Showing posts with label photography. Show all posts
Showing posts with label photography. Show all posts

Sunday, 2 November 2014

Stranger that Fiction - Joan Fontcuberta - Science Museum





Ok. Favourite exhibition of the year. I LOVE this! Never heard of him before but YES. If I had time (there's not long left before this show ends) I would go again.

Fontcuberta creates stories with photography and plays with the trust we put into photographs and the things we see in a museum setting. (And it works - Stu got really confused at first thinking it seemed so real but couldn't be real but was it real?)

My favourite bit is the Fauna part at the beginning which shows the research of a fictional professor who was researching unusual animals and there are photographs and taxidermy and sound recordings and observations of wonderful animals. I particularly like what I call the Turtfluff. It has a turtle-y head and a fluffy body and when threatened it puts its fluffy tail in the air and it's head in the ground and pretends to be a bush.

Other animals included a clamshell with an arm, a baboon-centaur, a winged deer, a mousething with a snake for a tail, a unicorn winged monkey, a tortoise bird, a snake with legs.....I loved it and it was so convincing.

Other bodys of work showed fossilized mermaids, constellations that were really windscreen bugs, landscapes created by computers reading famous paintings, made up plants and miracles.

It's only on till 9 Nov - quick, quick go now!


Tuesday, 21 October 2014

post rain pre sunset


Ordinary Beauty - the photography of Edwin Smith - RIBA




I hadn't heard of Edwin Smith before and I think I really should have. His photographs are beautiful with amazing light and show the beauty of everyday life.

On till 6 Dec 2014


Saturday, 15 March 2014

Kew Gardens

Had the loveliest day at Kew a couple of weeks ago with my parents. Such a nice park its worth the 2 hour journey to get there! And I still haven't seen it all.

Love the galleries there too. One is the Marianne North Gallery and exhibits the work of Marianne North, an adventurous lady who travelled the world and painted the natural world. So epic.

There's a gallery that exhibits botanical drawings/paintings too. Particularly liked the work of Regine Hagedorn. This is her painting of Mermaid Rose Stamens:



There are also some fun giant woven sculptures of different types of mushrooms by Tom Hare :)


Saw so many inspiring plants this visit. Made me want to draw. It's been so long I'm not sure I can draw anymore! I need to practise!



Sunday, 23 February 2014

Wildlife Photographer of the Year at Natural History Museum

I always enjoy this annual exhibition. Although every year it seems to get more crowded! So many beautiful photos though. Elephants greeting each other in the distance in black & white simplicity surrounded by sparse trees. A sunlit field of flowers. A view of trees from under water, framed by bubbles.

Here are two of my favourites.

Simplicity by Valter Binotto - blurred dew around a delicate violet.



Twin Hope by Diana Rebman - the MOST adorable baby twin gorillas in their mothers arms. No one I've excitedly shown my baby gorilla postcard to seems to think they're as cute as I do but I can't stop melting when I look at them!



Wildlife photographer mainly celebrates nature and its beauty but also at the end there are photographs showing how it is being destroyed. There seemed to be less of this, this year but there are some traumatising photos of elephants killed for ivory. It was really upsetting. Although the elephants had no heads, the guys who worked in the wildlife park could still tell which elephants they were as they had cared for them closely for so long.

I think the destruction hits harder after having looked at so many intimate photographs of life and beauty. I hope this exhibition can help us to think of the environment and creatures that live here. It's so hard to be good, everything seems to be bad. I'm slowly making tiny steps. I usually only eat free range meat. (I'm not ready to be a vegetarian but at the very least I think farm animals should be well treated and respected) I'm starting to avoid palm oil (I'm unclear on the details but I believe deforestation to get palm oil is destroying habitats). Sometimes it feels like these small things don't matter and can never make a difference and I get embarrassed if I have to mention it because people think I'm being ridiculous. But little by little attitudes do change and little by little things can change.

On till 23 March 2014.


