The Boomer Legacy

Eloi wonderland

We gathered by the harbourside, sipping infused agave nectar and nibbling on sweet fuyu persimmons, and were amazed by the vast contraptions built by our distant ancestors

Sydney Harbour sunrise kayaks [Jan-2019 197KB]

Remarks

The 135mm TEM (11861) can be an amazing lens under the right conditions. Particularly when shooting into a low sun, it makes everything go an intense orange while still retaining sharpness and resisting flare. Unfortunately it is also 100g heavier than the current 135mm APO (11889), but it does have a greater focus-throw angle to make fine-tuning easier, and of course is much more affordable

No map and a broken compass

Cheap goods and MTV proved to be more effective than détente and ICBMs

Bric-a-brac stall on Tverskaya St, Moscow, beneath a memorial plaque to the soviet artist Pyotr Vasilyev [Dec-1991 244KB]

Remarks

Moscow December 1991, a couple of days before the end of the Soviet Union. The command-economy had collapsed, while early attempts at market capitalism stalled because there was neither investment capital nor enough disposable income for consumers to spend

Meaningful social interactions

Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, TikTok, WeChat, Instagram, Snapchat, Tumblr, LinkedIn, 4/8Chan: elaborate frameworks were created to ensure you could never be alone

Stargazer lawn at Barangaroo Reserve, Sydney [Aug-2016 563KB]

Remarks

Another scene stumbled upon completely by accident. Had revisited Millers Point to re-shoot the clothesline crucifix image and eventually ended up on the “Stargazer Lawn” to find this installation, with people walking around and through the wooden ties

In the thrall of Schedule 8

A considerable number of people spent their lives up the Cross

Fitzroy Gardens in Kings Cross [May-2003 418KB]

Remarks

Taken when using a Leica rangefinder was the only relatively unobtrusive way to do candid photography. Have subsequently used cameras triple the size, sometimes even mounted on a tripod. So it's really just a question of confidence, timing and discretion, and not the brand of camera or whether the logo has been properly taped

Delivery apps were so convenient

HungryPanda, Foodora, Uber Eats, DoorDash, EASI, Menulog, Deliveroo, Hey You, GrubHub, goPuff, EatNow, Yelp… We imported an underclass of temporary-visa holding self-employed contractors to zip around and deliver authentic pad thai, bubble-tea and burrito bowls to their famished clients

Food delivery rider at Broadway, Sydney [Apr-2020 135KB]

Remarks

Suddenly in 2020 food delivery riders were everywhere. Most were foreign “students”, who would zip along footpaths and plazas at breakneck speeds. During the lockdowns these riders multiplied to an extent where there were more of them hurtling through CBD streets than there were pedestrians trying not to get hit (ABC News, 2020)

Nothing's gonna change my world

Imagine no Holden Morrisey Caulfield

Strawberry Fields, Central Park NYC [Oct-2017 445KB]

Remarks

Some of the weekend circus attracted to Lennon's memorial in Central Park. Peace had little chance when it came to epic jostling for the best selfie positions, while in the background numerous versions of St John's simplest tunes were played by buskers hoping to score some coin

Day-tripping

The greater our impact on nature, the more we wanted to see it

The Waterrun, Royal National Park NSW [Aug-2019 411KB]

Remarks

Many people liked to travel for hours just to take photographs of themselves. In the background you can see one of the cliffs mentioned earlier

Golden sunlit uplands

Import alien species to remind you of home, then watch helplessly as they take over the environment

The invasive plant species Common Gorse spreads along the Taieri Gorge, NZ [Dec-2017 818KB]

Remarks

This shot was taken while hanging out the door of the Taieri Gorge tourist train. Had originally wanted shots of the train taking a curve, but looked around and saw the weed-covered gully — next time it might be an idea to stay safely inside inside the carriage and just point the camera out the window. There might not be a “next time” however, as the line was closed in 2020 due to COVID related financial pressures, and the reopened line now only runs to Hindon, well short of where this photo was taken

Brett's armchair

The same music in completely different hands

Room 82 on the sixteenth floor, Harbourside Apartments [Jan-2019 419KB]

Remarks

Lavender Bay (visible through the windows) was one of Brett Whiteley's favourite subjects. The book on the table is Whiteley on Trial (2017), about the forgery of a handful of Whiteley's paintings and how the Victorian legal system couldn' to find anything wrong with it

On track for Soylent Green

2019 → months of raging bushfires; 2020-1 → pandemic lockdowns; 2020-3 → torrential rain & flooding from three La Niñas in a row; 2023 → stagflation, interest rate hikes and the return of El Niño

