I’ve not posted here for the last month, as I’ve been deep into computer management issues. Creativity has been at a low ebb, as has been anything cogent to say about the process. But I’m on the road now, which always gets me creatively engaged with my surroundings.
We’re visiting friends on Salt Spring Island, which is between the BC mainland and Vancouver Island. The hills and sea coves are spectacular, of course. Walking with friends at Ruckle Provincial Park, I explored the woods and beach with my camera as they conversed. I felt like the off leash dog lingering behind to check out the compelling scents along the trail.
Washed up on the rocky coast, with all the other woodsy flotsam, was a huge stump with its ring of roots, whitened by many seasons in the sun. I’m a sucker for these sorts of things. No matter that this is a well worn rut in photographic explorations–the reason photographers are attracted to eroded rocks and convoluted trees is that they’re interesting natural forms to stare at. I am not above joining the fray, so long as I get to do it in relative solitude.
The more I started poking around this stump, the more I appreciated how this was one of the more complex shapes in a natural object that I had encountered in awhile. By taking pictures of it, sitting in it and looking, and looking, and extracting more shapely photographs, and looking some more, I got to “know” this thing. I crawled in close, and I backed off and saw how it sat in the larger landscape. I began a relationship.
We had about 30 minutes together, this stump and I. Most people, and me in another mood, would have walked by, glanced at the stump, thought, hey, that’s cool looking, and gone on their way. The camera was an excuse to linger and really feel what this spot was like for the duration.
Doug:
Like your work. Your report on concerns expressed about the inroads of digital photography caught my attention. What are pros going to do?
Magnificent stump. Comes across as something that may have been hard to encompass in a single frame. So solid yet so visually porous. I’m sure that many have sized it up for a coffee table. glass top of course.
Chambersburg, Pa. Fish Furniture I believe.
Welcome back, Doug. Glad you’re through the system changeover hassle.
It seems it was special about this trunk that it was by the water. You have water in every shot, except the last two where, instead, the wavy grain is reminiscent of the water. Plus they all have a sense of movement iva the zooming diagonal, the falling into the (apparently) deep well, or the lively undulation of the bark. The tree is always dominant, though, a powerful presence, very solid as Jay says.
Georgia O’Keefe-like erotic pictures from a masculine perspective.
I am thrilled by the lines in the last photo. They remind me of June’s The Mother of US All
The stump and Doug. Fascinating journey.
I liked the time you took to study this natural form and get back to us with some great pictures – favorite of mine being stump_05 (the fourth image)… The whorls and gnarls is very abstract in one sense and speaks of physicality and the environment in another. Emerson and Thoreau come to my mind.
“I frequently tramped eight or ten miles through the deepest snow to keep an appointment with a beech-tree, or a yellow birch, or an old acquaintance among the pines” – Henry David Thoreau
Doug,
So glad you posted these photos. They are wonderful — I like the last best, even if it doesn’t have that tilted water view. I am reminded of photos of buffalo hides by Terry Evans, who did a lot of macro/micro photography in Kansas 20 or so years ago.
Right now We are on our way to Gabriola Island, somewhat North of Salt Springs. We take the ferry to Victoria tomorrow AM. I will see if I can find a log of my own to explore on Gabriola. Slowing down to look closely is almost always useful, and sometimes even fruitful.
By the way, I’ll be in and out of internet access for the next week. I have a post coming up on Friday, but may not be able to respond to comments in a timely fashion. You’ll have to carry on without me.
June,
Hey, I’m reading your comment at my friend April’s computer on Gabriola Island. I’ll be posting more “summer vacation” shots on my Flickr site (http://www.flickr.com/photos/dougplummer/) later today. My favorite spots on Gabriola are Berry Point and Drumbeg Park. Great eroded sandstone beaches.