We know all photos are re-presentations of the real and so not the same as the real, and depending on the approach taken can be either realist in approach – a window to the real – or a transformation/interpretation of it – and so be an expression of it.
Straight photographers aimed to offer us a window to the world with crisp sharp images uncontaminated by any painterly approach while New Realists aimed to show the essence of things through adopting points of view to offer us insights into the world that only the camera could capture. I begun my approach with those ideas in mind but a colleague posted a series of interesting images (link) on Flickr that offered traces of war films and this got me thinking and experimenting on representing the above kit as traces of the real. This is the result and my photo of the day.
My image can’t really be described as straight because its softer and much more expressive. Yet I have tried to capture and reflect something of the nature of the soft polythene tubes that form part of my leg and night bags. It’s not quite abstract either, but quite close to it. I like it because I think it makes the viewer work at seeing and understanding.
anomiepete 