Portraits, Downtown L.A. 2011-2015
Digital photography of my friends and family
I hardly ever
use a
camera’s built-in light meter. I use the method passed on to me by my
employer, when I was a young
photographic assistant aged 18; I lick my thumb and
hold it in the air, then
I take a wild guess at the correct exposure. It works every time,
especially after the
first
few thousand tries. So, is a ‘good’ or ‘important’ photograph one that
is well-exposed? Almost certainly not. The Buddha, though not a
photographer, set out on his journey with one objective: to relieve
suffering. My father told me when I was very young, “I think the point of
life is to be happy,” which I think amounts to much the same. Does
a ‘good’ photograph make us happy? Again, not necessarily. I like to
think that a picture that tells a story, or reveals a truth or beauty, is good. So, why ‘Plain
Food Society?’
Vera coaxed
out of the kitchen for a 30 second photo-shoot. No makeup, no
photoshop. Si-Huis
Crane Lamp (see reflection in the eyes), SLR, 2013
Sir Christopher Wren (b.1632 d.1723) was an astronomer, geometer,
mathematician and physicist. He was proficient in optics, ocean
navigation, cosmology, mechanics, microscopy, surveying, medicine and
meteorology. Wren was an ‘architect’ and builder in
a time when
educated and learned gentlemen would take it upon themselves to design
and build
architecture, solely by the application of general knowledge, physics,
mathematics and construction methods. Today, the title or term
“architect” is legally protected, just as the
title
“doctor” is. American icons of architecture, Frank Lloyd Wright,
Charles and Ray Eames, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe and Thomas Jefferson,
also did not hold degrees in architecture and
could not, today, have legally called themselves architects.
Nisha. No makeup, no
photoshop. Si-Huis
Crane Lamp, SLR, 2011
Sir
Christopher Wren was a giant in his own lifetime, but like every man,
he had to eat food. Wren started a dinner club
for
himself and his friends. He called it, ‘The Plain Food
Society.’ We only know that, ‘the club was started as a reaction to the
many
heavily flavored foods and their sauces that were becoming popular in
England, influenced by the cuisine of France.’ His issue with these
particular foods is unclear. Perhaps it was just a tongue-in-cheek
reference of other societies at the time. Almost 40 years later, in my
own home town of Great Barr, the Lunar Society of Birmingham
was formed, which counted Erasmus Darwin (Charles Darwin’s grandfather)
and (in a spectacular example of historic social networking) Benjamin
Franklin among its members.
Burton. No makeup, no
photoshop. Si-Huis
Crane Lamp, SLR, 2011
Members of the Lunar
Society’s homes and were burned in the Birmingham Riots of 1791. The
Priestly Riots, as they are also called, mainly targeted religious
dissenters, which included Lunar Society member, Joseph Priestly -
isolator of oxygen and inventor of soda. Societies had the potential to
affect significant change, and therefore influence (and sometimes
offend) many people. Perhaps Sir Christopher Wren chose plain food as
inspiration for his society, as it was a subject that would upset very
few people; there
are few clues to his true motivation. Perhaps, such a learned and
academic person as Wren might also have questions, doubts and concerns
about the world he found himself in. The term ‘plain food’ itself
raises more questions than it answers.
Jorge. No makeup, no
photoshop. Si-Huis
Crane Lamp, SLR, 2011
“Fraudulent
food tastes sweet upon the lips, but turns into
gravel in the mouth.” This line from Proverbs would suggest
that people have been complaining about falsely flavored foods for at
thousands of years, and almost certainly longer. It’s
literally, an age-old problem. This biblical statement, perhaps more so
than others, is open to some interpretation. Either nature could be
perpetrating the food fraud; or else it could be committed by another
person
by way of cleverness, and motivated by profit, using spices or textures
that excite the palate, but which don’t nourish the body.
