I take most of my photographs in Dunedin, New Zealand, the small city where I live, and I often return to the same places, buildings, and events I've photographed many times before. Habits, like geography, can be limiting. Sometimes we have to force ourselves to go somewhere else or try something different where we are. Since it looked like we were in for several rainy days this past week, I decided to dress for the weather and walk into town in search of umbrellas. I’ve occasionally taken photos in the rain before (131. Umbrella Reflections, 148. Rainbow Bridge), and found that, if I got a few photos that I was happy with, I quickly forgot how uncomfortable I was at the time.

Umbrellas add a splash of colour to an otherwise dull scene, and colours are more saturated in overcast conditions. They also introduce a distinctive shape into urban environments that we immediately associate with rainy weather. Depending on the colour and angle, an umbrella can suggest a starfish, a crescent moon, a patch of clear sky, or a sliver of sunshine.

Spotlight

My search for umbrellas reminded me of The way of the Arrow!, a recent post by about the ubiquity and meaning of arrows in urban environments. Søren’s post is illustrated with examples by a few of his favourite photographers as well as photos from his own arrow folder.

søren’s photography substack

The way of the Arrow!

[Søren Harbel: Chattanooga…

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10 days ago · 77 likes · 57 comments · søren k. harbel

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Building façades that appear flat under overcast skies become three-dimensional in clear, slanting, late winter light. As shadows crawl along the surface, they reveal and exaggerate every recess and projection, breaking up flat planes into patterns of light and dark shapes that stretch and change as you study them. Two-dimensional silhouettes of trees and utility poles projected onto buildings across the street join with the dark cutouts of people walking by.

While the light picks out some objects, other things are partially obscured by shadows or completely lost in inky blackness. From one moment to the next, the visible can disappear and the hidden can be revealed. It’s a silent dance of opposites — the light and the dark; the dimensional and the flat; the visible and the invisible — like a tug-of-war between night and day.

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Vehicle ownership in New Zealand is high by international standards, reflecting a dispersed population and limited public transport outside major cities. For a small country, New Zealand has a surprising number of model-specific clubs. Historically, New Zealand imported large numbers of British vehicles. Many of them are still on the road, and the strength of the British tradition is a distinctive feature of older-car clubs. Other community-based groups have formed around Japanese models and American classics. These clubs organise meet-ups and trips, and their classic cars are often seen at A&P Shows and country fairs.

A string of Morris Minors, MGs, or Holdens passing through an intersection in town is a sure sign that a classic car club is on a road trip or meeting for an event. It’s not unusual to find dozens of Volkswagen Beetles, Minis, or Triumphs all parked in the Octagon in the centre of Dunedin. The owners admire one another’s cars and exchange technical details, while tourists and locals photograph their favourite models. This club-based, community-oriented enthusiasm is one of the most distinctive aspects of Kiwi car culture.

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A common approach is to find an interesting backdrop — a wall, billboard, or building — and wait for someone to walk by who can serve as the main subject. Architectural façades can provide framing elements, and the relationship between a pedestrian and background can create interest and humour through visual juxtaposition, similarities of colour or pattern, or light/dark contrasts.

There are times, however, when you come across a background that can stand on its own. Scenes that contain evidence of recent human activity or hints of what might happen next are gaps for our imagination to fill. This pause in the urban conversation, this brief silence, sharpens our attention and draws us in. Rather than offering an easy, satisfying narrative — neat, tidy, and complete — it provides a problem for us to solve; it gives us work to do.

Sometimes the humanity of the moment is made stronger by the absence of people.

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Tuition fees at Otago and other New Zealand universities are much higher today than they were in 1993. As in other English-speaking countries such as the UK, Australia, and Canada, strong neoliberal reforms in higher education have resulted in substantial student fees (“user pays”), high student loan debt, increased dependence on international student revenue, and competition between universities that are pressured to behave more like businesses. Organisers of the recent protest at Otago have four main demands: fees-free education, funding for universities above inflation, independent student unions, and a universal student allowance. They’re also calling on the University not to increase fees further, not to cut academic staff or programmes, and to resist Government austerity measures.