SOH Tour group during the 2019 summer bushfires [Jan-2020 265KB]

Remarks

It was amazing that day how similar the sunshine was to that in the cheesy 1973 sci-fi movie. If that wasn't sobering enough, what in Jan 2020 was an offhand remark about Sydney turned out to be an eerie foretaste of what happened in Greece and NYC in July 2023

Crucify your mind

I really thought that love would save us all (Lennon, 1980)

The exterior of the Greek Orthodox church of Saint Peter & Paul (since repainted), at Petersham [Sep-2012 463KB]

Remarks

As mentioned elsewhere, one of the most enjoyable aspects of this project was randomly finding unusual scenes in unexpected places. You could walk for hours and suddenly there it would be, almost as if had been waiting for you

Gone a million

The rich were always with us

Abandoned Rolls-Royce automobile at Hiles Street in Alexandria [Jun-2015 289KB]

Remarks

This Rolls Royce was “parked” in Alexandria for a long time. When Leica Australia held a launch event for their SL-2 camera in Nov 2019, it was done in a converted warehouse in the same street. After the presentation I went outside to see if the Rolls was still there four years after taking this photo — it was

What this little black rock could do

We have to make sure this economy works. We have to export dollars. We have to realise we have a moral responsibility to other people in other nations to keep their lights on (Joyce, 2017)

The Steelworks and Coal Loader at Port Kembla harbour [Sep-2014 66KB]

Remarks

Port Kembla featured some of the largest coal handling facilities in the world. Unfortunately it was difficult to capture interesting views of generally ugly industrial locations. Sunsets helped, as did telephoto lenses and silhouettes

The carnival is over

The market faithfully rewarded those who took a long-term view

Luna Park Hair Raiser ride, in the rain [Jan-2019 126KB]

Remarks

Night photography is difficult, especially in the rain. Here it was persistent enough for water to seep into my 35mm LUX (11337) lens, necessitating a round-the-world trip to have it disassembled, cleaned and recalibrated

Life under the occupation

The Fragmented was turned into the Harmonised by encouraging our staff to compile their own dossiers

Revolving doors at the ANZ bank building, in Castlereagh Street [Aug-2014 143KB]

Remarks

When capturing this image it was assumed it would most likely end up as a discard. When back home however, an hour spent in image editing programs changed things considerably

Better balance the value exchange

With rates at five-thousand-year lows (until 2022), cheap debt could not be blamed

Used-car yard at Parramatta Road Granville [Apr-2017 206KB]

Remarks

Global interest rates were kept artificially low for decades to encourage economic growth. Finding metaphors for the corresponding deterioration in lending standards + mountain of consumer-debt turned out to be surprisingly easy

Accidental monuments

Civil Engineering 101: slap it together as cheap as you can and then completely rebuild it later to solve issues you should have addressed the first time

Zigzag Railway upper viaduct, Clarence [Jul-2019 596KB]

Remarks

Landscapes are hard. You not only have to be in the right place, at the right time with the right gear, but you also have to work with the prevailing light AND come up with an something more substantial than “eye-candy”

One-way journey

On a sailing ship to nowhere, leaving any place (Yes, 1971)

Ovation of the Seas cruise-ship at the Sydney Overseas Passenger Terminal [Dec-2017 108KB]

Remarks

Two years after this photo was taken, 22 passengers from this ship died during a shore excursion due to the White Island volcanic eruption in New Zealand

Stack trace

International trade agreements led to enormous economic benefits

The concrete base of the demolished Port Kembla copper stack [Sep-2014 349KB]

Remarks

The Copper Stack was an Illawarra landmark since its construction in 1965. After its closure in 2003, it stood derelict for years until it was finally demolished in Feb 2014. This image was obtained a few months later by scaling a security fence, along with risking arrest by waiting around for the sun to peek out between clouds to light the stack base

Through an augmented sky

All the atmospheric particulates ensured a golden hour for everyone

Sunrise over Bourke Street, Melbourne [Apr-2019 57KB]

Remarks

The 135mm TEM (11861) in action again. While on holidays in Melbroune, glanced out the balcony just after dawn and noticed hot-air balloons being launched. A few 40mm shots looked okay, but the 135mm pointed into the sun did the trick

Channelling Sierra Leone

Follow PolAir through Chippendale, run the lights on Enmore road, swerve left at the servo and we're only a few doors down from the burned out WRX

Enmore smash repairs [May-2023 501KB]

