Humans, Art and Humans as Art

 

 

After loitering outside a gallery in the rain last week, today on a sunny but freezing Saturday the London Street Photography Meetup photogs headed for the Tate Modern with the theme Humans as Art. Our much loved "lights of stripe" (sic) were not present today due to the sun being in the wrong direction and them having bizarrely carpeted the Turbine Hall. The latter encouraging our potential art exhibits to do a lot of sitting about, lying about and rolling down the slope.

 

 

Our first challenge was to look for moments of stillness, possibly in monochrome, maybe a shadow or silhouette. I eagerly pounced on one light of stripe I had found, and was determined to extract every possible potential from it.

 

Our second challenge was to capture moments of interaction between the visitors and the artwork, hopefully capturing a moment of synergy. I spent so long staring at a yellow disc slowly revolving whilst hoping that somebody would walk in front of it at the precise moment, that I'm still seeing yellow circles a day later. Lurking in the shadows whispering "walk into the light" is perhaps a tad creepy and when a little boy appeared in the doorway clad in the perfect yellow jacket, I tried much too hard to convince him with my mind to stand in front of the reflected circle. His parents "kindly" restrained him from running in front of our waiting lenses, curses!

I had slightly more luck stalking a lady in a striped bobble hat, however, hoping to corral her in front of the Bridget Riley stripy painting. I also trailed a woman sporting vibrant dreadlocks. And being a fan of Antony Gormley's work, I was pleased when a girl stood in my line of sight. It would have been too much to ask to have her arms outstretched and probably would've looked too contrived anyway.

Whilst searching for shadowy subjects in the welcome sunshine, I captured a rare selfie, sliced by beams of sunlight bouncing off the doors.

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Through the eyes of an alien child

 

 

Saturday's London Street Photography Meetup was "Urban Abstracts", also known as "Through the eyes of an alien child"! We had four close-up elements to capture - 1) letters, numbers or symbols, 2) colours 3) curves (not 'women curves') and lastly lines (up and down-y lines, side to side-y etc).

 

 

 

 

 

 

Our playground was Smithfield Market, post meat trading, though still a tad gamey in the air. One of the brethren of our most enduring group of supporters, a security guard, informed us there was to be no photography, we smiled, nodded and pretty much ignored him!

 

 

 

 

 

This was a new theme and I really enjoyed losing myself in the abstracts, the minutiae and the little details and not having to contend with those pesky human types.

 

 

 

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Day 239: subterranean restoration blues!

My beloved iPad Air (about 21 months old) had developed a serious attitude when I tried to upload photos to it to process (something I do pretty much daily for my 365 photo-a-day blog). So I organised a date with an Apple Genius last night in Covent Garden, who said the only solution was for them to give me a brand new replacement, and so they did. "You have backed it up" they asked. "Ummm, I use the iCloud" I respond. So I then only had to see if the iCloud has been safely squirreling away my 5k+ (not backed up anywhere else) photos all this time. I was told that a restoration from the cloud would take "a while" so I should kick it off when I could plug the new iPad in, and crucially rely on WiFi.

So I thought I'd better get my precious package home!

On the escalator down to the Piccadilly Line at Leicester Square (as Covent Garden tube is currently exit only), I was taken by how different the decor is to my more familiar Jubilee Line industrial urban look escalator jouneys. Some of the Jubilee Line eschew adverts so the cool gunmetal steel isn't broken up by all that random colour. This escalator is more traditional, and there's a moment when only one woman is riding the escalator. Moments later the escalator appears completely full. Either she's super speedy getting off, or else lingered after the previous tube disgorged it's passengers.

On arriving home I started the big restore and waited...and then waited. This morning it was showing a patchy restoration of my photos. It seemed to favour those that had been processed. But I figured it might just carry on. And after 24 loooong hours I can report that it seems to have retrieved nearly 50GB of images, plus everything else it should have done, successfully. Phew, I'm just a little bit relieved!

