Summer Trails and Trials in England
by Howard Nowlan (Unison Photo Arts)
UdA Art Editor
"Connection, when expressed in an image, is deep and true."
Jock Sturges
"Breaking Light"
Art Model Joceline Brooke-Hamilton
It's always a challenge working in England. This summer, for example, the sun pretty well refused to shine through most of July and August, making it feel, aside from the temperature, that we jumped pretty much from Spring to early winter!
As someone whose first love is the nude in the landscape, this causes several quiet moments of frustration, as once again, you find yourself limited to working with a model in a pretty confined space, trying to create something new, when your heart is yearning to get out amongst the wide spaces of the coast or the moors.
This frustration hit a high mark this month (that story is coming), but thankfully, the summer here usually starts in June, and the 'blanket' of gray forgot that this year...June proved to be the gem of the season, allowing Magenta, Joceline, and I to work together over a few days of truly glorious weather.
Teaming up with some other photographers for most of this, we were able to engage in a small run of shoots along parts of the North Cornish coast and across an area of the bleak but stunning Bodmin Moor.
"Vibrance"
Art Model Joceline
A week later, and the sun was still keeping Magenta and I busy, this time once again close to the moors amidst some of the splendid wooded valleys of the region.
Of course, it wouldn't last, so when the first model I ever worked with, Natasha Himpson, tracked me down last month to work with me again, Magenta and I knew it would be back to the studio.
"Twist"
Art Model Natasha
It was superb to work with this wonderful young lady once again after almost five years. Natasha is now returning to modeling, so I hope to have more about her here in the near future.
And so, to the big (bad weather) story.
Magenta and I have been planning all summer for a major outdoor shoot with at least one other model. At first, it looked as though we might be able to do this in the South of France, but events worked against that, so we settled upon a camping trip in Cornwall. Joceline was keen for a return trip, so we put together a one day workshop for a small group of photographers on outdoor nude photography in the midst of the trip.
"Still"
Art Model Joceline
The weather literally turned some 36 hours before the off, meaning I had to re-work the entire workshop day into an indoor event (quickly finding a venue we could hire and use) and canceling the camping trip.
Well, the week away never happened, but the workshop proved to be a true success...
The one good thing about all the poor weather is that it's given me lots of time to work on my new project - a very special 'coffee table' book of the very best of my nude photography over the last five years...more about that next time !
1 comment:
Ah, the UK. As a Welsh policeman once said to me, "While the rest of the world has a climate, here in Britain, we have weather!"
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