Protests are public events staged to make a point, demand attention, invite documentation, and encourage action. Designed to be disruptive, they occupy and dominate public space and address anyone and everyone within sight and hearing distance. People, placards, speakers, marching, drama, and high emotions — there’s plenty to take in. Protests can be good subjects for a street photographer, especially if you sympathise with the causes they promote. But they can be challenging — you have to be fast on your feet and react quickly to changing circumstances, wielding your camera like an extension of your body.

I usually use a 55mm prime lens for street photography, but for events like this I switch to a 35–150mm telephoto. I like to photograph from the middle of the crowd to get a protester’s eye view and try to get close to the speakers to increase the sense of being there. When the group is marching, I walk close to the front to get wide-angle shots of the leaders carrying the main banner and zoom in to frame small groups and their signs. Although my presence as a photographer is obvious, I weave through the protesters as though I am one of them, raising my camera quickly to capture images as the event unfolds.

You can see all the final photographs that I shared with the organisers here.

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We had such a day in Dunedin recently and I walked into town with no particular destination in mind. I found myself at the Dunedin Railway Station (one of the most photographed buildings in the country) and thought I would check out the view from the pedestrian bridge at the south end of the station that goes over the railway tracks. From the bridge, I saw stationary boxcars occupying two of the tracks while freight trains passed occasionally on the third track.

I decided to stay there, determined to make what I could of the elements around me. I’ve discovered that, sometimes, I have to stand in one place for a long time and look hard before I can see a composition and raise my camera to frame it. Given the lack of sharp shadows or bright patches of light, I looked instead for colour and lines. I took my time framing views from the bridge, incorporating its structure, and I tried to catch passing trains, pedestrians and cyclists for added interest.

As has been my practice recently, I've used high f-stops, accepting the trade-off of high ISO and grainy images. In a comment on the images in my last post, Karl Rubin asked why I chose such a high f-stop. This got me reflecting on my changing practice and preferences.

When I used to use my iPhone for most of my photography, I was often frustrated with the impossibility of controlling the depth of field in any effective way. The tiny sensor size and extremely short focal length of the lens on a phone camera ensure that everything is in focus. Portrait mode in more recent iPhones uses synthetic depth of field via depth mapping, but it’s nothing like real optical blur (see post 52. Toitū te Tiriti (Uphold the Treaty) Rally). When I started using a full-frame digital camera in manual mode, I loved the ability to blur the background and focus attention on a subject in sharp focus, so I often used low f-stops to narrow the depth of field (for example, see post 11. Market Day 2023).

Later, I spent time looking closely at photographs by Harry Gruyaert and others who often work with higher f-stops to widen the depth of field. With most of the scene in sharp focus, the viewer isn’t immediately directed toward a single subject chosen by the photographer; instead, they’re encouraged to explore the full frame. The scene is presented as it was observed, rather than as an image where selective focus highlights one element and demotes everything else by blurring background textures and details. When I see images that resonate with me, I often wonder what f‑stop and other settings the photographer used. With that in mind, I've included this kind of technical information in every caption in this Substack since my very first post.

Spotlight

Harry Gruyaert

Harry Gruyaert has been a member of Magnum Photos since 1982. Many of his photographs use deep focus to ensure that details at every layer are sharp right to the edges. He often avoids a single, central subject and instead encourages the viewer to explore the whole scene. You can see this in many of the photographs in his book, Last Call, as well as in some of the shots that are included in the short Masters of Photography interview below.

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Downtown, I found myself in a low-noise, low-distraction, low-stress environment. No crowds, no multi-lane highways, and no pretensions of being a world-class city. Several years ago, the City Council adopted an overarching vision: “Dunedin — one of the world’s great small cities.” People who might find a better job and higher pay in a larger centre are often drawn here for the lifestyle. The city has a stunning natural environment, rich architectural heritage, and a vibrant arts and culture scene. About 85% of the more than 20,000 students at the University of Otago are from outside Dunedin, enhancing the city’s diversity.

Dunedin is a very liveable city, but it’s not a major urban destination, and it’s certainly not one of the cities that comes to mind when you think about street photography. Most of the photographers I’ve met through the Dunedin Photographic Society (one of the oldest photographic societies in the Southern Hemisphere) are drawn to landscape and wildlife (especially bird) photography.

