Guided Meditaiton - Autumn

Autumn

In Autumn I can smell somebody drinking their hot chocolate and making noise as I walk by their houses.
In Autumn I can smell the cold, frosty wind blowing by as I am walking on the grass.
In Autumn I can touch the wind blowing my hair and the Autumn  leaves stuck in it like a bee in a flower.
In Autumn I can touch the crunchy leaves in my hands, turning into pieces and being blown away by the wind.
In Autumn I can hear footsteps stepping on the leaves making sounds like crunchy crisps.
In Autumn I can hear the birds singing on a chilly morning from my window.
In Autumn I cans see the wind blowing the leaves like a fan blowing a paper.
In Autumn I can taste the orange, green, red leaves that are crunchy, wanting to eat and hoping to taste like crisps

- sanjita gurung

   Here in New England, November is a humbling month.  The glorious colors are gone and the trees are stripped of their leaves.  Everything seems to be holding its breath in anticipation of what is to come.  There is still a lot a contemplative photographer can experience in a walk through the November landscape.

   The poem above seeks to stimulate all the senses to participate in the experience of an Autumn wood.  Copy it, print it out and take it with you...find a place to just sit, an old fallen log perhaps.  Let all your senses revel in the joys of November. 

   I've always felt that November has a particular smell about it.  Near my home are wild grape vines and when I can smell the ripen grapes I know it is November.  I also love seeing the bare bones of the landscape, the dark trees etching lace-like patterns in the grey sky. Pulling the seed heads from the wild flowers and scattering them is my way of believing in the future.  Some will sprout no doubt and I can feel I've aided their survival in some small way like those plump grey squirrels burying acorns they'll forget to dig up.

    After a time of just sitting and taking in the "Novemberness" of the landscape, see what draws your attention and what inspires you to release the shutter.

Downeast Monochrome...

   I didn't concentrate on my monochrome images while I was Down East but I didn't forget about them altogether.  My first thought of doing a monochrome photograph came when I visited West Quoddy Head Light outside of Lubec, Maine.

   This was a bit of a surprise since the famous lighthouse is known for its striking red stripe motif.  I, on the other hand, loved the angles and tones and geometric quality of the place.  It reminded me of my Tamworth series, Rural Geometry.

  In fact, all three monochrome images I made harkened to other series I've done.  This image of the sails of a ship model at the Tides Institute in Eastport made me think of the Simplicity and Light series from Pleasant Hill, Kentucky.

    This brings me to the third image, a simple study of a gull.  A gull was also one of my Monhegan Monochrome photographs.

   I know most people think of gulls in less than praise worthy terms but I love them and I always am drawn to their soft forms and tones and this gull had such a sharp and penetrating eye.  He seemed to look right into my being.

   This got me thinking (you see how my mind works, a meandering maze!) about something Diane Walker said in her guest post recently.  (If you missed it, you can read it here.)  A gallery owner said of her work, "I can always tell a Diane Walker photograph."  It got me wondering if people could tell a "Patricia Turner" photograph from any other.

   I can't say I think too much about my individual style.  It is part and parcel of who I am and I can't really change it anymore than I can change my eye color.  But I do believe who we are directs what we are attracted to and what we become attracted to is what we photograph.  Ultimately, they form a kind of a visual autobiography. (You can read a previous post on the idea here.)

    This all leads me finally to think about hosting, at some point in the not too distant future, an on-line retrospective of my work. (That sounds a bit too pretentious for my taste but indulge me as I can't think of another term.)  I would do it as an exercise of discrimination.  Could I wade through all my work and pull out say 50 images that, should all the others be lost, would best represent my work over the last 8 years?  What would the collection of images say about me?

   One of the photographers on my Down East house share asked me if I would do with my old images what I do with my old journals...just chuck them out!  I'm not sure I'm ready to do that but it's an interesting concept and the ultimate in non-attachment.  For now, I'll see if I can narrow all of my images down to just 50.  That would be enough of a challenge... 

 


  

  

The Heart of the World...

   I was very fortunate to be able to see the exhibition of the Dead Sea Scrolls at the Museum of Science in Boston recently.  While the exhibit was excellent - they  recreated a part of the Western wall (even using one of the actual stone) where people could leave prayer messages in the cracks, as they do in Jerusalem - it was the Imax movie that accompanied the exhibit that took my breath away.

    Created by National Geographic, the film attempted to illustrate why people regard Jerusalem as the "heart of the world"; where three great religions, Christianity, Judaism, and Islam overlap.  It was a stunningly beautiful virtual tour of the old city, within the walls that define one square mile of sacred space.

   As much as I wish I could travel to Jerusalem, it is, after all, the ultimate pilgrimage, I doubt I will be making the trip anytime soon.  This film was the next best thing.  It got me thinking about the conflicts that rage in this part of the world.  When you leave the film, which tells the story through three young girls of the different faiths, you find yourself puzzling over how religions who have so much in common can be the cause of so much hate and violence.  This is truly a contemplative film.

   You can watch the trailer to the film below and you can see if it will be playing in a theater near to you.  I recommend you see it if you can.

The Heart of the World- Jerusalem

PhotoTao Card #47 - Difficult Recognition

Difficult Recognition

To take a single breath and feel at ease

is to begin the journey of Tao.  To have

begun a journey 100 times and still not

arrive is better that to not have begun

at all.