Links:

Wildlife Photographer of the Year

Diana Rebman

Valter Binotto

Compassion in World Farming

Say no to palm oil

World Wildlife Fund


Astronomy Photographer of the Year at Greenwich Observatory

Wow. I didn't know you could take pictures like this from the ground. Incredible. And I loved that the text explained how each photograph was taken on one side and then the other side explained what we were looking at.

My favourite image is Hi. Hello. by Ben Canales which shows a tiny person looking up at the stars. When I didn't live in London (where you cannot see the stars), I used to stand outside gazing up, feeling like I could drown in the sky and it was so beautiful.


Links:

Ben Canales

Astronomy Photographer of the Year


Tuesday, 6 March 2012

ObsessionArt 5th Anniversary Exhibition





ObsessionArt is an online boutique that specialises in nude and erotic artwork and they are having a 5 year anniversary exhibition next week. I'm excited, mainly to see the work of Stephen Perry and John Wellington who will be on show among others including Hajime Sorayama.

Stephen Perry's photography is beautiful. Beautiful use of light and human form, and very sexy. I've been looking at his non nude work on his website as well. I think his pictures are so full of personality and life. I'm very visually pleased!

John Wellington's paintings are intriguing, like a fragment of dream or story. An odd mix of dramatic landscape, modern toys and naked women. I don't know how much I like them, but they interest me.

I very much like Stephen Perry's photos though.

12th - 17th March
The Gallery, 28 Cork Street, London W1S 3NG

http://www.obsessionart.com/
http://www.stephenperry.com/
http://johnwellington.com/

Wednesday, 8 February 2012

250 Euston Road glowing up ahead


Buildings covered in mirror look stunning at sunset.

Sunday, 6 March 2011

365:25 is done
















Taking a picture a day to document being 25 is finished...I missed a couple days a month....but here we go.

Tuesday, 9 March 2010

25 : 365

I have decided to do this 365 thing that I've seen being done at Afeitar (a pretty blog I like to read). You take a picture every day for a year and then you have a year captured in photographs. I think its a flickr thing, I'll look into that later, for now I'm doing it here for myself, starting from yesterday, my 25th birthday, rather than the start of the year. I'm going to capture my 25th year.

Sunday, 17 January 2010

Monika Filasiewicz



My lovely friend Monika takes stunning photos and I'm very lucky that she has agreed to photograph my wedding :) She has a knack for composition and colour and capturing people looking natural and beautiful. Her photos are only up on facebook I believe...but hopefully she will have a public gallery soon...

Wednesday, 24 June 2009

Dead Moth Dirty Plate


I left my washing up to do in the morning...and when I came to do it there was a dead moth drowned in this greasy plate :( sad. disgusting. strangely beautiful.

Thursday, 19 February 2009

Flickr - Kaos2



Have just had a little browse on Flickr and saw these beautiful close up photos of reflections, marbles and water. :D http://www.flickr.com/photos/barbeezgarten/

Wednesday, 8 October 2008

Friday, 15 August 2008

Heart my Garden


I think my laundry looks really attractive seen through the flowers :) everythings so wild and tumbling and we have loads and loads of free blackberries :) much joy.

Wednesday, 16 July 2008

I miss Japan...

Nagasaki
Karatsu



Kawaguchiko



Takedao



Japan was amazing! It was so good to see family even though I could barely communicate - my sister has given me her textbooks now though so we shall see. Most amazing was staying near Kawaguchiko, one of the lakes near Mt Fuji. It was incredibly beautiful surrounded by misty mountains and loads of lavender. I love the way the air smells in Japan, it smells familiar, it's a piece of my childhood. And I love hearing chirping insects. I love the food. And I especially love the bathrooms. I want a japanese bathroom!! You shower on the floor, then relax in the bath. Everyone shares water because you get in clean, then after the water goes to the washing machine to wash the clothes. They're wonderful :)

I don't love mosquitos. Though they love me.