Wednesday 9 November 2011

Three Views of the Coast as Art


Back in 2005 two friends joined me in a 3 day exhibition called 'View3'. We held it at Cooks Hill Surf Club, overlooking the beautiful Bar Beach, in Newcastle Australia. Mates since school who shared a passion for surfing, we reunited with our art to present our different views of the ocean and its many moods. We did it again in 2007 and now look forward to holding the latest exhibition 'View3 20 eleven' from 18-20 November.

My friends are University of Newcastle computer scientist and painter, Keith Nesbitt and professional firefighter, surfer and artist, Chris Buller. We've set up the View3 20 eleven Facebook page where you can find samples of the exhibition. It will feature 24 works encompassing the diverse fields of Keith's abstracts, Chris's seascape realism and my photography.



To quote Keith “This exhibition has been four years in the making and has provided us with a common goal among the challenges and changes in our own lives.”
“Our previous view3 exhibitions fostered reconnections of people and experiences from our collective past as well as a range of new relationships, and this exhibition will build on that,” he added.

We all hope you can join us at Fridays opening or over the weekend. There will be short Artist Talks at 1 pm on Saturday.



My contribution is called 'the light moods'  and features two of my favourite places - Newcastle and Merewether Ocean Baths. Australia's oceanside pools were originally built to safely wet and cool the citizens on hot summer days. Today, along with the ebbing edges of the Pacific Ocean, they hold memories and remnants of past living and lives.

Coastal pools like these at Newcastle and Merewether Beaches are spread along the East Coast. For many they are often nostalgic places - especially in times of special light. Early mornings; warm, soft dusks; bright, hot afternoons and cold, weather-beaten nights.

The worn, whitewashed steps have seen the same feet skip and later shuffle, growing from tiny & soft to gnarled and wide. Parents, holding small, excited hands, have nurtured the tentative steps of offspring beginning their own memories. These places are community - gatherings of clans and friends.

For such a visual feast 'the baths' are just as sensory with closed eyes. Squeals of fun, the slap of bare feet on wet concrete, the crashing of waves and the squarks of seagulls picture the story of the Australian coast indelibly on the mind.

The Newcastle and Merewether Ocean Baths are very familiar to my camera. My early visits in the 70's and 80's taught me about light and composition. These places are where I became a photographer, honing my craft and patience with a 4"x5" camera, while a measly film budget meant I had to get it right before I pressed the shutter. I don't live nearby any more, however, when I visit it's often enough for me to sit with eyes closed and let the sounds and scents refresh those slideshows in my mind.

I've made images for long enough to know many of the rules of my craft. It's that knowledge that helps me break a few of them from time to time. With these pictures I used an unusual lens arrangement and techniques to selectively blur and emphasise. I hoped to find pictures that suited memories of special places. Perhaps a little embellished, with some 'facts' less defined but always a steady centre of truth - even as time separates then from now.

Whether it's the saturated sepia of the Newcastle Ocean Baths plates or the muted tones found in the Merewether Ocean Baths pictures they reflect the mood and the light of a few short moments when the shutter opened.

For the technically minded I mounted a Canon 17mm Tilt/Shift lens to a 2x Extender. The technicians will tell you not to use a extender and such a wide lens together (and they are right) but this combination gave me a soft but defined point of focus. If you are going to do something 'wrong' with your lenses make sure they are of the best quality to begin with. A Tilt/Shift lens allows the front to swing, tilt and slide up and down. They are highly crafted, very sharp and most often used in architecture and landscapes to keep the perspective square to the sensor and to get as much in focus as possible.

Not happy to just distort the clarity of the lens with an extender I also 'swung' its front the wrong way creating a very narrow field of focus. I shot with a Canon 5D Mark 2 connected to a SmallHD DP6 Monitor which helped me set the focus point exactly where I wanted it.

I was happy enough with the pictures to try out Blurb - a easy to use and very professional looking book printer. You can see the results here. 'the light moods' is available in both hard and soft cover as well as an ebook for your ipad or tablet.