Photographer's Log Photographer's Log

Something New

This photograph is not what it seems. It is not a vase filled with water and greens. It is a composite artwork made from obscure portions of photographs of trees.

Often, when I am perusing my stock of photographs I come across some nondescript shot which many would throw away, but speaks to me of it’s potential. I find myself suddenly pulled by the tender tendril of possibility within it which, until that moment. had been lost or hidden, yet was always on-duty crying out for the attention of my imagination to recognize it’s potency for new life. Swept up in discovery and creation something fascinating, lovely, meaningful in it’s own substance comes forth, usually unrecognizable from the parent photo. I saw crystal and water in a tree branch and it grew into this photograph.

The beginning of each new year reminds me very much of these photos I create. Every year (but actually every day) we awake with the opportunity to begin again; to take that in our lives which is common or even ruined and give it a whole new life, make it a new creation.

It is similar to making lemonade out of the lemons we are handed, but more so. Even the lemons have obvious beauty and use as we receive them.

No, I am talking about those things in our lives which seem to be laid to waste or are ugly beyond redemption, or seeming useless. These things which lay on our psychological and physical doorsteps every morning, like the daily newspaper. If we can approach them from a less fearful, defeated or hopeless mind-set, see them in a non-threatening manner, in the reality of their own actual absurd weakness, we can boldly let them touch our inner levels of resourcefulness. Then we can ask ourselves what in this “photo” is alive, real, capable of erupting into new being, with imaginative and willing guidance and attention.

I believe there is a potential for good to evolve from anything bad in life, but it has to be sought out and dealt with at the correct time. I knew the original photos from which this vase of greens were created were unglamorous, useless in themselves, but I knew the time would come when they would become a new creation, an “Ah!” from something, “Eew, ouch!”

With this new year I pray we will all be able to find the usefulness of, and even create beauty from, those things which we and others might have deemed useless or ruined in our lives.

To quote my scientific friends: energy (and therefore matter) can not be destroyed but it can be put into a new order - good or bad. I’ve seen this practiced daily by someone close in my life. So, here’s to positive creation for all of us! God bless us in our new year, our new today. --June Mohan
Photos: (Copyright Mohan 2007) To contact the artist, please send email to: junemohan@hotmail.com.