Remarks

Purchased the SEL-1655G in Dec 2019 to use for school functions, but was reluctant for years to use it for personal work due to its barrel distortion at wider angles. It took until May 2023 to figure out how to precisely use lens-profile correction when shooting RAW, mainly due to Capture One Pro's incomplete support for non-native DNGs

Temporary respite

Spend all morning crawling over room-sized boulders, before having a break and doing it all over again on the way back

Glenbrook Gorge, Lapstone [Aug-2021 608KB]

Remarks

At Darks Common lookout a few days earlier, noticed a family with small children wandering around far below in Glenbrook Gorge. Thought that if they could take their children in there, then it shouldn't be too difficult to walk in. Yeah right. Humping it over boulders for almost an hour and then slipping into the river with $Ks camera gear was not anyone's idea of easy. N.B. the “beach” in the image no longer exists, washed away by extensive flooding in 2022

Everything was done to preserve social harmony

Our unwavering commitment to specific kinds of inclusion was immeasurable

The waterfall entrance to the NGV, Melbourne [Apr-2019 767KB]

Remarks

Shots through the “water wall” at the National Gallery of Victoria are, unfortunately, a photographic cliché. Usually great care is taken to avoid these things, but this time the juxtaposition between the mother and outside family was too strong to ignore

Memories of what's to come

The last thing we wanted to do was extirpate all the large vertebrates (WWF, 2018)

Deceased sulfur-crested cockatoo, Warrimoo [Dec-2017 149KB]

Remarks

The cockatoo — which had died overnight — was lying on a neighbour's front lawn. What was fascinating was watching the ants explore the corpse. Used the 100mm APO (11352) to get in close and bring out the details. And yes the Dali references [1] & [2] were deliberate

A two-speed world

The landscape was altered to more accurately reflect our social order

The remains of Lawrence Hargrave Drive beside the Sea Cliff bridge, near Coalcliff [Dec-2016 913KB]

Remarks

Most people drive over the Sea Cliff Bridge and don't notice the abandoned Lawrence Hargrave Drive alongside. It was decommissioned in Aug 2003 due to numerous rockfalls from the escarpment on its western edge. It still remains open to intrepid walkers though, and the truck-sized boulder which finally closed it still rests in the middle of the road

Peak oil

Rapid obsolescence was just around the corner

Motorcycle parking at the top of Hill Street, North Sydney [Oct-2020 343KB]

Remarks

A disadvantage of panoramic cylindrical projection is that horizontal lines will always appear curved. You can partially compensate by using Mercator projection, but often you just have to live with it. If the budget allows, you could print the image and mount it onto a concave backing, and then stand inside the arc to see the horizontals straight again, a truly mind-bending experience! (Here the master image is 15340×7670 pixels, which if printed at 150 dpi would end up being 1.3×2.6 metres)

Unknown knowns

The systematic destruction of the environment was an event so terrible that even mentioning it became a taboo

Hornby Lighthouse gun emplacement, South Head Sydney [Dec-2014 203KB]

Remarks

South Head turned out to symbolise the end of the line in more ways than expected

Consumer karoshi

A culture had to be created in which self-sacrifice was encouraged

Market Street escalators at Centrepoint, Sydney [Jan-2016 260KB]

Remarks

A side-benefit of being treated for amblyopia as a six year-old was that you learned early to critically look at things. Noticed here that these escalators bore an ironic resemblance to a Japanese Samurai Kabuto

A crown of ashes

Every Christmas we would gaze up at the pyrocumulus sky, exchange Bushfire Survival Plans and kiss beneath the epicormic shoots

Woodford bushfire aftermath, Blue Mountains [Dec-2019 736KB]

Remarks

Panoramic sequences have become commonplace after phones and cameras started to include built-in “panorama mode” options. Nevertheless, shooting high-resolution panos still require lens entrance-pupil aligned mounts and supports. Used to do this stuff professionally 1996—2006, so occasionally it's fun to get the gear out to shoot some scenes, for instance the aftermath of yet another Blue Mountains wildfire

Taming animal spirits

There is something more systematic about the way people behave irrationally, especially during periods of economic stress (Greenspan, 2013)

Lunchtime in a George Street amusement arcade, demolished a few years later [Sep-2003 326KB]

Remarks

Having worked in the 1990s in high-pressure corporate environments, it proved difficult to find suitable metaphors outside. But then sometimes you got lucky

Here we were

Passing paths that climb halfway into the void (Yes, 1972)

Royal Coastal Track, near Wattamolla [Aug-2020 911KB]

Remarks

Roger Dean everywhere, although without the tarns or waterfalls. Instead a vista of burned scrub, courtesy of yet another deliberately-lit bushfire

