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| 26 June 2026 |
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| 16 May 2026 |
On days when
it is not raining (I today was just fine in the afternoon) I ride my 3-speed
bike to Jericho Beach. Every time I take a purposely underexposed photograph
with my Fuji X-3 of a view of the city from a park on Point Grey Road at the
end of Musqueam View Street.
In the last
few years I have seen the disappearance of the kind of photography I used to do
for magazines and newspapers in that last remote century. Most of the view
photographers that I know that have not gone to retire to the Gulf Islands (God’s
Waiting Room) shoot street photographs.
A few of the
street photographers in the last century are now seen as mentors like Cartier-Bresson.
I can assert
that when I go to Buenos Aires or Mexico I immediately shoot street
photographs. But in Vancouver that is becoming more drab by the day I am not
inspired. There is one photographer who pretty well insulted me and my only
thought is that there is now a deep division between those who shoot street
photography and the very few who like me do portraits.
I wonder if
the problem is a combination of the proliferation of phones and digital cameras
with our reluctance, after that terrible pandemic to talk face to face. We live
now in the age of emoji/emoticons. We live in the age that if you want to talk
to someone on the phone, the protocol is to text first.
My thoughts
right now is if I take this Vancouver photograph every day from the same spot
am I a landscape/street photographer? In Vancouver if you take a picture of a
red fire hydrant it is of no importance but if you “document” fifty of them is
it art? There are a few photographers
here that do that (not fire hydrants). Because I have at least fifty Vancouver
views from the same spot, am I an artist?
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| Jericho Beach -11 June 2026 |
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| Jericho Beach -Lens Baby - 17 June 2026 |