Beautiful Things: Moment: anticipation

Saturday, 13 July 2013

03.14 Moment (Henri Cartier-Bresson's "Decisive Moment")

Timing is central to composition in all instances where the subjects or their environments are temporally dynamic. Time might be measured in milliseconds, like the flow of drops of water that make up a stream; in hours, such as the migration of stars across the night's sky; or in an unguarded instant of feeling.

Henri Cartier-Bresson distilled this into the idea of "the decisive moment", articulating it as:

"Inside movement there is one moment at which the elements in motion are in balance. Photography must seize upon this moment and hold immobile the equilibrium of it." (from "The Photographer's Eye" by Michael Freeman)

So clearly was this expressed that "the decisive moment" can be found at centre of photography. (In some circles it has assumed the stature of dogma, stimulating a backlash of argument by post-modernists.)

Cartier-Bresson's idea of moment should best be taken at its simplest - that any activity of a subject within the image frame affects the quality of communication from moment to moment. The "decisive moment" might thus be found in:

composition - balance, imbalance
emotion - unguarded, affected
anticipation - framing, dynamic tension
repetition - movement, flow

Saturday, 25 May 2013

Hunting in the Garden of Roses, Oltrarno, Florence

Following a stream of tourists on their ascent to Piazzale Michelangelo in Florence's Oltrarno district, I stumble across Giardino delle Rose whose modest side-entrance barely registers with the climbing barbarian horde. Jean-Michel Folon's installation, 'Partir', is a red rag to a bull.

It's pretty obvious that Jean-Michel's drawn from Masaccio's 'Holy Trinity' in Basilica di Santa Maria Novella; there has to be one sweet spot where everything comes together, but there's no handy 'x' on the floor. Close-up and focussing on the installation doesn't cut it.

A slightly lower vantage point and focussing on Palazzo Vecchio's bell tower remains unconvincing. The sweet spot must be behind me and I start drawing back. Also, there's no visual 'hook', no relationship... apart from the installation to the view, which would only result in a "that's nice" sort of picture.

As I back up, a fellow tourist-photographer walks into shot. Suddenly there's the possibility for a stronger three-way relationship between her, the installation, and the view.

I want to keep my distance so that my presence doesn't distract her, so I use the zoom on my hand-held camera; and take two steps to my right to bring Palazzo Vecchio's belfry deeper into the installation frame. I'm still missing the sweet spot.

One more step to the side and I'm there. The relationship between the girl and the frame is good, but the interaction between my camera's frame and 'Partir' feels wooden. Also I'd like to exclude the gentlemen on the left from the shot - I turn my camera on its end and soften my knees to lower the perspective, so that I can look 'through' the ship's funnels more...

The moment's perfect - we're looking at her, and also what she's looking at. The lower perspective unifies the relationships and also positions central Florence through the ship's funnels, heightening the depth of our visual field. The framing adds dynamism and excludes the unbalancing presence of the two men, while retaining their shadows to add symmetry. The young woman and her scarf counterweight the square patch of paving.