Mrs Lemon's Visit to Japan

I've seen a lot of photography videos and listened to a lot of photography podcasts but this is the best thing I've heard / seen in a long long time - Cig Harvey's passion, wisdom and honesty are inspiring and a beautiful combination: watch this and weep at your own inadequacies (well, if you're me - you might be better off than I).

Sunlight on a rickshaw driver as he repairs a puncture in an alleyway in Holborn: I asked, he said fine, bingbangbong.

Looking at Cig Harvey's work here is humbling and makes me realise I'm really only at the start of the road.

Not my favourite activity (says the blogger). Maybe I should hire a publicist? Anyway, here's a link to a website I've been working on: Patrick Dodds Photography - Arts. Snappy title eh? No, I know, but anyway, it's a work in progress. Portraits and theatrical productions mostly, with some other creatives (performers, painters) thrown in for good measure. More to come in due course.

My maunderings over the net today, aided by an alcohol-induced malaise the size of the Pacific gyre, took me to this picture which I'm led to believe is one of Steichen's, though TBH it looks like Kate Moss to me. Anyway, be that as it may, I think this may be the most beautiful photograph I have ever seen, almost perfect in it's imperfections, more beautiful than even anything by the God of Photographers, Paolo Roversi. I'm going to try and find out more but in the meantime, swoon baby swoon!  

Addendum: why so taken with this? Well, let's see:

1. Her beauty - eyes, eyebrows, lips, nose, hair, skin...
2. The perfect intensity of her gaze.
3. The imperfections of the picture: it's slightly slanted, it's a bit discoloured, it's not quite symmetrical.
4. The (warm?) wind blowing from right to left, ruffling the coat a bit and sending out a tendril of hair on the left of the picture.
5. The coat, the beautiful coat.
6. The tones. Her make up.
And we'r…

A '30s, surrealist-out-of-kitsch vibe? Oh go one then. Man Ray? Steichen? Well, not quite, but coming out of the same room maybe.

Ted Forbes. 

Outside the Royal Festival Hall. Again, I asked, he was happy, so I took a shot - this time just the one. Don't know his name or anything about him but thought he looked cool and up for a photo.

Try as I might, I cannot remember seeing a rickshaw driver in India that looked like this. When I saw her I had to ask if I could take a picture and she just shrugged so I took a couple of frames before the lights changed. Not only beautiful but inspirational, she gave London an extra glow in the unseasonably warm September evening. To be honest though, London seemed a bit crazy with heat tonight - flesh and drink and skimpy and brash and tattooed and LOUD and a section of summer stolen and then reused on a Wednesday night in mid-September.

Yes it looks kind of muddy and dark - best seen on a large monitor at full size. Anyway, aide memoire / scrapbook remember? So it stays.