View allAll Photos Tagged Undercurrents
I made this photo back in early March, after having spent a week sequestered at the coast undertaking a work project in solitude there. I drove back late on a Thursday and passed through Salem, stopping for a coffee at one of my favorite shops near the capitol (The Governor's Cup, an awesome spot by the way) and to see the cherry blossoms. These blossoms have surpassed my own hometown's blossoms as my favorite spring ritual each year. They never seem to be quite as crowded and they are more beautifully arranged. It was late in the day and the sun was quickly setting. It was bright and warm and just about a perfect afternoon. There was a low level of anxiety in the air as the COVID-19 pandemic was really beginning to grow but had not yet reached the point where daily life was noticeably impacted. I remember those two things clashing together though, the relatively idyllic nature of the afternoon and the darker undercurrents of fear, uncertainty and anxiety about what would come next when that warm sun set and the night brought the next day.
Looking back that afternoon seems ages ago. In some ways life hasn't changed at all, in other ways it is completely different. And I wonder how long things will remain different even once they have returned to one definition of normal or another.
I do take comfort in the notion that time is not as linear as think it is. This photo reminds me that at some point in time there is a version of me standing there in the warm light of afternoon, smelling spring and enjoy the quiet end to a quiet day.
Hasselblad Flexbody
Fuji Acros II
Week 9, Saturday
Most of my daily routines happens in familiar places and while my photography happens there too it’s sometimes challenging to find new things to photograph. It feels like with every photograph it becomes harder and harder to come up with new pictures from same places (didn’t I claim something else earlier..). You would be surprised to see how close locations of each picture are to another. For example, there are at least four other pictures taken within 50 meters of this place. So I’m naturally very happy that I could actually squeeze one more picture from that same route what we use with Aura when go to grocery store. Not that it gives any benefits to photo itself.
I firmly believe that good photograph should have some context or it should tell something – otherwise it’s just picture without meaning or a technical study. Only the picture is not enough, but neither is the story. That’s the main reason why I see the effort of writing something about every picture. In a sense, taking a picture and writing something about it is an exercise which will force me to interpreter my own pictures (and hopefully helps me to find my own context). But even if I write about the pictures, there are things I don’t want to expose. I feel there is sensitive gray area what should be explained and what should be leaved unsaid. If you explain too much you’ll destroy meanings. Still you need to show direction of interpretation. It’s these subtle meanings I would love to create with photography. Fusing together what is visually on top and what is hidden in undercurrents of sub-conscious.
Year of the Alpha – 52 Weeks of Sony Alpha Photography: www.yearofthealpha.com
Happy Labor Day. I hope that the people figure out that with the improvements in technology and manufacturing - we really should only be working for four days a week now instead of five. How great would it be to not work on Monday anymore?
This is also the start of two new albums. The first is just a album for record for a submission that I put together for 2016 Decisive Street Photography. I didn't place or anything like that, but it was a good exercise for me to go through and I need to be able to reference it.
The second is the start of a new peace project that I have begun working on. I'm exasperated with the undercurrent of fear and hatred that we are constantly being fed through various forms of media. I don't think that most people are about that or believe in that. I feel that most people in life are just trying to get by and at the core of their being want peace and love to be the foundation for the world in which they live. More on this later.
Magnificent Monday to you my friend.
Another one from the small patch of woodland I have been spending my last few weeks exploring. This one I have really gone to town with the dark morose atmosphere and I was really looking to juxtapose upbeat beautiful autumn splendour with dark undercurrents in deep misty woodland. My next step is to go here at night with torches, but I need to build up my bottle!!! (o:
This stretch of water on the River Wharfe is reportedly the most dangerous in the UK. There is a fatality rate of 100% if you fall in here, due to the fast flowing water, strong undercurrents and underwater caves.
Wallach Art Gallery at the Lenfest Center
Sculpture "Bitch Balls" by Raquel Paiewonsky part of the Relational Undercurrents exhibit
Chris Ofili completed his coursework in art foundation at Tameside College of Technology, greater Manchester, England. In 1992 he was awarded a travel scholarship to Zimbabwe, an experience that profoundly influenced his approach to painting. His early works incorporated layers of paint, resin, glitter collage and elephant dung, among other materials which were applied to the canvas or used as props. Olifi has appropriated sexual, cultural, historical and religious references to create uniquely aesthetic and physical works. His work exposes the darker undercurrents of society and racial stereotypes while also celebrating contemporary black culture.
