The Marks of Man

The Inuit have hundreds of words for snow, that’s not so strange considering were they live. As I was running tonight, I realised my project is more about paths then marks. A path, paths is everything to us. We follow paths, we come to the end of the road, path. Its not the right path, take a turn for the worse. As I splashed though puddles and ran on gravel, I realised there so many words about paths, muddy, hard easy going, damp, wet, easy, slippy, firm, dry, rocky in places, hard to see, easy to loose, as clear as the day, hidden from view, spongy, fast and slow. There are so many words and uses for paths, even a terrorist organisation named after paths, “The shining path”. We are migratory I guess, far in the past and now, the path is all we live for. Even life is thought as a path. Enlightenment is a path, for a whole supermarket of Religions. So are we metaphysically, Physically, emotionally and scientifically on a path? Far in the past we started a path to survive and its our wh

Tekapo for me one of the most beautiful places I have every been too. You can almost pass it by on the way to somewhere else. The place the colours and the stillness.

I received an email today, thanks Ian, about a Claude Mirror, and did some research, finding out that:- Claude Lorrain was the pseudonym of the French painter Claude Gellée (1600-1682). He specialized in landscape drawings and paintings, and spent much of his life in Rome. The Claude Lorrain Mirror is a slightly convex mirror made of black glass that produces a reduced, upright and virtual image of the scene being observed by reflection in it. Much of the colour is washed out, thus allowing the artist to concentrate on the forms and perspective. Mirrors were used to give the viewer an Arcadian vista, a dream. Same thing with Alice who experiences a mirror. Michel de Nostredame was alleged to have had his visions looking into a pool of still mirror like water. Perhaps there is more to a mirror then meets the eye.

From Wikipedia:- The term man (sometimes capitalized as Man) (from Proto-Germanic mannaz "man, person") and words derived from it can designate any or even all of the human race regardless of their gender or age. This is indeed the oldest usage of "man". The word developed into Old English man, mann "human being, person," (cf. also German Mann, Old Norse maðr, Gothic manna "man").

The light at Godley head is very different from the rest of the Banks. It sticks out into the Pacific and catches the last of the light at the end of the day. Capturing it is always hard work, trying to find the marks and get to the right location, just at the decisive moment, (thanks HCB), is always a challenge. Just trying to translate thoughts into pictures is a difficult road to be on. My daughter ran the furthest distance of her life today with me. Five kilometres, not bad for six years. http://www.madrascafebooks.co.nz/index.php?option=results&search_by=isbn&search_text=0473112922&Fnew_search=1&pagestyle=single

Here is the small cave at Rapaki, again, almost an afterthought. I seemed to be more worried about sand in my nice new field camera,updating the Graflex I bought for fifty dollars, twenty years ago in California. Annie likes the image, but I am not so sure it really refects my thoughts at the time.

I was wondering around today, feeling as if the exercise of image making was pointless today. I saw a tide cave in Rapaki, Taking my time, enjoying the spirit of the place, and the stillness, set the camera up. Finally with an image of the cave and pausing to inspecting the rocks, the tide slowly moving across the sand, I hear a shout. An older Gentleman is running over the sand and breathlessly asks if I own a Toyota that is stuck. I say no I own a Saab, he says," do you own a Toyota"? I realise he is deaf, and shout, “No I own a Saab”. The man looks disappointed and sits on the sand breathing hard and says, “Oh no point in running here then”. He looks at the Camera, and asks if I am making a study. That’s a great way to ask, I think. I answer yes, smile and say, “making pictures old fashioned way", meaning the 5x4 camera and taking my time. The man smiles at that. He sits and shouts, “Hey what’s that in the water”? and points. I look around expecting a dead seal or sim

This image is a bit obvious for me with my working title. Makes think of an old tutor of mine, Martin Parr, yes when he was broke and not famous he came down to my Art School and showed us his work, and his Nikonos for the wet weather pictures. Even sold us a few books, of course we all thought he was great, though still as posh as ever. I have no idea why, I guess it just made me think of him. Nikonos, now there’s a good name, better then Digital Rebel, gives me a lisp, digital wrebbel. Nikonos reminds me of that old kids program "Stingray".

Well this was a hard day, we had a North Westerly. In the South Island this means heavy head, heavy air. I went out in pain, was really disappointed with the ground glass screen. As much as Edward Western must have been excited by the screen, in his diaries. It was hard to see in my new Toyo view. The scanning back didn't like its connection to my Laptop. I was wondering what a Colonial photographer would have made of the view. Got home feeling as if the trip was a waste. Then I took a look and thought it was not half bad, with all those scanner patterns in the water. I had in mind Wynn Bullocks water images from the 1940', so was not sure even if it would work in colour. The other picture was a surprise too, even with the soft background.

Pictures are experiences for me, I have spent a lot of time in galleries looking at pictures, the eyes of those painted, the human look, the gaze. I would like my images to be the other way round. A look through my eyes, with my prejudice and sense of time. Give a sense of the time it physically took for me to revisit this place and make a picture. The chore of unpacking, setting up, keeping the dog out of the picture, getting out of the way of walkers and answering questions. Then in the end looking inside myself to make a picture in a moment of calm.

Landscape has been boiling inside me for 30 years of searching for its reason to be a relevant genre, rather then a decoration for motel and hotel walls. Its difficulty has been our technological success and an inability to understand, me included, that landscape photography should be a state of interpretation of the land, the understanding and projection of the thoughts and ideas of the photographer, through the images. Whenever I walk into a book shop, it is almost with trepidation that look at the coffee table books on sale for the tourists here in New Zealand. Usual themes, blue sky, mountains in the distance, seascape with lighthouse. The images are good, high quality, professionally competent, but they say little to me about New Zealand, photography, the photographer and the audience.