But you don’t have to live in New York, Sydney, Paris, or Tokyo to practice street photography. Life happens everywhere, in small towns as well as in large cities. If you’re looking for scenes and moments worth capturing, you can find them in the way a shadow falls across a building’s façade; in the shape of a man’s coat blown by a gust of wind; in the gesture of a woman flicking her hair as she waits at an intersection; and in the reflection of passing pedestrians in a shop window on a sunny day. You can find these things and much more wherever you happen to be.

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A string of fine days preceded my arrival in Dunedin. The rain set in soon after I landed, making the days wet as well as cold and dark. Still, I was happy to be home and back on familiar territory. Midwinter in New Zealand isn’t nearly as cold and inhospitable as it is in North America, and the days will get longer and warmer with each passing week.

The difference in the weather is not the only adjustment I will have to make. While Toronto has a population of about 3.3 million, Dunedin has just over 130,000. That means the practice of street photography is very different here. Crowds are rare, the city centre is much smaller and less dense, and the pace of life is slower. People are seen as individuals or part of small groups rather than as a mass or flow of humanity. The scale of everything is smaller. Notable buildings and architectural details stand out. Things are more specific, differentiated, singular, and set apart. There are fewer layers and less compression. It’s quieter, with pockets of stillness. Change is slower. The pressure is off.

The significant differences in the size, speed, and complexity of a small city compared to a larger one change more than the visual appearance of a place — they affect the mindset of the people there, and the photographer who records their daily activities. The resulting images, if they are true reflections of the people and place, will have a very different mood and meaning.

Spotlight

The Art of Street Photography, a new book by Joshua K. Jackson & Sean Tucker was published in June. It won’t be available in my part of the world until September, so I haven’t seen a copy yet. The book promotes street photography as a form of subjective creative expression rather than an objective practice of documentation. As the review below argues, it’s a successful collaboration by two well-respected street photographers.

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I headed to Toronto City Hall and Nathan Phillips Square, recently refreshed for the FIFA World Cup. Photographic backdrops had been created for visitors drawn to the city for the matches. Documenting people taking pictures of other people turns the act of photographing into subject matter.

Walking up McCaul St. towards the Art Gallery of Ontario on Dundas Street, I stopped to frame a handsome old residential building. I caught a passing 505 Dundas streetcar in one shot and the profile of a stylish woman walking by in another.

At Wellington St. & Church St. I spotted a small dog on a lead by the Berczy Park fountain that could have passed for one of the 27 cast‑iron canines spouting water and gazing upward toward a golden bone perched at the top.

From Bay St., I entered Brookfield Place, a high, light-filled atrium, and studied the reflections of people in a newly installed sculpture called Anthems To Colour. I found my own reflection in the coloured panels as two businessmen passed on the other side.

On Queen St. W., I walked by The Cameron House, one of Toronto’s most iconic small music venues. There was a new mural on the east side of the building, but the one on the front hasn’t changed since my last visit three years ago. I was pleased to see the giant ants are still there, crawling across the façade. I raised my camera as two young men zipped by on a scooter.

Each of these settings, stored in memory like sets from an old play, reminded me of my time in Toronto many years ago. But the cacophony of sounds, streams of vehicles, and frenetic movement of people took me back to the present, where the performance of everyday life brought these spaces back to life again.

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I visited the market on a day when the Waterloo County Horse Sale was taking place. It’s an important event for Old Order Mennonite families who use horses for daily transportation and farm work. I was attracted by the distinctive call of the auctioneer, the rows of hay bales surrounding the sale ring, and the quiet, attentive men, women and children in their traditional clothing. Men wore straw hats, plain shirts, dark trousers with suspenders and a black vest or jacket with buttons (no zippers). Women wore hand-sewn long dresses in solid colours or tiny patterns and bonnets in bright purples, blues, and greens, often in small floral prints (hair always covered). The children were dressed like the adults, although the boys’ shirts were sometimes more colourful. The rules governing their clothing clearly prohibit trendy or form-fitting fashion.