Olifi’s recent works adopt simple, pared-down forms while continuing to be expansive, dynamic and romantic. They are full of references to sensuality, sexuality, and his on-going exploration or Biblical themes as well as exploring a more recent interest in the landscape any mythology of Trinidad where he has lived since 2005.
We have a long way to go...
Guided by the watchful, expansive sky
Steered by the gushing undercurrents
Of the deceitfully calm water around
They make our destination unattractive
And the picturesque journey worth sailing...
Saco River located in Limington, Maine These waves are actual waves from undercurrents ...Not over rocks, the water is way to deep and not a possibility, a powerful flow of water rushing at lightning speed ...A scary, awesome and majestic river! Beautiful and stunning display of Mother Nature!
Corporal Cavendish has been seeing things.* Strange things. Eerie manifestations pushing themselves into our reality. They bring with them a nasty ambiance, like a phantasmic slime, leaving one feeling... unclean.
From Corporal Cavendish's diary:
The Marsh of Mourning
Was I still dreaming?
It felt real. But it felt different. It was like I was filled with wadded up newspaper rather than blood and grit and bone.
I had my platoon with me. But none of us were armed. They didn't seem to think much of it. It was their usual talk.
"Corp, you think we're headed the right way? Somethin ain't smellin right."
Polecat was right. Something didn't smell... right. There were the smell you'd expect from a marsh. Wet. Foul.
But what was that other undercurrent? That odor that kept drifting to the tip of your nose and, just when you thought you had latched onto it, it was gone. It left just a whisper of an echo of a memory of something... sick.
"I don't like this Corp, we need ta move on!"
"Awright, let's go!"
I tried to infuse some bravado in my voice. Put on a show to tamper the dread that was settling in on us. Fake it till you make it. Because dread becomes fear, and fear leads to panic which is fatal for a soldier.
"I'm hearin somethin out there!"
"We all are!"
The faint rustling of all these weeds, sudden small sounds of displaced water, it was either the sounds of this marsh or something was pacing us.
"Stay with me, men! Keep movin."
Why were they here? It didn't seem that they or I had been here a few moments ago. How did we get here?
In fact, were they even here or was it another product of... visions? Dreams? I firmly hoped it was just me.
I'd never want to drag these men into what I've been experiencing.
═════════════════════════════════════
A year of the shows and performers of the Bijou Planks Theater.
Indeed! As first experienced in BP 2024 Day 247!
www.flickr.com/photos/paprihaven/53969710535/
And then again in The Nursery of Shadows in BP 2024 Day 283:
This one is from when the island was affected by "mar de fondo", a
kind of sea phenomenon that makes the waves to be much bigger and
powerful than usual.
Please view On Black
Kashmir is extremely beautiful & yet a broken dream. You sense the pain, the undercurrents & feel for the people who have been bearing the brunt of it all. You sub-consciously compare it with other states & wonder how such a pretty place could not be developed.
The changes & development are slowly happening but it seems the deep-rooted angst, the history & the smolder will take a while to extinguish.
The view down the river Findhorn at Logie Steading, near Forres Moray north East Scotland.
Artist Statement:
In this my latest work, I have tried to echo both the stillness and the silent dynamism of the River Findhorn as it carves its way downstream from Randolph’s Leap, where for a short time the river is allowed to open out and show its infinitely expansive reflective qualities. The deep blues emerge from an almost subconscious depth, a nod to the river's mysterious, unknowable undercurrents, while the colours of autumn embolden the landscape with a sense of transitory fragility.
In this piece, I invite viewers to immerse themselves in the depths and to experience the river as a mirror for our own transient reflections, a space where time, memory, and motion are distilled in the ephemeral pulse of nature.
A spring Minch tide swellsurfs into lonely Sandwood Bay, five miles south of Britain's notorious northern extremity, Cape Wrath. Tales of shipwrecks, mermaids and WWII merlin engines mix a briney voodoo backdrop into a timeless, haunted undercurrent.
This is a bridge / causeway between bahrain and saudi arabia. its more than 20kms give or take some kms. this is one part of it that you see, the highest part of the bridge. i took this shot at 300mm from a far off distance. Undercurrents in the water, made this lot more interesting. Was the reason i wanted to capture this shot.
