The Sea holds an endless but subconscious fascination for me and features again and again in many of my landscape images. I've lived my whole life near the coast, yet have never sailed, never canoed, and indeed nearly drowned as a child in a swimming pool. And yet The Sea draws me to her, she haunts me; calling my name in the sound of angry waves crashing on rocks, just as she whispers to me when the ebbing tide gently laps the sandy shore.
Photographically The Sea presents a wealth of opportunities and a unique set of challenges to work around. I feel I could never convey the breadth of her emotions even if I devoted my life to the task, so how can an exposure usually measured in seconds or the fractions thereof begin to tell her story? You can love The Sea, but she is a cruel and temperamental mistress. The inter-relation of sea and sky is one of the biggest joys in nature for me, and offer the chance for some truly poetic images. The poetry can be for nothing though if you get seasalt, sand or spray in your camera or lenses. I've learnt that the hard way.
Because The Sea reveals her character through her waves, and her beauty is often a reflected glory, she offers something different every single day. Sometimes in photogrpahy you can project your emotions into a picture, The Sea demands you portray hers to the viewer, just as she presented herself to you.
Is it the implication of something beyond, a corresponding shore and maybe even person on that shore? Is The Sea a metaphor for life itself? Is it the actual life she brings to the shoreline, or the mysteries she hides within?
I don't know, but even if i restricted myself to one section of reasonably undramatic shore (say Lepe Beach in Hampshire), I could go there every single day of my life and be content.
Content to see, to be, to marvel, and to try to reveal.
0 comments:
Post a Comment