I tried to be discreet as I observed and photographed this close-knit farming community. They didn’t seem to mind my presence, but I felt very much like an outsider. The Waterloo Farmers’ Market and Horse Sale function as a commercial and cultural crossroads between the Old Order Mennonite farm life and the urban existence of others in the Waterloo Region. Encountering people who have chosen an alternative way of living, governed by different community values and social practices, reminds us that there is no single right way to live in the world. Our relationship to the land, to one another, and to technology result from collective and individual choices.

Spotlight

Michael Eugster

In a recent post, Hasn’t Everything Already Been Photographed? The Case for Street Photography Today, Zurich, Switzerland-based photographer argues for the relevance and importance of contemporary street photography. He points out that, although we might not be the first to photograph a particular place, subject, or situation, no one can capture it as it appears to us today with our individual perceptions and sensibilities.

Michael Eugster

Hasn’t Everything Already Been Photographed? The Case for Street Photography Today

You hear this again and again: the best photographs have already been made. Everything we photograph today is just repetition. Irrelevant. Too late. Already seen…

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3 months ago · 8 likes · 2 comments · Michael Eugster

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We met in Kensington Market, a popular historic neighbourhood bordered by College St. on the north, Dundas St. W. to the south, Bathurst St. to the west and Spadina Ave. on the east. Irish, Scottish, Jewish, Caribbean, and Chinese immigrants have made this a diverse and colourful area. Large‑scale redevelopment has been resisted and the area has been designated a National Historic Site in recognition of its multicultural significance. Although several shops have changed, the market is largely how I remembered it.

The Moonbean Coffee Company, Augusta Coffee Bar, and other popular cafés are still there. Courage My Love, Vintage Depot, and Bungalow are among the vintage clothing shops that have survived. Among other things, you can find hand‑beaded garments, 60s–90s vintage jackets and leather bags, retro sunglasses, small‑press poetry, quirky souvenirs, and indie pins, patches, and stickers.

We split up to photograph independently. We then had lunch at a Caribbean‑Italian restaurant before exploring streets further south and east.

We discussed the urban environment, stopping to photograph a life‑size bronze elephant outside the Art Gallery of Ontario, FORMA, the two‑tower Frank Gehry development rising on King Street West, and the dog fountain in Berczy Park behind the Flatiron Building on Wellington Street. I usually photograph alone, accustomed to seeing the world through the viewfinder in my own way. The photowalk with Mark and Marcello reminded me that there are many ways to photograph the same places and subjects. We can stand in the same place, in front of the same subject, but the images we make are as different as our individual histories, experiences, attitudes, and preferences.

Spotlight

Mark Foard: I’ve Snapped

You can read Mark Foard’s account of our Kensington Market meetup in his post: The 3M's Toronto Photowalk. We documented some of the same subjects and scenes but our results are quite different. I didn’t include photos of the other locations as I preferred the photos Mark captured, which you can see in his post.

I've Snapped

The 3M's Toronto Photowalk

You may find that this post is too long for you to read in your email. So, to see it in all of its glory, you might have to view it in your browser or via the Substack app…

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3 months ago · 21 likes · 8 comments · Mark Foard

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Standing at the busy intersection of Front Street and Bay Street on a sunny afternoon, I could see the city’s diversity all around me. People from many different countries and backgrounds hurried past with purpose.

Official history and government messaging emphasise the centrality of diversity — and the embrace of difference — to Canadian identity. But at street level, it becomes tangible and personal. As I caught quick glimpses of passing faces and fashions, I thought about the remarkable variety of nationalities, histories, and cultures that shape this city and this country. Standing still, I raised my camera to my eye as the people of the world streamed past.

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The city of Toronto has a population of about 2.83 million. The Greater Toronto Area has over 7 million. On a typical weekday, roughly 550,000–600,000 people commute into downtown. They arrive by walking, car, bicycle, subway, streetcar, bus, and GO Transit rail.

Union Station, at the foot of Bay Street in the downtown core, functions as the central switching point of the entire Greater Toronto commuter ecosystem. It’s the largest and busiest multimodal hub in Canada. From here, regional travellers flow into the downtown and transfer to local transit, walking routes, and the underground pedestrian network. More than a quarter‑million people pass through Union Station daily — twice the population of the city of Dunedin.