- Exercise -

Each day we begin again.  We carefully

file away what we have learned.  Today,

open up that cabinet of experience.  Choose

a subject you have photographed in the past

and begin again.  Has your vision changed?  

Has your experience of the process

evolved?

   Every year, usually several times during the year, I visit this small pond near my home. I've written about it before, in the post Autumn Reflections. I don't think I would ever tire of photographing this little body of water.

    In this photograph I've tried to reconcile the trees that grow along its bank to the pond itself. This is a particularly lovely grey birch which grow abundantly in this area of Maine.

    I was thinking more about composition than detail but I noticed the two shelf mushrooms and I thought they added so much to the overall image...the way the light just catches the edge of the lower one.

    I think my vision has subtly but positively altered over the years of photographing this pond. I find my mind now is always drawn to the small details of the landscape far more than it was in the past...and color. I regard color now in a way I never did before.

   Just for the fun of it, I converted the first image into a monochrome image. What a totally different feel one gets from it!  Eight years ago I probably wouldn't have even considered this view of the pond...when I was a completely confirmed monochromist!

    Every step of your journey opens your eyes to a new way of regarding your world. Almost with every image we make we subtly alter the way we proceed from then on. What a wonderful adventure it is!

  Do you ever consider your photographic work as an adventure?  Stop and think of your time exploring the world with your camera as a journey...where have your been?  Where would you like to go?



   

The A,B,C's of Contemplative Photography - Perspicacity

P is for Perspicacity (and also for Ponder and Perception and Perspective and Percolate...) 

A penetrating discernment...a clarity

of vision which provides deep understanding

   I suppose that this is what I strive for most in my camera work...a clarity of vision.  There are so many factors that contribute to a cloudy perception not the least of which is the burden of expectation.

   This is particularly true when you travel or make a special trip to a location because you were told it is a great place to photograph.  You go expecting, what?  Great images?  A unique experience?  A revelation of some kind?  Very often you are, well, let down.

   Clarity of vision and a penetrating discernment begins with an open mind and a non-judgmental attitude. My only expectation is that  I will see what I need to see even if it isn't what others think I should see.

   This is particularly true for me when I visit tourist destinations...like Monhegan Island last June.  I had no idea I would gather this alphabet of images in the village while everyone else was photographing the fog and the cliffs.  I didn't imagine that it would lead to this series on my blog where I've been able to mine a wealth of ideas about my favorite subject, contemplative photography.  But that was what I received because that is what I needed and, as usual, I'm deeply grateful.

Inspired by James Behrens...

Order the book here...

   People who use photography as a contemplative practice are a small fraternity but a passionate one.  Contemplative photographers who publish books of their images and reflections is an even smaller one.

   I was thrilled to discover Fr. James Behrens, a monk at Holy Spirit Monastery in Georgia.  The abbey was founded in 1947 by Trappist monks from Gethsemani Abbey in Kentucky.  The Trappist order is dedicated to contemplation and apparently contemplative photography as well!  Consider Fr. Louie (aka Thomas Merton), Br. Paul and now Fr. James.

   His book, Portraits of Grace, is a lovely and insightful pairing of images and words.  Fr. James has, like Br. Paul Quinon at Gethsemani, discovered the metaphors close to hand.  No need to travel great distances to spectacular landscapes; they find all the meaning they need in their own back yards.

   Fr. James has combined his intimate photographs of tiny and deceptively simple, everyday objects with his wonderful and thought provoking reflections.  Each page is a delight and an inspiration.  I've chosen one passage from the many....

   Each day has a vast array of beauty.  

Take the time to notice it.

It is an interesting habit to develop.

The more we give ourselves time

to see it, the more beauty will 

reveal itself to us.

It is a very generous mystery.

   I chose this quote from Fr. James' book for that last line..."It is a very generous mystery."  What a beautiful way to describe the messages we find in the world around us.  There is so much there for us if we would but have eyes to see it and a heart to receive it!  Nature is a most generous mentor to the seeking soul providing us daily gifts of the spirit. 

Links to Our Past...

   In Celtic tradition, Samhain (what we, this side of the pond, celebrate as Halloween) is a time of remembrance of those who have gone on before us.  Because it was considered a time when the veil between heaven and earth was at its thinnest, communing with ancestors was much more possible.  In Mexico, the Days of the Dead, November 1 & 2, is not a somber holiday but a celebration of the lives and influences of our ancestors.

   I've often spoken on this blog about the "chain of influence" we forge every time we meet someone who has, even subtly, an impact on our life.  We do not begin life, however, with only one link.  Our chain of influence was handed to us by our parents and grandparents, in fact, all our family members.  We simply add onto what they themselves forged.

   At this time of looking back, I want to acknowledge one such link in my chain of influence.  My father's passionate pursuit of photography had a deep impact on my early love of the medium.  He was our family's chronicler, for that was what photography was in the 50's and 60's, the great recorder of family life.  He felt that daily life was worth remembering and, in his own way, he saw the sacred quality of the commonplace. 

    November 1st is also the beginning of Winter in Celtic tradition;  a time of sheltering in by the fireside.  It is also a good time to look through old photographs and remember those on whose shoulders you now stand. Take time tonight, in between handing out candy to little "trick or treaters", to acknowledge your links to the past.  They have made us what we are, for better or worse.

The Origins of Halloween