Assignment five ‘Photography is Simple’

This assignment evolved into a study of the diverse constituents that make up my local shoreline and the relationships that bond them all together. Like families, they have to be accepted and viewed as a whole. View each image and see it not in isolation, but in context. See the bigger picture and see a different view through fresh eyes. The selection of images below are a mix of close up images and some more ‘landscapesque’. This is to encourage the viewer to go away and expand on their own way of viewing the mundane. Seeing the same thing both up close and from a distance (whether that distance be a couple of metres or a couple of hundred metres) frees the mind and allows you to see the multitude of life’s facets.

The detritus left by us humans is often an eyesore, but nature can deal with some of it and make art of it. See image ‘Harmony’. What might this look like in five hundred years (think of the cannons recovered from Henry VIII’s warship Mary Rose)? The nature images show beauty, but the human (related) images provoke intrigue and interest.

Maybe what you see or remember from these images are the ones that show human interference and negativity but (on my shoreline) it is just a small part of the greater picture. Yes, as a species we need to realise our responsibilities and step up to the plate, but let’s not throw the baby out with the bathwater. Let’s keep our eyes open and see the beauty and celebrate our interactions as a part of the greater picture.

Our boring old beach

Where life and death are played out every day

Millions of years laid bare you see

Where man leaves his mark, nature adapts and adopts

Two high, two low, the rhythm of life

Mapped out on the beach gently ebb gently flow

Creating harmony where once there was discord

Where work and play are but a stone’s throw away

Not such a boring old beach I say!

Please follow this link https://eledhwen.blog/exercise-5-2/ to view the contextual exercise (exercise 5.2) on my learning blog.