The misty look of the shot reminded me of the movie Mist. Most of my friends hate that movie, but i love it. The hate and love of the movie is for the very same reason, its the ending.
This concludes a small snippet on stephen king work and movies that were made from his work. And yes im feeling a little better now. :)
Based on Chinua Achebe’s iconic work "Things Fall Apart" and his novel "No Longer at Ease“, “Giving way“ aims to pick up on both works’ undercurrent of unsettlement, confusion and chaos - once resulting from the breach of Igbo villages’ integrity by missionaries, and once from an educated young Igbo succumbing to corruption due to the local systems’ new instability and the unachievable expectations placed upon him.
Both stories focus on the Igbo experience - „Things Fall Apart“ taking place during the countries “pacification“, “No Longer at Ease“ a decade before Nigeria’s independence - and paint the clash between Igbo culture and colonialism, between tradition and Christianity in vivid colors. They draw parallels: the initial breach between missionaries and natives becomes a rift between a people and between generations.
A series for Lagos Photo Festival: rituals and performance: inherent risk.
Erik Kessels presents « Perfect Imperfections » , the fine art of making mistakes...
Erik Kessels (1966) is a Dutch artist, designer and curator with a particular interest in photography, and creative director of KesselsKramer, an advertising agency in Amsterdam. Kessels and Johan Kramer established the "legendary and unorthodox" KesselsKramer in 1995, and KesselsKramer Publishing, their Amsterdam-based publishing house, both of which they continue to run.
He is "best known as a book publisher specialising in absurdist found photography", extensively publishing his and others' found and vernacular photography. Notable works include the long-running series Useful Photography, which he edits with others, and his own In Almost Every Picture. Sean O'Hagan, writing in The Guardian, said "His magazine, Useful Photography, forgoes art and documentary for images that are purely functional. ... Humour is the unifying undercurrent here as it is in KesselsKramer's series of photo books, In Almost Every Picture".
On paper, successful creative director, artist and photographer Erik Kessels doesn’t seem like much of a failure. Yet, as his new book reveals, failing is a healthy part of the creative process – while imperfection can be a fascinating artistic sphere in which to work.
"This exhibition shows a large overview of the best fabulous failures found in contemporary art, design and photography, made by a group of artists that like to fight perfection, embrace serendipity and search for fabulous failures."- Erik Kessels
“Let’s face it, we’ve all failed. Maybe not on a grand scale, but in some way, shape or form, we’ve screwed up.” That’s the first line of Dutch photo curator and art director Erik Kessels new book Failed It! (published by Phaidon).
I know I've said this MANY times (so I know it isn't senility), but it still sounds "old" when I say how much I miss what this neighborhood USED to be. Gritty, grimy, dirty, greasy, sketchy, with a little undercurrent of "possibly dangerous" thrown in.
It had more character. At least to me it did. But I guess that's all part of getting life as well. Longing for things that are gone and just ain't coming back. To some people that's progress. Progress should mean making something better. To me, it doesn't apply in this case.
We make a habit, rain or shine, of coming away to the east coast every Christmas holiday. This year the weather has been very harsh and only yesterday it was snowing, which threatened (unsuccessfully) to postpone our trip due to a blocked road on the north York moors. Part of the reason I love to come to the coast when the weather is at its most turbulent, is that it feels raw, its unforgiving and real. I feel a unique oneness with nature when immersed to my knees in freezing waves, blasted by salty winds.
Now some of you wouldn’t understand why I have such warm feelings for something so hostile (my wife included), it sounds like I’m painting a gloomy picture of northern England in winter, but that’s my point. This isn’t Cornwall, it isn’t summer, but it is as inspiring. It does have an emotive undercurrent that speaks of oneness to nature.
Today when we came down off the moors and the fog cleared, our first sight of the sea was truly elevating. It mysteriously injected us all with childlike energy. I felt my eyes widen and my hart quicken, at the sight of a heavy swell and deep unforgiving clouds. The waves were big enough to surf on and compared to the swells of our Cornish body boarding this summer. But the cold, the freezing sea looked less inviting.
