. . . an art of observation . . .

“To me, photography is an art of observation. It’s about finding something interesting in an ordinary place . . . I’ve found it has little to do with the things you see and everything to do with the way you see them.”     Elliot Erwitt

I was on a field trip with my class from LIGHT Photographic Workshops in Los Osos (Sweet Springs) and saw this old tree branch while the instructor was setting up for a model shoot. It looks to me like it is pointing to somewhere . . .          I like the original, but had some fun playing with the image in photoshop – this is what I came up with.

this was written in 1897!

“Man has been endowed with reason, with the power to create, so that he can add to what he’s been given. But up to now he hasn’t been a creator, only a destroyer.  Forests keep disappearing, rivers dry up, wildlife’s become extinct, the climate’s ruined and the land grows poorer and uglier every day.”           Anton Chekov (Uncle Vanya, 1897)

I haven’t read Uncle Vanya, so I don’t know the context of the quote. But I was surprised that it sounded as though it could have been written today, not over a hundred years ago . . .

This shot was taken in an old oak grove in Los Osos, Ca. while taking a workshop with Andy Katz through the Lepp Institute, now called Light Photographic Workshops.