During rush hour on a Tuesday afternoon, I paused on the lower concourse level where the subway system and the subterranean PATH network connect to Union Station.

At the bottom of the Yonge-University subway line, passengers poured out of packed trains. There was a rhythm to the movement of people passing through the concourse, racing to catch the next GO train. They flowed over the sand-coloured floor in waves, one after another. By morning, the movement would reverse and the tide would come back in.

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The sun stays closer to the horizon, drawing a smaller arc across a sky that darkens a little earlier each day. The sunlight itself becomes golden, amber, honey‑toned, while the air stays cool and blue‑edged. Shadows deepen into blue‑grey. Surfaces present a contrast of warm planes against cool voids. By mid‑afternoon, shadows darken the streets and begin climbing the faces of buildings on the opposite side. Brightly lit facades are slowly consumed by darkness from the bottom up. Compositions of light and dark shapes move and change as you observe them.

Sun and shadow are constant companions — we never see one without the other. In summertime, shadows provide contrast and definition, but they play a supporting role. In winter, shadows dominate the scene with their broad coverage, long reach, and extended time on the stage. In autumn, we witness the changeover — graceful and gradual. Shadows are beginning to show their character, which will develop, strengthen, and take shape as the season and the scene unfold.

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In street photography, you have to be in a constant state of anticipation without knowing what you’re expecting or hoping will happen. From the visual chaos of the urban environment, an interesting composition can come together for a split second at any moment, and you have to be ready to see and capture it.

Normally, we keep an eye on the movement of people and vehicles in order to spot potential dangers and avoid trouble. With a camera in hand, we search for and try to anticipate compelling visual collisions — we look for happy accidents.

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This doesn’t mean that we have to be at exactly the right place at exactly the right time in order to see something worth photographing. Things worth noticing and recording are taking place everywhere, including where we least expect them, all the time. No matter where we are, the unpredictable and constantly changing interaction between a multitude of variables means that something interesting can come together at any moment. What we perceive from the same location from day to day, or from one moment to the next, can be very different. No place is the same place at different times. We have to learn the art of seeing familiar places as though we have never been there before.

There’s a scene in the film Smoke (1995, directed by Wayne Wang) in which Auggie (Harvey Keitel) shows Paul (William Hurt) his photo albums — his “life’s work.” Auggie has been taking a photo of the same Brooklyn street corner at 8 in the morning every day — 4,000 days straight so far. Paul, flipping through the pages, comments “They’re all the same.” Auggie explains:

They’re all the same but each one is different from every other one. You got your bright mornings and your dark mornings. You got your summer light and your autumn light. You got your weekday and your weekends. You got your people in overcoats and galoshes and you got your people in T-shirts and shorts. Sometimes the same people, sometimes different ones. Sometimes the different ones become the same and the same ones disappear. The Earth revolves around the Sun and every day the light from the Sun hits the Earth at a different angle.

— Auggie (Harvey Keitel) in Smoke (1995)

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From a distance — taking in the building, some scaffolding, parked cars, and nearby trees — it was a complicated and noisy visual scene. I decided to see what I could get if I moved as close as possible with my camera and 55mm prime lens. As well as the fixed focal length, I kept the horizon level, the shutter speed at 1/100, and the f‑stop at 16. I tried to frame the shots as tightly as possible in the viewfinder. I hoped these limitations would result in a more cohesive set of images.

We discover at a young age that if we say a word out loud repeatedly, it seems to lose its connection to the thing it refers to and becomes pure sound. Something similar happens when we listen to spoken conversation and everyday sounds not for meaning but for musical quality — rhythm, pitch, texture, the rise and fall of voices. Sustained attention shifts what we perceive. The familiar becomes strange, and in that strangeness something opens up: the soundscape around us turns out to be as rich and compositionally varied as any music.

As I began photographing the water slides, I was aware that their twists and turns were designed to entertain the children who slid in a swift descent before splashing into the pool below. But the longer I considered the painted tubes, the more their function slipped away, and I became increasingly aware of the formal visual qualities of what I was looking at. I saw compositions of colour, curves, and contrasts. The swoops and bends took on a dynamism that could be comprehended in purely visual terms.