 

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Day 238: rain inspiration

Ah the rain is back, back, back. This is not light precipitation but an utter deluge. I'm at a customer waiting for the lift to leave and the window next to the lifts overlooks St Bride's Church across the road. The church is famous for the tiered appearance of the spire, and some believe the Sir Christopher Wren designed church inspires the look of wedding cakes today. It's also the church for journalists and the media because of the historic connection with the newspaper printing industry that used to be very present on Fleet Street. When Reuters upped sticks from Fleet Street to head for Canary Wharf, I recall there was a farewell ceremony in the church as this was Fleet Street's last link to its media past.

St Bride's is partially obscured by the raindrops on the window and it made me think I should try and use the rain splattered windows to good effect. I got to return to the office and the rain is still pouring so I might be able to get some inspiration through the window of a black cab.

But after various attempts I realise I really need it to be darker and have lots of vibrant lights vying for my attention. But it is midday, and not dark enough so I'm going to have to think of a plan B.

As the cab drives over London Bridge my right side view is entirely obscured by the oncoming traffic and on my left is the pavement filled with umbrella toting pedestrians and then in the distance is Tower Bridge. I see my shot and hope I can capture the two together. I think I managed it. This isn't shot in monochrome, it was just that sort of day!

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Day 231: a photo of a drawing of a photo

I was taking an unusual route back to our building, there is a pedestrian walkway here as such but really it's the buses that rattle past this spot. I'd been unaware of this Nathan Bowen graffiti hidden down here, which according to his website is a nod to the well known Charles Clyde Ebbets photograph "Lunch atop a Skyscraper" taken in 1932. In seems appropriate with all the recent and continuing building work taking place around London Bridge Station to have the little hard-hatted 'demon' figures wearing high-vis jackets with the London skyline behind them. I particularly like the fact that the Shard is there, whether our building is also there is unclear and the figure looking a little like a scary Father Christmas is obscuring where it should be.

Nathan Bowen is famed for his demon characters, and the demon builders often turn up on some hoardings near a building site. I've seen other exponents of his guerrilla artwork around London, this piece apparently appeared here early December 2013. Clearly I need to keep my eyes open more.

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Day 228: snail party!

If I happen to passing the end of the road after a rain shower, I have to look to see if the coniferous hedge is host to any snails. And today there is a veritable carpet of the gastropods all slithering around the spiky needles. I have no idea I'd they live inside the hedge and mainly emerge after a dousing. Or perhaps they live closer to the ground and after rain, for fear of being drowned, they crawl up to the top of the hedge.

As a non-gardener I don't feel extreme hatred for snails, and rather like them so produce a little photo montage of today's favourites. Now if they had no shells, and were merely slugs, absolutely no photos, ever. Yuck, yuck, yuck!

 

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Day 216: the saddest poppy

Thinking of previous poppy pictures for the colour splash challenge on Sunday I was struck that I haven’t seen a poppy even from a distance this year. Not one, not even an elusive out of my reach one by the side of the train tracks or tucked away in someone’s garden. And then I had been photographing the view from the windswept balcony on the fourteenth floor. Fortunately I was prepared for it this time by deploying a handy hair tie I had around my wrist so that every shot I took didn’t have my own hair whipping in front of the lens as on previous visits.

I was just going to return inside out of the testy wind but I thought I’d check out the raised beds for anything interesting and there it was, one lone rather dilapidated tiny clump of poppies being buffeted by the gusts. The first poppy of the year! Okay not the finest of specimens but it might be the only poppy I get in front of my lens this year. So I descend upon this vibrant streak of scarlet amongst the lavender, and shoot it from every angle. Okay first poppy…any chance of a second?

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Day 215: warp drive

I’m heading up the escalators from the Jubilee line and was rather taken by the effect of the industrial metal panels studding the escalator tunnel creating such strong converging lines towards the ticket hall. And the passenger a few feet above me has a pleasing monochrome stripy top that matches the edges of each metal step. And my camera is slung around my neck…it would be most rude not to!

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Day 204: rapid flower photography

I'm just about to cross the road to get to the bus stop, and an intriguing bloom catching my eye emerging from the bush surrounding the churchyard. Have I got time to grab a few shots before the bus rounds the corner? I'll give it a try. Camera unleashed, close-up filter applied, shots fired, angle adjusted and another go. Okay, nip across the road as the bus rumbles into view. Phew, made it!

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