Paulo. No makeup, no
photoshop. Si-Huis
Crane Lamp, SLR, 2011
Another
interpretation is this: ‘Food obtained by fraud tastes sweet,
but turns into gravel in the mouth.’ That is, stolen (but
otherwise nourishing) food comes with unexpected and undesirable
consequences. All of the above could be true. Proverbs is one of the
most practical chapters of one of the greatest repositories of wisdom
in all of human history. A message so simple as,
“Don’t steal food,” seems less likely. It
seems more likely that the statement is referring to our susceptibility
to fraud via the taste-buds, whether that fraud is perpetrated by man,
or by nature.
Burton. No makeup, no
photoshop. Si-Huis
Crane Lamp (see reflection in the eyes), SLR, 2011
Ask anybody the question, “What is food?” and most
people would agree on certain facts. ‘Food is a
fuel.’ This is true for everybody. ‘Food is
enjoyable.’ This is true for most of us. The most
contentious food question to ask anyone might be, “Which food
is
beneficial and necessary, and which is not?” The
answers to this question may differ the most. It is fair to say that
the question, “What is food?” is as old as life itself.
Some of us can live our entire lives without thinking about food.
Others
are
obsessed with it. It’s also true that the healthiest
specimens
amongst us don’t even eat what some people would consider
‘food.’
Jorge. No makeup, no
photoshop. Si-Huis
Crane Lamp, SLR, 2011
The food
pyramid might be our first go-to reference. However the typical Inuit
or
Mongolian diet is an inverted version of this, and yet both groups are
well known for being healthy and vigorous, in contrast to the western
world. Fruit and vegetables are rare or entirely unavailable for them,
so to call them essential would fly in the face of logic. Certain
truths are self-evident. We need air. We need water. There may be some
things that we need, and don’t need, that we are not aware
of. Once upon a time, we as a culture, believed that the body needed
only protein, carbohydrates and fat. Later, we found out that there are
other trace substances in food that we also need, which we called
vitamins. Is
that really the end of the story?
Angeline’s boyfriend. No makeup, no
photoshop. Si-Huis
Crane Lamp, SLR, 2011
In other
parts of the world, there are people who live on fruit. There are
people who live on vegetables.
Rice. Trash. Alcohol. Some of these people are also very healthy,
sometimes against all odds. Some people, perhaps tricksters
or illusionists, have said that they can live on sunlight alone. There
are so
many of us in the world that it’s not that unreasonable to
think that somebody, somewhere, can photosynthesize. Stranger things
have happened. One man’s meat might be another
man’s poison. In theory, we didn’t start off with
eyes, ears, noses, hands, and speech. We picked
these up along the way; fortunate mutations that worked out nicely.
Paulo. No makeup, no
photoshop. Si-Huis
Crane Lamp, SLR, 2011
Somebody, somewhere, may be able to thrive on the hard-to-spell
ingredients that are ubiquitous amongst food products across the
western world. There may even be a sub-group of people that can live on
the mysterious and anonymous ‘vegetable’ oils
contained in those same products, which, at the turn of the 20th
century were used only for oil lamp fuel and fattening
cattle
before market. It’s also true that another person might take
one bite of an apple and become sick, because simply, apples
just aren’t good for them. A scientist should not presume
either. Every possible theory should be tested, and every human is
different.
Elena, my daughter. Historic Core District. No
photoshop, natural daylight (see reflection in the eyes), SLR, 2015
This scientific method is
age-old: presume nothing
whatsoever; hypothesis, experiments, and observation, testing all the
variables in isolation. The Buddha said, “Do not believe in anything
simply because you have heard it. Do not believe in anything simply
because it is spoken and rumored by many. Do not believe in anything
simply because it is found written in your religious books. Do not
believe in anything merely on the authority of your teachers and
elders. Do not believe in traditions because they have been handed down
for many generations. But after observation and analysis, when you find
that anything agrees with reason and is conducive to the good and
benefit of one and all, then accept it and live up to it.”
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