Quarantine is bad for health

Vancouver sunset

 

 

Here I am, in quarantine again.... as I am now returned from visiting my family in Vancouver. 

To say that this is hard would be an understatement.

Another 14 days of being confined to quarters, with nothing to do but talk to my other half (OH), weed the garden, and consider my navel.

The lack of anticipation of big hugs all round makes this second 14 days feel like a very different experience.

Quarantine is bad for my health.

 

Not to mention the health of the airlines. 

 

This is Calgary airport international terminal.

 

My flight to Gatwick was the only flight listed on the board.

 

 

Calgary airport in the time of Covid-19

 

Before I left England I wrote to my MP asking why I had to quarantine on my return when there is much less Covid-19 in Canada than in the UK. 

 

He replied saying that he is too busy to reply. 

I think it is something to do with Brexit.....

Meanwhile I am quietly losing my marbles and the airlines are quietly going bankrupt.

Here is the arrivals area at Gatwick.

Anyway, apart from being just a tiny bit miffed, I am well and had a wonderful time in Vancouver with my family. 

All activities were outdoors, and on some days we could almost forget about the pandemic.

 

 

We walked the seawall. 

We cycled the seawall.

We swam in the sea, in mountain lakes and walked in the forest. 

All were cool and refreshing.

 

There are a lot of pine trees in Canada. 

 

 

 

 

 

And bears...... 

This is classic bear country.

 

Not to mention cougars......

 

Canada is a dangerous country.......

Or so my inner voice tells me whenever I try to walk alone in the forest.

Best to walk in a group. 

Which makes contemplative landscape photography almost impossible for one who is easily spooked.

Playing with a snow shovel on the beach and making pirate ships out of driftwood was much more appealing.

In Harrison Hot Springs I found the Sasquatch less of a threat.....

The Sasquatch is a much revered creature with a conveniently sized 2 metre arm span.

The hot springs were closed...... not so convenient. 

As were the kayaks and bicycle hire.

But my son and I did find ourselves on the set for a new movie 'Solitary'.

On asking, we were initially told that they were filming 'a movie' . 

But we were persistent. 

We dug deeper... and were told that it is about ' a man who has been in solitary confinement for 7 years and is then released into the world in the grip of a covid-19 pandemic  and social isolation'. 

I for one can't wait. Who needs 007?

Social distancing advice from the Sasquatch

When walking alone I decided to 'notice what I notice'.

I am known for noticing traffic cones and small things.

I cannot be the only person to think that the cones of Vancouver have been renamed for the pandemic.

The other thing that I notice in Canada is deciduous trees; mainly because there are so few of them.

I miss them when away from England. They are mostly found only in parks and gardens.

I enjoy the changes of autumn. The beauty of a single leaf left on the tip of a branch.

Mountain, tree, leaf.

Sources of great pleasure.

Enough.  Time to stop writing.

I am in quarantine and have lots to do.....

OH has gone out to do real things like sailing and walk on the beach.

He has left me with some potatoes. I will feast later.

For now I have just had a delivery from the postman; a new book.

'Japanese book binding' by Kojiro Ikegami.

I shall spend the rest of the day learning some different types of Japanese and Chinese bindings.

I will leave you with my video '14 days'..... from my first quarantine.

They really weren't so bad!

The Indecisive Moment (indecisive photography in Vancouver)

Last week I was in Vancouver visiting family - always a special time. 

Hiking, paddleboarding, swimming and childminding. I loved it all.

Being in the city is always a challenge photographically. I am conscious that I haven't made any new 'work' recently, after aborted trips to New Zealand and the USA, and am feeling a little pressure to come up with some new ideas.

I think the only idea that I came up with after a week of wandering was that of the 'Indecisive Moment'. Indecisive in that I couldn't really find anything new to say about the city or its beautiful parks and forest. Indecisive in what style of photography to go for. And indecisive over how to process what few images I did make.

Henri Cartier Bresson described the 'decisive moment' thus;

 “To me, photography is the simultaneous recognition, in a fraction of a second, of the significance of an event as well as of a precise organization of forms which give that event its proper expression.”

This is the absolute antithesis of how I work in most of my photography. A tree doesn't walk, or a flower run. Dead seaweed, the subject of my recent book 'findings' lies quietly on the sand, unmoving.