Anyway after our two-hour journey I was very keen to get down on the beach, but Cathy’s plan was very different to my own. She wanted to escape the cold at the beach side café. How different we can be sometimes eh, I think it’s a woman thing (hey don’t get me wrong I'm not sexist), I just think women feel the cold more, god only know why?
Anyway after a good hour taking shots of different stuff, (a new anti erosion post had strangely appeared, but that’s another story) I saw Cathy becoming me off the beach. Now I didn’t want to go, but knew that I had to earn my brownie points and after all it was only the first couple of hours of a long weekend, so I did the honourable thing and came away. Well apparently the kids had been hell and Cathy was cold tired and hungry…not something to be taken lightly. But we still had 20 min before we could get into the holiday cottage that we were staying at. So we collected stuff from the car and headed back to the beach.
Now on making it back down I was given strict instructions that I had only 15 minutes ‘in this cold’ (she is use to me getting carried away snapping). Which I wasn’t very happy about, but beggars cannot be choosers, after all she was tending the kids. I ran down to the erosion posts at the far end of the beach. Now just before I got there I spotted this interesting rock. The sea was at the right tidal height to enable me to get some movement in the water, but still retain some detail and texture in the rock. I set up and knee deep in gushing waves and held the tripod hoping the crashing pebbles would shake the second long exposure. I was lucky with this one, but only a few minutes later (and I only had a couple left) I was hit by a rather large wall of water (created by a double wave) and jumping up with tripod and still exposing camera in hands and camera bag and laptop bag on back (another story) I hoped I would regain my footing and not fall into the salt water.
Anyway my trapped nerve held out and my camera gear lives to snap another day.
By the way not wishing to make this into an essay, I’ve tried something new here, by de-saturating it somewhat and playing with multiple exposures from the same raw file. I did consider black and white but I’m not keen on loosing the colour. For those of you that have got this far, I hope you like it.
Vernal Fall is a 96.6m waterfall on the Merced River just downstream of Nevada Fall in Yosemite National Park, CA. The waterfall runs all year long, although by the end of summer it is substantially reduced in volume and can split into multiple strands, rather than the single curtain of water seen here.
Yan-o-pah (little cloud) was the local name of the fall before it was named "Vernal" by Lafayette Bunnell, a member of the Mariposa Battalion in 1851.
Above the falls - and off to the right of the image above - there is a pool of water called the Emerald Pool around which hikers lounge and rest. There is also a 20˚ slope of rock with water flowing into the pool called the Silver Apron.
Swimming above Vernal Fall can carry with it a great deal of risk: rocks are slippery, and strong undercurrents exist that may not be visible from the surface. It is not banned, but there are signs warning against it. Thirteen people are recorded as having entered the water above the falls and subsequently have gone over them since the 1920s. The latest were a trio in 2011.
However, going over waterfalls is not the only way to die in Yosemite. Base jumping, falling whilst rock climbing, landslides and and lightning strikes are also all causes of deaths in the park. Up to 20 deaths in a single year have been recorded since the millennium.
It might be surprising to some, but there have been no recorded fatalities from encounters with the numerous black bears in the park, although injuries have occurred, as well as significant damage to parked vehicles whose owners have ignored the plentiful advice and left food in them. Indeed, the casualties are much more significant the other way around, with at least 10 bears killed by cars in the park in 2016 alone.
This view was taken in May 2002 and has been scanned from a negative.
It’s a sleepy little chill town with tons of bar/restaurant options and many small quaint hotels. The beach is beautiful but is also the most dangerous beach in all of Mexico because of the undercurrents! If you venture into the ocean use caution and don’t go out too deep! Because of its location, you can enjoy the sunrise & sunset each day!
Zipolite OAX Mexico
(Published in Advanced Photographer, December 2012)
(Explore #10, Front Page)
Continuing on a theme from my last post - this image also involves the unwelcome(?) inclusion of people. I've often shot at this location, yet can't recollect these warning flags being placed out before now - naturally anything new is inviting! To the left of me was a near empty beach. To the right of me was a near empty beach. Yet within seconds of me setting up to shoot, a mother and her two small children bounded into frame from the left, followed by a wakeboarder jettisoning himself in from the right.
