Love Small and Obscure Things
This week I am back to shrinking myself down to that wedge-shape core of darkness. I’m going small. I’m blessing quiet things, obscure things. I’m loving what I love.
A Prayer
by Robert Creeley
Bless
something small
but infinite
and quiet.
There are senses
make an object
in their simple
feeling for one.
What are the small things you love? {Poem from poets.org}
I’ve been slowly crossing things off my photo bucket list in this strange time we now live in. I think most photographer types have a list something like this, whether they write it down or not. In my still life series, I’ve had “dahlias like Fantin-Latour” sitting there for some time. And finally, here they are. I want more, of course. That’s the way one proceeds into one’s obsessions….
I love dahlias. I love their sturdy goofiness, their uniformity and pizazz. And I love Fantin-Latour’s paintings of flowers. He’s not a household name or anything but neither is he completely obscure. Or maybe he is obscure? If you’re a fan of New Order you might remember the album cover for Power, Corruption and Lies?
If you spent a lot of time listening to this next song in the day then I guess we’re likely contemporaries…
I love the process of starting small with a still life and then enlarging it, and then at the end slowly taking away each object. Which is better, the more minimalist version with just the one vase, or the addition of shells, flowers from our garden, then lemons, the skull? For me it doesn’t really matter, it’s the process that’s the thing. These small gestures. Standing up on the sofa with my camera and then jumping down to nudge a shell, turn the vase, heading to the kitchen to peel the lemon, wondering if the skull is too much, pulling the one broken bloom out to dangle its head, turning the nautilus so you can’t see the broken off part, turning it back so you can. I’m blessing the still life, all still lifes, their quiet, their infinite nature. I’m blessing the held breath of the photographer, the perfect blooms and the more ragged ones. I’m loving the way all the time I’m shooting, Fantin-Latour is in the back of my mind and how art and loving art and objects and flowers connects us through time. It’s a small thing to love, but it helps.
