Alberta Legislature Building – Edmonton, Alberta Canada 1Alberta Legislature Building – Edmonton, Alberta Canada 2Alberta Legislature Building – Edmonton, Alberta Canada 3
Summer had begun. I left my truck at a Ford dealership for service and cycled eastward within Edmonton’s river valley. The morning featured billowing clouds against a bright blue sky. Rain and sun would feature throughout the day. I gathered in the world that met me with my camera. Here, the Alberta Legislature building sits in quiet summer morning repose.
Quote to Consider – “Photography is an art of observation. It has little to do with the things you see and everything to do with the way you see them.” – Elliot Erwitt
Listening to – Wardruna’s ‘Runaljod Raganarok’ album; if you are into the ‘Vikings’ mini-series, Wardruna provides the opening and closing soundscape, a song entitled ‘Völuspá.’ ‘Raido’ and ‘Odal’ are songs of interest.
A summer image, looks west from Baseline Road at 17th Street to Edmonton’s skyline; it appears as silhouette. To the left and right are various petroleum-based industries – the road is known also as ‘Refinery Row.’
Quote to Consider – “Just put on the lens and go.” – Miroslav Tichy
Listening to – Bruce Springsteen’s ‘Open All Night,’ as first rendered on his Nebraska album – a rockin’ boogie on an electric guitar and the voice of Bruce, those two instruments, nothing else; the song is quite different from piano and band boogie as it is rendered on his ‘Live in Dublin’ performance. Also, listening to ‘The Candid Frame: A Photography Podcast’ and Ibarionex Perello’s interview of Stacey Pearsall and the subject of Military Journalism and the Veterans’ Portrait Program.
Eskimos vs Alouettes – Edmonton, Ab Canada 1Eskimos vs Alouettes – Edmonton, Ab Canada 2Eskimos vs Alouettes – Edmonton, Ab Canada 3Eskimos vs Alouettes – Edmonton, Ab Canada 4Eskimos vs Alouettes – Edmonton, Ab Canada 5Eskimos vs Alouettes – Edmonton, Ab Canada 654-40 , Half-time, Edmonton Eskimos versus Alouettes 154-40 , Half-time, Edmonton Eskimos versus Alouettes 2Eskimos vs Alouettes – Edmonton, Ab Canada 7Eskimos vs Alouettes – Edmonton, Ab Canada 8Eskimos vs Alouettes – Edmonton, Ab Canada 9Eskimos vs Alouettes – Edmonton, Ab Canada 10Eskimos vs Alouettes – Edmonton, Ab Canada 11Eskimos vs Alouettes – Edmonton, Ab Canada 12
Thursday, 11 August 2016 – the Edmonton Eskimos dominate the Montreal Alouettes in a Canadian Football League (CFL) game, winning 23 – 12. Despite my playing halfback thirty-plus years ago, and enjoying team and gameplay, this was the first CFL game I had attended. A big thank you goes out to my youngest brother for getting me out to this game during an unintended Edmonton layover. Canadian band 54-40 offered a half-time performance – ‘Ocean Pearl,’ ‘She La’ and ‘Nice to Luv You.’ Camera-wise my Olympus OM-D E-M5 Mk II (micro four thirds) impresses with its image accuracy and photos taken from seats a third of the way up into the stadium.
Quote to Consider – “If I saw something in my viewfinder that looked familiar to me, I would do something to shake it up.” – Garry Winogrand
Listening to – an ‘On Being with Krista Tippett,’ podcast interview with Maria Popova, ‘Cartographer of Meaning in a Digital Age;’ Susanna Kearsley’s ‘A Desperate Fortune;’ ‘Born to Run,’ an unabridged autobiography by Bruce Springsteen; and Bruce Springsteen’s ‘Nebraska’ and ‘Ghost of Tom Joad’ albums.
Black Church at Buðir, Iceland – 1Black Church at Buðir, Iceland – 2Black Church at Buðir, Iceland – 3Black Church at Buðir, Iceland – 4
The Black Church at Buðir (in Iceland) is a striking, black, wooden structure with white door and windows. Black pitch (or tar) preserves the church from the weather and has done so for most of a century at a time. This same black pitch is used to preserve the hulls of wooden sailing vessels against rot. The aphorism pitch black describing darkest of nights derives from this same black pitch. The church began serving parishioners in 1703. The rebuilding of the church occurred in 1847. A woman petitioned her King for permission to do so after the hamlet of Buðir encountered a decline in trade. Steinunn Larusdottir won her King’s consent to rebuild the church.
My curiosity about this church stirs. What would Sunday’s service be like for a parishioner when the church was first built? What would the order of service have been? How would the parishioner come to know God? How would he or she meet the people within the narrative of old and new testaments? Was the church the place to meet in the hamlet of Buðir for fellowship through each week? A broader curiosity, involving centuries perhaps, is how Viking heritage / culture came to resolve and coalesce with Christianity.
