simon Hill HonFRPSMr Smith planned to enlist ten men from each village, film them, take their portrait, and make a documentary.
But many former miners had already died and he faced huge reticence from those remaining, he said.
Some replied to say it had been the “worst time I ever had, I don’t want to talk about it, the strike cost me my marriage, not interested”, he said.
He eventually found five men from each village.
“I’ve learnt so much in the last six months about how parochial these places still are,” he said.
“So, even though there’s a mile from Easington to Horden, they don’t talk.
“They’ll have relatives there, but it might as well be from Germany to France.”
Simon Hill HonFRPSThere followed another chance encounter, with professional editorial photographer and president of the Royal Photographic Society, Simon Hill.
Coming from a former mining community himself, he said he was “passionate about recording people and people’s lives” and agreed to take portraits of the men – for free.
“Russell was very open to me doing the portraits in a very contemporary style rather than formal portraits,” he said.
“Which is right up my street really- so I just couldn’t resist the job.”
Simon Hill HonFRPSWanting to spend time “breaking the ice” and putting his subjects at ease to get the best pictures, Mr Hill planned to take three portraits a day.
“Some of them were very, very cagey about having their photograph taken or even talking about their life in mining – they took a little bit longer,” he said.
“I’d much rather spend the time and get the shot than rush it through and just grab a likeness of somebody.
“I needed more character in the photograph.”
Mr Hill had recently been commissioned by Warner Bros to take portraits of Kindertransport survivors in their 80s and 90s reflected in the film One Life, to be shown at the National Portrait Gallery.
He had three-and-a-half minutes with each, so the miners’ project “was like a walk in the park by comparison”, he said.
Simon Hill HonFRPSMany miners followed their fathers, uncles, brothers and friends down the mines, despite the many pit disasters, Mr Smith explained.
One man included in the exhibition was begged by his mother not to, he said.
“All his friends are mining in Blackhall, his mother’s adamant that she doesn’t want him to go to the pit because she’s lost her husband aged 33 down that mine, and he still went,” he said.
“Every pit has some kind of tragedy, they’ve all got one, and Easington’s was terrible, still remembered, yet they all went down.”
Simon Hill HonFRPS The exhibition also reflects what happened to the pit villages after the mines closed.
“There was no Plan B,” Mr Smith said.
“The government shut a major employer where you could have 2,000 people working in a village and there’s nothing there to replace it.”
The resulting decline as shops and services closed left “a ghost town where nobody does go out because there’s nowhere to go”, he said.
Mr Smith has assigned copyright of the photographs to the social club so any profits can help it stay open.
He then hopes to set up an annual arts festival for the three villages, to which local people can submit photographs and art works.
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Perrysburg’s Winterfest canceled
Perrysburg’s Winterfest has been canceled due to the weather conditions, organizers announced Saturday morning.
The ice sculptures might be put on display …
The ice sculptures might be put on display …
Jason hill hi-res stock photography and images – Alamy
Hampshire & Isle of Wight’s Big Picture: 8 January
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‘Truant Penguin’ snow sculpture debuts in Harbin
As Harbin prepares to host next year’s Asian Winter Games, a Truant Penguin snow sculpture made its debut on the south square of Harbin Grand Theatre on Friday.
Wild life: Friendship, shared love of photography endure for Lepper, Rahn