I waited and waited to see if they would move. Of course they didn't, and by this stage I had already decided to postpone for half an hour or so and try again - knowing the tide would be on the turn which might bring some fresh interest to the base of the tripod frame. Nothing to do then but fire off a few test shots and take stock during my wait. Sure enough, once the waters shifted I was back in position - no young families or water sports practioners anywhere to be seen. And you know what? The empty pictures sucked. I'm not sure if it was due to changes in the light, or a subtle shift in the cloud or some other small alteration in circumstance - but regardless, like it or not I couldn't deny that the human interest appealed to me this time round...
Well, apart perhaps from the guy wakeboarding - he still looks kind of odd to me!
A curious photograph....very interesting ….It was difficult to know what's fact and what's fiction...
Erik Kessels presents « Perfect Imperfections » , the fine art of making mistakes...
Erik Kessels (1966) is a Dutch artist, designer and curator with a particular interest in photography, and creative director of KesselsKramer, an advertising agency in Amsterdam. Kessels and Johan Kramer established the "legendary and unorthodox" KesselsKramer in 1995, and KesselsKramer Publishing, their Amsterdam-based publishing house, both of which they continue to run.
He is "best known as a book publisher specialising in absurdist found photography", extensively publishing his and others' found and vernacular photography. Notable works include the long-running series Useful Photography, which he edits with others, and his own In Almost Every Picture. Sean O'Hagan, writing in The Guardian, said "His magazine, Useful Photography, forgoes art and documentary for images that are purely functional. ... Humour is the unifying undercurrent here as it is in KesselsKramer's series of photo books, In Almost Every Picture".
On paper, successful creative director, artist and photographer Erik Kessels doesn’t seem like much of a failure. Yet, as his new book reveals, failing is a healthy part of the creative process – while imperfection can be a fascinating artistic sphere in which to work.
"This exhibition shows a large overview of the best fabulous failures found in contemporary art, design and photography, made by a group of artists that like to fight perfection, embrace serendipity and search for fabulous failures."- Erik Kessels
“Let’s face it, we’ve all failed. Maybe not on a grand scale, but in some way, shape or form, we’ve screwed up.” That’s the first line of Dutch photo curator and art director Erik Kessels new book Failed It! (published by Phaidon).
these two spots in london are less than a mile a part. And i love both bits. The history and the undercurrent of rebellion.
Agradeceria que me comentaseis si la veis oscura o no. El histograma dice que no hay negros empastados, pero me han dejado un colorimetro para el monitor, lo he probado, y segun el, alguien que tenga bien calibrado el monitor la veria muy oscura.
The water was 72 F. warm but yesterday was a red flag day which means dangerous conditions, big waves and a mean undercurrent. So you see there really isn't anyone in the water except the surfers who love the big waves and don't get involved in the undercurrents and rip tides.
This was taken from the San Clemente pier where we had the best lunch ever, blackened halibut, sour dough bread and a dessert to die for.
Detail, Undercurrent, by Philip Taaffe, In the exhibit Brand New: Art and
Commodity in the 1980s, at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sclupture Garden in Washington, DC.
Undercurrent - After countless visits to Altona Beach where each time I arrived the cloud cover seemed to appear from nowhere I was finally rewarded with perfect conditions for the shot I was after. The setting sun beautifully illuminated the underneath of the pier, creating a perfect warm glow, and the wind whipped up the tide perfectly to emphasise the forces that these pillars are constantly battling. It definitely made standing waist deep in the water worthwhile.
Borgarfjörður is a fjord in the west of Iceland near the town of Borgarnes. The waters of Borgarfjörður appear to be calm, however the fjord is on the contrary a rather dangerous part of the sea because of its undercurrents and shallows.
There are many flat islands lying in the fjord, but for the most part they are uninhabited.
The land around the fjord has been inhabited since the time of Icelandic settlement. Events in the Icelandic sagas such as that of Egill Skallagrímsson are situated here.
The name of the fjord seems to come from the farm of Borg, which according to the sagas was founded by Egill's father Skallagrímur, who took the land around the fjord and accordingly gave the fjord the name of Borgarfjörður.
Avec ce collectif, HEHE, composé de Helen Evans et Heiko Hansen, il sagit d'interroger, non sans humour, les besoins en ressources énergétiques de nos sociétés contemporaines et de visualiser les problématique sociales, industrielles et écologiques qui découlent des modes de production.
L'oeuvre est comme tombée dans les douves du Château des Ducs de Bretagne à Nantes