Quotes to Consider – ‘Prayers are tools not for doing or getting, but for being and becoming.’ – Eugene Peterson, Montana-based Pastor, author-translator, translating the bible himself into what would become ‘The Message Bible,’ the Bible in current, everyday, layman’s language.
Listening to – an unabridged audiobook memoir by Bruce Springsteen entitled, ‘Born to Run;’ current songs include ‘My Debts Is Paid’ (Brian Houston), ‘When One Door Closes’ (Carrie Newcomer), ’24 Frames’ (Jason Isbell), ’78 Eatonwood Drive’ (Garrett Viggers & a Thin Places Band) and ‘Hope’ (Sarah Masen).
Before dawn, out with my camera, capturing reflections along the Athabasca River as it travels through Jasper National Park (July, 2016).
Quote to Consider – ‘Light makes photography. Embrace light. Admire it. Love it. But, above all, know it for all you are worth, and you will know the key to photography.’ – George Eastman
Listening to – ‘Singing Is The Most Companionable of Arts,’ an ‘On Being with Krista Tippett’ podcast interviewing Alice Parker. “The voice is a part of us much as our physical appearance is, and the customs that we have, the way we use our bodies … so we each have a sound. And we communicate emotional states through that sound that are impossible to get at any other medium. It’s deep. Sound gives us what is behind the surface. Sight gives us the surface (excerpt, On Being, 8 December 2016).”
In my photography I am back to basics. I am working the fundamentals of post-processing in Adobe Lightroom 5. Haste in producing a photograph is taking back seat to broader consideration of what can happen with each image. Post-processing holds choices that I would also make using the Nik Collection. The resulting photograph, though, does not degrade with each edit.
B-side images contain surprises – they often hold gold. Post-processing becomes a means of mining for that gold. It becomes a means of re-discovering what you saw and now see. It is practice. It is also a kind of meditation, a practice of seeing more. I am tied in with Mitchell Kanashkevich for post-processing instruction with Adobe Lightroom 5. There is more to understand / discover – yet, I am getting somewhere.
Images – Reynisfjara Black Sand Beach, Halsanefshellir Cave and Dyrolaey Arch – South Coast, Iceland.
Quote to Consider – ‘Personally, I am always ready to learn, although I do not always like being taught.’ – Winston Churchill
Listening to – ‘Truth, Beauty, Banjo,’ an ‘On Being with Krista Tippett’ interview with Bela Fleck and Abigail Washburn, presented as podcast.
Today, my daughter dances refining skills at a dance workshop. My wife has my truck and gathers bottles in a Church-youth bottle-drive. Our week’s sermon explored the intricacy and direct assertion of faith being tied to works – within my week there has been my action and my shortfall. Much of Northern Alberta burns, consumed in wildfire; we’ve donated money to the Red Cross and gently-used clothing to the 80,000 Fort McMurray evacuees. Today, I am chauffeur, more behind the scenes and needed, as needed. Time in-waiting provides opportunity to edit images and is welcome respite … the activity fits the day. Images – a farmer’s field alongside a highway north from Valleyview serves as resting site for older vehicles, those from a few generations ago … used parts, ready for use – for structure or as donor car. For me, each vehicle associates to former lives in memory. What memories stir and surface for you?
Listening to – Dream Academy’s ‘The Love Parade,’ The Beatles’ ‘Twist and Shout,’ Brian Houston’s ‘Next to Me,’ Nilsson’s ‘Jump into the Fire,’ Bruce Springsteen’s ‘Radio Nowhere,’ Link Wray and the Wraymen’s ‘Rumble’ and Tim Armstrong’s ‘Into Action.’
Quote to Consider/Inspire – “I wish more people felt that photography was an adventure the same as Life itself and felt that their individual feelings were worth expressing. To me, that makes photography more exciting.” – Harry Callahan
Aquamarine Ford F-150 – Tompkin’s Landing, Ab Canada 1Aquamarine Ford F-150 – Tompkin’s Landing, Ab Canada 2Buttertown Buildings – Fort Vermilion, Ab CanadaLa Crete Heritage Museum Buildings 1La Crete Heritage Museum Buildings 2La Crete Heritage Museum Buildings 3La Crete Heritage Museum Buildings 4Old Tompkin’s Landing Ferry 1Old Tompkin’s Landing Ferry 2Stuck in Snow – Buttertown, Fort Vermilion, AB Canada
I got out for an afternoon drive on a Saturday late in February. I gathered my cameras and set off for a look around within Alberta’s MacKenzie Municipal District.
