Walk Between The Rain

A couple of days after Christmas we finally had a brief interlude of sunshine between the deluges and leaden skies of recent days.  It didn’t last long but allowed me a short photographic excursion round one of my regular local circuits.  Whilst absorbing much-needed Vitamin D, I was keen to discover if my damaged leg muscle showed any sign of healing and also, to gauge the water level of the River Soar.  My house is quite nearby, and hardly any more elevated than the river, so the constant rains and nationwide flood warnings had caused me some concern.  Happily, I found I could walk about a mile with only mild discomfort and the river was well within its banks, although roaring over the weir with spectacular force.

I took a handful of photos that, although of familiar subjects, benefited from a combination of golden illumination and portentously dark skies as the next rain belt moved in behind them.  I’ve always loved the strange juxtaposition of dark skies with foreground elements lit brilliantly from behind the camera.  This time it had an almost eerie end of the world feel, possibly enhanced by the cascading water behind me, which seemed to fit the somewhat calamitous mood of this year as it concludes.

It also made me ruminate on just how vitally a specific quality of light can dictate my emotional response to a particular location.   A normally mundane or overlooked zone can, under certain climatic or temporal conditions, trigger sudden surges of almost visionary romance with whole new trains of conscious thought in their wake.  I suspect more of this quality may enter some of the photographs I take in the near future.  I’ve already noticed an increasing tendency to deliberately point the camera into the sun or bracket shots in search of emotively ‘incorrect’ exposures.  It will be interesting to see if this taste for a rather more subjective quality in images seeps into my painting in the New Year.

I was also delighted to find a couple more motifs to feed my current preoccupation with Health & Safety graphics.  The striped river barrier below the Victorian bridge adds an element of arbitrary, parallel reality to what would be a quaintly picturesque view otherwise.  The green Tarmac sign is something else altogether and illustrates how corporate H&S and mission statement culture can apply a bizarre, almost poetic utopianism to the most workaday situations.