If we can appreciate the visual qualities of everyday things, we can frame compositions anywhere. The city is a concert hall for those attuned to it.

Spotlight

One way of learning to see the everyday world as visual compositions is to practise listening to familiar soundscapes musically.

Steve Reich

Steve Reich is best known for his early experiments in minimal music. He also incorporated spoken voice and everyday urban sounds directly into his compositions. In City Life (1995), he included sounds he recorded in New York City — car horns, slamming doors, alarms, and street vendors.

This is a recorded performance of City Life by the Conservatorio “Arrigo Boito” Parma.

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Landmark destinations and public festivals can serve up views and subjects designed to attract our attention, but they can’t guarantee an interesting photograph. The compositions that delight me most are the ones that appear where and when I least expect them.

If I stop looking intently for a singular subject — some thing to photograph — and instead try to see the relationships between things, however unremarkable each of those things might be, compositions can emerge that are greater than the sum of their individual parts.

A strong, singular subject confidently occupying the frame makes an emphatic statement of fact. It’s an answer delivered, a conclusion reached. No discussion required. Take it or leave it.

When two or more elements are captured in a frame, like strangers entering the same room, a conversation begins. We compare and contrast. We look for similarities and differences. We notice relationships of scale, differences in colour, affinities of form. We consider the fit of each within the group. Do they constitute a group? Does any element appear out of place? Are they from the same family? Are they speaking the same language? What stories might they tell?

Like the earth, the moon, and the sun, every compositional element has its own identity and unique characteristics. But it’s the pull each exerts on the others — the dynamic tension — that creates the dance that defines their relationship.

Spotlight

Mark Foard (I’ve Snapped)

is a Toronto-based photographer who shares images of city life, landscapes, wildlife, and whatever else catches his eye on his I’ve Snapped Substack. I lived in Toronto for many years before moving to New Zealand, so his posts always make me feel a little homesick. I love it when I can identify a location he has documented, but he has also introduced me to places and sights I haven’t yet experienced myself, such as the Wallace Avenue Pedestrian Bridge, wildlife in High Park, and white-tailed deer in a cemetery near where he lives. One of my favourite posts features a series of photos documenting Frank Gehry’s staircase at the Art Gallery of Ontario — a place I visit whenever I'm back in Toronto

I've Snapped

The Week That Was #22

Welcome to this week’s edition of The Week That Was, a collection of images that I’ve taken the previous week…

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4 months ago · 38 likes · 33 comments · Mark Foard

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Although the number of Palestinians living in Ōtepoti Dunedin is small, the pro-Palestinian community here is large, visible, and active. Taking and sharing photos of these rallies is one way that I can support the group and its ongoing efforts to advocate on behalf of Palestinians and their basic human rights.

I’m a familiar face to the other participants and easy to spot with my Sony A7V and telephoto lens, especially when I’m up front near the stage. Just about everyone else can also be seen taking photos or recording video—usually with their phone—at some point during the event. A few of us make a game of photographing one another in the act of taking photos. Many, like me, will later share their work on social media, contributing to a growing visual archive of the many public pro‑Palestinian events that have taken place here and the large, diverse group of individuals who have taken part.

Sometimes a participant will pose for the camera, and if asked I’m happy to take a photograph of a group of family or friends after the event has concluded. Still, I try to work as much as possible as a street photographer, taking candid shots while walking around and approaching the stage from different directions and angles. I take a few environmental shots for context, and try to capture the mood of the crowd and the relationships between people. I make an effort to take a few good close‑up photos of the organisers and each of the speakers to record their contribution. I alternate between the speakers (from the front, sides, and back), wide shots of the crowd, and shots of smaller groups and individuals, paying particular attention to interactions.

When it’s over, I head home, download the files to my computer, and edit and process them in Adobe Lightroom Classic (I shoot in RAW format). I upload a selection of full-resolution jpegs to a folder online, numbered according to the order in which they were taken. My aim is to create a set of images that will enable participants to relive the event from start to finish. I keep and share about one in every ten shots I take. Many are very similar, differing only in the position of a sweeping hand or the turn of a head. This is my way of attempting to convey the unfolding of a dynamic event over time using still images. You can see the 85 photographs I selected and shared here.