From High Level I traveled south. I would cross the Peace River ice bridge through slushy water at Tompkin’s Landing, traveling no more than 10km/h. Before I got there, on the hill descending toward the ice bridge a blue, aquamarine colour caught my eye. The colour belonged to a seventies Ford F-150. Someone had dragged it a ways into the trees. It, like the 1970 Buick GS next to it, had served a purpose and was left there – a rusting relic. Tromping into knee deep snow I gathered photos.
Driving past Blue Hills, farms held livestock, the occasional horse and derelict farming implements. I detoured along back roads behind Buffalo Head Prairie. There, second and third generation families are operating farms that have grown in size through the years. Many families are moving from original homestead homes built in the forties into new homes. The older homesteads stand holding memory’s residue. Next, I drove behind La Crete to the Heritage museum. The museum site holds old buildings from the La Crete area, old farming implements and machinery. The old Tompkin’s Landing ferry that transferred people and vehicles across the Peace River is there. The museum is one I want to return to for photos. And, people are invited to arrange a tour of the site. It might be something to see in early June.
Later, in moving past Fort Vermilion and into Buttertown, I managed to get my truck stuck in snow. I had seen some Buttertown buildings built with Swedish log cut corners. They were likely more than a hundred years old and I had been meaning to photograph them for a while. In parking my truck on a snowy road shoulder, I got too close to the shoulder’s edge and my truck and I slid sideways into the ditch. I did not have to wait too long for help though. A young Mennonite farmer out for a drive with his date stopped. He took some time (an hour or so) and was able to pull my truck back onto the road. And, he didn’t want anything for his trouble. He was just being neighborly. Good on him!
I stayed in Buttertown for another hour or so before sundown and my return home with pictures, better for being out of the house, better for being away from town, grateful for all that my afternoon had held.
Quote to Consider – “Sometimes I do get to places just when God’s ready to have somebody click the shutter.” – Ansel Adams
Listening to – Martyn Joseph’s ‘Strange Way,’ Bruce Cockburn’s ‘Wondering Where the Lions Are,’ David Gray’s ‘My Oh My’ and James Taylor’s ‘Country Road.’
Watt Mountain Weather – High Level, Ab Canada 1Watt Mountain Weather – High Level, Ab Canada 2Watt Mountain Weather – High Level, Ab Canada 3
After a late winter snow, my truck brought me up the 12 kilometre climb to the top of Watt Mountain and its weather.
Listening to – Agnes Obel’s ‘Fivefold,’ Junip’s ‘Don’t Let It Pass,’ Coldplay’s ‘Another’s Arms’ and U2’s ‘Song for Someone.’
Quote to Consider – “Photography is for me, a spontaneous impulse that comes from an ever-attentive eye, which captures the moment and its eternity.” – Henri Cartier Bresson
Hudson’s Bay Company Crest – Edmonton, Ab Canada 1Hudson’s Bay Company Crest – Edmonton, Ab Canada 2Hudson’s Bay Company Crest – Edmonton, Ab Canada 3Hudson’s Bay Company Crest – Edmonton, Ab Canada 4Hudson’s Bay Company Crest – Edmonton, Ab Canada 5
The crest of the Hudson’s Bay Company is affixed to the southeast corner of the Bay store on Edmonton’s Jasper Avenue. The crest recalls Peter C. Newman’s book, ‘Company of Adventurers,’ a history of the Hudson’s Bay Company in North America.
A decade ago, as a home education coordinator, I travelled within our school division boundaries helping parents provide their children with an education within their homes. The area of our school division encompasses an area equivalent to that of three small European countries. In one day, I might work with four to eight students and have driven as much as four to six-hundred kilometres. Windshield time was a part of the job. In one month, during my travels, I worked my way through an unabridged audiobook of ‘Company of Adventurers’. What was extraordinary was the fact that some of our northwestern Alberta territory featured within the book. What also was intriguing was that many of the stories about Life working for the Hudson’s Bay Company remained true.
In Meander River, for instance, an old Hudson’s Bay trading post was still in use. It had had its title transferred to a Church and a thrift store serving the Dene Tha’ people was being operated within the building. Part of Newman’s book highlighted the fact that the temperature in a Hudson’s Bay post was often kept close to zero as a means to encourage departure of customers after they’d made their purchases. This was the case in this building; heated by a wood stove the family tended to congregate close to the fire through the winter and were always dressed in layers of clothing. The family operating the thrift store chose home education as the means to educate their child.
Quote to Consider – “Unless you photograph what you love, you are not going to make good art.” – Sally Mann
Listening to – The Primitives’ ‘Crash,’ Bruce Springsteen’s ‘Radio Nowhere,’ The Who’s ‘I Can See for Miles,’ Link Wray and the Wraymen’s ‘Rumble’ and Green Day’s ‘East Jesus Nowhere.’
You must be logged in to post a comment.