A conundrum of sorts

The past few months I’ve been puzzling over the tension that sometimes occurs between the content and subject matter of an image, and its more abstract qualities of composition, color and design. Ideally, the two should complement each other, with the design qualities strengthening the emotional impact of the subject matter — and vice versa. However, I have found that is not always the…

Time passes

The queen rides by in sparkling yellow proud and smiling. A few blocks away, the afternoon sun illuminates a crumbling cemetery. The stones speak of dreams and lives long gone, and stories played out on that balcony just beyond the cemetery wall.

Different lives

Different people, different lives. The image above was captured at dusk in a waterfront cafe, waiting for the Christmas boat parade to begin. A smiling older woman strolls through the crowds selling trinkets and candy from a bin in a baby stroller. Always ready with a smile, she is a fixture at the town’s events. And below is a tall man, cigar and beer…

Subjective Realities

Each person’s heritage and life experiences are different, creating unique subjective realities that affect our interpretation of the world around us. I like these images because the feelings and stories they evoke for me tell me something about myself. The original images were captured at night, handheld, without the benefit of flash. I then enhanced the indistinct and impressionistic qualities to make the images…

Rising Stars Steel Band and Grilled Meats in Red

Some of the best steel pan music in the world can be heard from the large orchestras that compete at Carnival time on the island of Trinidad in the southern Caribbean. This seems appropriate since Trinidad is the birthplace of the instrument. While perhaps not the best in the world, we are fortunate on St. Croix to have several steel pan orchestras of our…

A Modern Shrine

There is a new shopping mall near the airport in Orlando, Florida. It is called Mall at Millenia and is a part of a much larger mixed use (retail-residential) development called simply, and somewhat ominously, Millenia. These images are from the mall’s interior public spaces dedicated to the further glory of upscale consumption. For a moment I had a vision of this magnificent public…

A suburban maze

What is at this glass corridor’s end? Is it the door to the vault where the secrets are kept? Or is it a way out, and with the right spin of the red dial the door will swing open? Or, is it the secret red button that when pushed will launch next wave to resolve the crisis? Whatever it is, I am not sure…

Emplacement

The two old Danish forts on St. Croix — one in Christiansted and the other in Frederiksted — were defended by cannons aimed seaward. The irony is that the real threat to the planter’s culture of that era came from the land in the form of the changing economics of the sugar trade, the end of slavery, and rebellions by workers against the oppressive…

Friends

I promised Pat Coakley my next post would be something a little nicer, after the spooky “Green Ghoul” posted for Halloween. These two women were clearly friends, and I hope their friendship and humanity come through.

For the Ghouls and Goblins

A creature was lying on the beach, dead and half covered with sand and dried seagrass. I tried to breathe some life into him and he opened his eyes and looked at me sadly. Or was that just a dream? A bit further on was the shell of a sailboat — someone’s home — that had blown ashore. Holed by the coral stone at…