Tag: Philadelphia

  • Urban Shadows

    Urban Shadows

    The last weekend of summer in Philadelphia offered the chance to look for contrast between light and dark. Nothing metaphorical or profound. Just shadows.

    Looking for and at shadows invites a different way of seeing the city, a way that often requires looking down, looking for lines and patterns, for fragments of people going about their lives. The shoes and the streets tell us a lot about who the person is. Feet walking to work, work in the tourist industry, wear period shoes and extend beneath the hem of a historic skirt. They move efficiently across the street in a crosswalk, against the “Don’t Walk” sign.

    Other feet don more comfortable, casual shoes, those worn by people who are themselves probably tourists. They stroll along cobblestoned side streets where no “Walk” sign discourages their progress. They have no destination in mind, no place to go.

    But don’t always look down. Light and shadow play across buildings too, creating patterns and contrast with the late summer sky. Buildings that send forth dog-walking residents who look every bit as tidy and uncluttered as the buildings they’ve just exited.

  • Documenting the Effects of Covid-19

    Documenting the Effects of Covid-19

    I have been thinking a lot about how photography can do something worthwhile over the coming weeks. Or more specifically, given my good fortune to have a job that will continue through the current health crisis, I wonder how I can use my photography to do something meaningful. Is there something I can do with my camera that might be useful for somebody beyond me?

    Thinking of previous periods of social distress and upheaval, photographers who have gone out and documented their world have, I think, recorded something meaningful. Beyond the famous images, e.g., Lange’s “Migrant Mother,” there are countless less famous photographers who have pointed their cameras at the world around them as it convulsed and was wracked by traumatic events.

    It seems that today photographer could produce an incredibly robust record, a record that could be compiled into a useful resource for both our present and the future.

    I am only a single person with a camera, but I can document the effects of Covid-19 on my city. So over the coming days and weeks, that is what I will try to do.