Before there were germs, there was miasma. Bad air. Billows rolling off the bogs and fens. The stench of swamp gas. The rot of ferns and trees fallen to decay in stagnant pools. Fetid. Rancid. Odoriferous.
Tag: Night Photography
Neowise – The Covid Comet
It’s hard to say much with certainty about Shakespeare’s life at that point, but there is one fact we know with absolute certainty: in 1607, Shakespeare saw a comet. Everybody saw it and spoke about it. It was Halley’s Comet.
Impervious
We eat at the bar; my nephew is serving. A man sits on the stool to my left. He says he’s at the convention for the North American Widget Manufacturers Association or something like that. As soon as he opens his mouth, we know he’s an American …
The Future
I have lived long enough to have had a past. In that past, I remember there was a future. It was the future of the science fiction novels I read, and of the movies I watched.
Listening To Images
When I look at the photographs I took of the nighttime cutting, I hear a crackling sound. This is not memory; at the time, I could not hear the workers for all the traffic on the street. It’s more a synaesthetic experience. I ‘hear’ the images.
Things Disappear
The more I tread the same ground with my camera, the more I come to recognize that an unwitting theme of my work is disappearance.
Toronto Raptors NBA Champions
Last night was game six of the NBA championships. Throughout the series, I keep telling myself I’ll go down at night to photograph people going mental in and around Jurassic Park, but I keep playing mind games with myself, inventing reasons why I should stay at home, put up my feet and read a book…
Le Grand Continental
Le Grand Continental is a 30 minute line dance inspired production choreographed by Montreal’s Sylvain Émard.
Ruby Reds & The Silver Lining
On a Saturday night in downtown Thunder Bay, Tamiko and I went to The Foundry Pub to hear Ruby Reds & The Silver Lining. No, this was not a random thing. Our daughter is, as Facebook puts it, in a relationship with one of the members of the band, Quintin Golka. They were really good!…
Breitling Bombshell Followup
Last October, I posted a little rant about the Breitling Bombshell that sits in the Canadian corporate headquarters for a Swiss men’s watch manufacturer. The bombshell is a blonde woman with exaggerated breasts and a skimpy red dress who straddles a large bomb. I think the gist of my rant was: what the hell happened to feminism?
Shooting at Yonge and Bloor
One report quotes a witness as saying: “The strange thing was there was no screaming, there was no shouting, there was no running away – people were just gathering around in front of him and in front of the paramedics that were working on him.”
Why did I shoot yet another fucking cliché?
This morning my alarm went off at 5:00. I remember setting it last night. My night self was pulling a prank on my morning self. My night self told my morning self that getting up at 5:00 is good for you. That’s when you get all the good shots. Plus: getting up is good for body and soul. Think of Benjamin Franklin: healthy, wealthy and wise.
Toronto Nuit Blanche 2015
This post should have a tag line: Art Event, Or Excuse To Get Wasted?
Handheld Photos At Night
Typically, when I go out at night, I bring a tripod, shoot long exposures, cityscapes with light trails, people so blurred you can’t recognize them. But sometimes it’s good to break the rules, even if they are only self-imposed. Here are some night shots without a tripod.
Toronto Island
It doesn’t happen often, but every once in a while I get all sentimental and my camera turns to goo as it did when I went to Ward Island for dinner at The Rectory. Maybe it has something to do with all the grass and trees, or the clean air, or the quiet.