Recent Posts & Cartier-Bresson A Question of Colour

After weeks of being what I can only aptly describe as 'flappy', (i.e. attempting to achieve many things at once and due to indecision of where to start, ultimately achieving nothing,) I've been slacking somewhat on the whole photoblog/archive front - which has resulted in a backlog of films and my one solitary fan getting mad and haranguing me into producing an update. (Not that it matters, but to put my penchant for flappiness into a little more context, this blog was initially set up about five years ago as a chronological archive I could use to hold and edit through photographs whilst I sorted out a website to showcase them properly. Five years later - still no website).

These more recent posts are products of a new camera, new films i'm trying, and also some notes on exhibitions I've seen recently. Well, the Klein + Moriyama (Tate Modern) one at least. I also went to check out HENRI CARTIER-BRESSON: A QUESTION OF COLOUR? at Somerset House and am still in two minds as to what I think about it. Whilst it was nice to see some of Cartier-Bresson's hitherto unseen photograph's here in the UK, i'm still opposed to curator William Ewing's decision to represent him using only twenty of his photographs printed at roughly 9x6 against an overwhelming number of colour practitioners printed at numerous sizes and formats. I'm not opposed to his basing an exhibition on a contention that Cartier-Bresson's opinions on colour photography were ill-founded. I am, however, opposed to the fact I schlepped my way across London because Cartier-Bresson's name was on the door and there were but a handful of his prints placed too awkwardly throughout the room to do them any degree of justice. It was a plus that I got to see some quality work by other practitioners including some of the most famous street photographs by Joel Meyerowitz up close, but this aside, I feel the exhibition was at best a showcase of current talent in the field of 'decisive moment' colour photography, at worst a misleading use of a legendary photographers name in attempts to draw a crowd.

In other news: Following numerous flooding reports, cancelled trains and general weather disaster, I recently took my camera out with the intention of making images that reflect this, and to a lesser extent work by peers, contemporaries and masters (including Don McCullin's landscape work, who I recently watched a documentary on and is one hell of an interesting albeit stand-offish/messed up sort of guy).
Rather than fear that this sort of image making is warning signs that i'm getting old/boring/uninspired, I rather see it as a challenge to tackle a new field of Photography I've hitherto never tried or attempted or taken any interest in - at least until the weather dries up. Moreover, the meadow I've chosen to document is Kings Meadow which has featured prominently throughout this blog as a place my friends and I used to hang out in, as such I do have some sort of emotional tie to the place, which made me kinda sad to see it like this...

Kings Meadow flooded, Reading

Kings Meadow flooded, Reading

Kings Meadow flooded, Reading