I don't usually wait for a special moment; I am not a street photographer, or a sports photographer, lying in wait for that moment when everything before the lens comes together to be captured as something unrepeatable. I am not a fan of seeking out sunsets and sunrises; waiting for moments of glorious light that may or may not arrive. 

I am a walking photographer, capturing what I find along my way.

I did try a few minutes of street photography on the waterfront at Coal Harbour, out of sheer desperation.

I achieved very little as I was shooting from the hip, being discreet, and mostly got photos of hips as a result.

 Later I tried being even more indecisive, by photographing the same scene over and over, waiting for something to happen.

 This was more fun, but the camera got confused and the people walking past were out of focus.

 

walkers, Stanley park, vancouver

So then I played with grids of multiple photos; each imperceptibly different ffrom the last.

This satisfied my desire to capture multiple indecisive moments, and also my love of the geometric.

But not that interesting really.

multiple moments grid

 

I tried indecisive birds.

They behaved beautifully unpredictably. I kept my camera still and waited for the ducks to move into the picture.

They did.

But they couldn't decide which way up to pose for the camera.

waiting for a duck

duck

ducks

 

I tried moody black and white images in the forest. Tangled dead trees and people walking along forest paths.

dead tree, beaver lake

walkers, stanley park, vancouver

walkers, stanley park

 At the botanical gardens I enjoyed the rhododendrons and hydrangeas.

I was indecisive about how to capture them. Multiple exposure, regular exposure or black and white. I tried them all.

multiple exposure mess

hydrangea flower

hydrangea flower

I think this last one is my preferred option; regular colour photography. No blurry bits. Just the sunlight filtering through the petals.

I tried night photography from my balcony.

night scene, Vancouver city

Not a great success. I won't show you any more of those.

My favourite image from the trip ( apart from family photos of course) is this one of kitchens.

As I spent a lot of my week cooking it seems entirely appropriate.

kitchens

I think the moral of this story is 'don't try so hard'.

Wait for the right moments to come along.

And if you are feeling indecisive, then it is probably because you are busy doing other things -  I was being a grandmother and mother for a week- something that gives me even more pleasure than photography.

And this week I am back being a photographer, preparing for my show at Rye Art Gallery.

It features some very decisive moments, as you would expect.

Conversations with Nature at Rye Art gallery

I hope to see you there!

Vancouver in the fall - an autumn leaf fest

autumn leaves © Caroline Fraser

I am visiting family in Vancouver at one of my favourite times of year; autumn ( or fall if you live over here).

The colours of the acres and poplars dotted between the tall pines fill me with wonder.

A richness of colours that I don't find back home.

In between rain showers I have crept out with my camera to collect leaves and wander the forest paths. Water dripping from green mosses; the sound of creeks running down the hillside towards the ocean.

I have been playing with fire trucks and reading toddlers' stories in a cosy home at the foot of the mountain. But outdoors is where I really wish to be.

autumn colours © Caroline Fraser

waiting for fall

autumn gold © Caroline Fraser

I started with some long exposures in the dark of the forest, but found myself drawn increasingly to individual leaves.

So many leaves. Not a single one the same.

This is the preoccupation that has been with me this week.

 I tried capturing them first against stones and wood in the landscape, but soon realised that I was looking for a more pure isolation of each leaf.

a single leaf

A portrait, set against a backdrop of some clean creamy paper felt more delicate.

Turn it over and a different beauty emerges.

 More subtle and sparse.

Each different from its neighbour.

Suddenly I am no longer interested in blurry images. I am drawn to the detail.

I keep collecting leaves of different shapes and sizes.

a leaf with no name

And will be carrying some home to work on if they survive the journey.

Finally I found a wonderful jumble of leaves amongst some hostas in Stanley Park.

They form a different scene; resembling a still life with rich dark hues.

Add caption

fall © Caroline Fraser

fall © Caroline Fraser

fall © Caroline Fraser

fall © Caroline Fraser

They remind me of currants and berries.

Organised chaos.

It will soon be all over, as we head towards winter.

All of these images different from the ones I made last year in the same places.

And that is what I love about photography; there is always a new way to find things, as our thoughts about what we see change and develop.

Here are some leaves waiting to fall.....