Looking through some photo’s recently and it occurred to me that some of them could be defined in terms of the idea of the line, incurring transformation in the frame, or otherwise differentiating a space, relationships, forms.
The photo below is what crystalised this idea. I was walking during a lunch break and couldn’t believe my eyes when I noticed this alleyway, with its own double archway, transected by the wall’s shadow in this diagonal line, that is somehow continued by the tree the other side of the street. It creates an overall geometric in terms of the light and dark, while the transecting line is curiously solidified, even across its opening.
I really liked the dynamic of this position, waiting to place my order at the Bagel Shop in Brick Lane. This is where something like the compact RX100 camera is such an asset (I’m sure a smart phone would be as discreet). The shop was full, one of the things that make it interesting is the feeling of its transciency, like a human service station, but there is also a sense of something older involved – perhaps just a throwback in the tradition of east London. Either way, I liked the limited profile of customers down the line, jammed but waiting patiently – I think in fact its that there’s an energy to the place, everyone is out and stopping by for mobile food. It is a fast food arrangement that manages to bring people into close proximity, suspended in a shared milieu.
This alleyway is where a friend lives and this shot appealed in the context of the light and space that separate the buildings, but also the pale blue light of the door.
This dense canopy I found appealing to photograph, especially with the trunk travelling through it. We don’t tend to think about lines of motion with trees, while of course they are in motion so much. The motions and force of the wind (alongside gravity) cause the tree to strengthen parts of itself by forming sections of stronger wood called Reaction wood (either compression or tension). Similarly a tree trunk is also the visual record of the tree’s growth, its sky-ward direction over time.
A couple of things about this relatively long exposure shot (half a second) appealed. held on a signpost, the shot is steady enough to get the edges of a sun star from the sunset, but what is most interesting to me is the motion relationship from the bus. As it is both cut by the lampost and yet still blurring, it creates the double effect of both appearing (or disappearing) behind something, while also tracing its motion in time. In this respect, it feels like a disjunction, the relationship with direction suggesting almost a ghost-line of motion, a line of motion that never was.
Under normal circumstances, I would have quite liked the idea of catching this aspect of a towerblock as an uninterrupted continuum next to the sky, something of the abstract in relationships between humans as we currently are and the nature of this world. Yet on this occasion, it felt even more fortuitous to be able to catch this scaffolding as a broiling patchwork of lines and platforms running the length as an effective sub-level. Running beneath the smooth outer facade of the building as an indicator of the dense and laborious under pinnings – so ubiquitous to the city; exo-skeletons of construction.
Along the river Lee between Stratford and Hackney Wick it’s possible to turn a corner and come upon this. Part of a concrete plant, it stretches across the space behind two trees. Insectoid human-industrial structures generate a sense of the human instantiation on the terrain as something akin to the alien in its lines and forms.
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