Spotlight

Juliette Mansour (The Additional F-Stop)

is a first-generation American, linguist, writer, and photographer with a particular interest in exploring the creative process, which she does through her Substack, The Additional F-Stop. While going through my inbox today I came across her recent post, Fidelity Over Force, which resonated with me. I’m listening to Keith Jarrett’s Köln Concert, which she embedded in her post, as I write this.

The Additional f-Stop

Fidelity Over Force

Hello. Another weekend Lightbulb Moment from me…

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4 months ago · 20 likes · 9 comments · Juliette Mansour

Marcel Borgstijn (Darkrooms)

describes himself as a conceptual photographer from the Netherlands, but he’s also a much-appreciated connector and community builder on the Substack platform. In a recent post, 33 Photographers on Creativity, he links to 33 interviews he has conducted with photographers on Substack about their creative practice. Juliette Mansour is one of several photographers in this list whose work I follow. Another is Marcel Borgstijn himself.

Darkrooms

33 Photographers on Creativity

Next week is World Creativity Day, and I have some big news about RBNXPLRNG to share. But that is for next week. For now, I want to give you something to sink your teeth into over the coming days: the complete collection of all 33 Darkrooms Uncovered interviews, gathered in one place. Thirty-three photographers talking openly about how they think, what drives them, and what they do when nothing seems to work. Consider it a warm-up for what is coming…

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5 months ago · 41 likes · 16 comments · Marcel Borgstijn

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We can feel irritated by the presence of others — annoyed that they are getting in the way, slowing us down, blocking our view, or causing a distraction. But if we are open to it, chance observations of strangers can yield moments as unexpected and delightful as a dolphin breaking the waves, a rare bird alighting nearby, or a snow-covered mountaintop suddenly coming into view.

Like places that trigger vivid memories or seem to invite new narratives, strangers can remind us of who we once were, who we might have been, or who we might become. In their appearance, manner, and behaviour, they can evoke people and incidents from our past. They can also offer a glimpse of lives very different from our own, and places unlike anywhere we have ever been.

A stranger is a destination not yet visited.

Spotlight

While continuing to focus on photography, we have all been following the catastrophe unfolding in the Middle East. None of us has escaped the effects of the United States and Israel’s illegal war of choice on Iran and the regional chaos and destruction it triggered. Meanwhile, Israel has continued its war crimes in Lebanon, applying tactics from its ongoing genocide in Gaza. Israel invaded Lebanon again, forcing the displacement of more than a million people while also bombing civilians and civilian infrastructure, even as it targeted Hezbollah militants.

Most of us hope that the current two-week ceasefire will lead to a lasting peace. Israel, however, carried out a mass killing in Lebanon just hours after the ceasefire was announced. Without warning, Israel hit 100 targets in 10 minutes, killing more than 300 people and wounding 1,165, drawing widespread international condemnation. They would have known that dropping 1,000-pound bombs in densely packed residential areas would result in mostly civilian casualties.

We have not lost our capacity to be outraged. Casualties in war are reported as impersonal numbers, but we know they represent real people. Their individual identities and stories might be unknown to us but, like the strangers we see in the supermarket, pass on the street, or observe on a ferry crossing to Waiheke Island, they are no different from us. And we know that, under different circumstances, they could have been us.

Anna Fifield (Between Giants)

is an experienced and well-travelled New Zealand-based journalist and foreign affairs commentator. You can see an interview with Anna about her 2019 book The Great Successor, about North Korea’s leader Kim Jong Un, here. In a recent Substack post, What is the international rules-based order anyway?, she provides a brief history of the rules-based order that is being tested by recent actions of the most powerful nations. She explains why it is in the interest of all nations — especially the smaller ones — to ensure the rules that support world peace and stability are followed.

Between Giants, by Anna Fifield

What is the international rules-based order anyway?

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5 months ago · 31 likes · 13 comments · Anna Fifield

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