Situation normal

Everything was fine, until it wasn't

Lawsons Auctions car-park, Moore Street Annandale [Sep-2015 302KB]

Remarks

Walk the suburbs for hours and sometimes you will be rewarded with the most surreal discovery

Defenestrate your livelihood

We mortgaged the future and bet it all on there not being one

Waverton Coal Loader wharf [Feb-2022 789KB]

Remarks

Although epic ruin porn is a photography cliché, sometimes you cannot ignore it. Here a barbed wire fence had to be scaled to obtain the overhead shot. The 19mm ELMARIT (11329) lens appears to suffer from pincushion distortion, but the foreground planks show that everything is as straight as it should be

Forging a new deal

The transition from manufacturing to a financialised economy was completely seamless

Derelict Ford truck at The Grounds of Alexandria. Revisited in July 2023 and by then the Ford was mostly overgrown [Apr-2018 761KB]

Remarks

How do you depict the systematic dismantling of industries, with their associated high-quality jobs for working-class people, without being tediously didactic?

Epistemic insouciance

Full speed ahead for transient high-rollers from the sky (ABC News, 2020)

Crown casino construction, Barangaroo [Jan-2020 212KB]

Remarks

Taken during the erection of Packer's Pecker. It's difficult to exaggerate the thrall in which gambling wagering was held by politicians, most of the general public and the advertising-revenue-hungry media

Potemkin Prosperity

The central irony of the financial crisis was that while it was caused by too much confidence, too much borrowing & lending and too much spending — it could only be resolved with more confidence, more borrowing & lending, and more spending (Summers, 2011)

Fields of green shoots at the Westpac plaza in Sydney [Jan-2014 520KB]

Remarks

This image is a photomontage of two shots joined via a false horizon. Although always fascinated by the glibness of the expression green shoots, it required a lot of exploration to find a corporate environment which actually had them

Think small

A charismatic and perfectionist architect; Engineers hamstrung by 1960s tech; A meddling public broadcaster; Timorous bureaucrats; Conservative politicians out for revenge… The Sydney Opera House looked magnificent from afar, but up close it was riddled with problems caused by years of indecision, controversy, compromise and bickering

Domestic fountain at Church Street, Croydon [Sep-2016 481KB]

Remarks

After seven years Jørn Utzon was forced out of the country in 1966, supposedly because of ineptitude during the design and construction of SOH Stages I & II (the podium and shells). It then took the Minister for Public Works and his team another seven years to complete Stage III (the performance halls and windows), resulting in a 3× cost blow-out and some of the worst acoustics and sightlines in the world. These were finally rectified by the 50th anniversary renovations, completed in 2022

Malpractice with impunity

The very first document, among more than a hundred in this folder, is a written admission by our client that he mixed up his patients and accidentally did a full hysterectomy on the 36-year-old plaintiff. Correction — our client is [redacted], not the surgeon, who is merely a policy holder of our client. Thanks. The surgeon admits, in writing, that he sterilised the plaintiff by doing an unauthorised procedure. This is undisputed — so why is this matter dragging for years with requests for interrogatories, updated medical reports and dozens of discovery hearings? Well, it is our firm's policy to comprehensively test all claims to discourage frivolous ones. The surgeon has admitted negligence, so it cannot be “frivolous” and, frankly, our stalling borders upon unconscionable. I'll say it again: it is our firm's policy to test all claims to discourage frivolous ones…

The ghosts of lawyering among the tombstones at Camperdown cemetery, Newtown [Jun-2015 407KB]

Remarks

It took a long time to find a scene which symbolised our stratified health system. The accompanying blurb is a paraphrased version of an April 1992 law-firm conversation between the myself and a medical-litigation partner (represented in italics)

What mean these stones?

We were at the beginning of a mass extinction, and all we could talk about was money and fairytales of eternal economic growth (Thundberg, 2019)

Iron slag at the Blast Furnace Park in Lithgow [Aug-2012 331KB]

Remarks

Another early Hasselblad 120 image, but one which became the main inspiration for this project. Had always wanted to buy a V-System 6×6 camera, but could only afford it in 2010 when they started being dumped onto the second-hand market. My project at the time had been a bit aimless, even if some of the shots were okay. Then a trip to Lithgow and this shot changed everything

A fit country for heroes to live in

With a place for everyone and everyone in their place

Unhoused on Pitt Street Mall, Sydney [May-2016 450KB]

Remarks

The Sydney CBD was overrun with panhandlers who mostly positioned themselves in doorways and major thoroughfares to maximise their earning potential. I noticed this particular juxtaposition at a busy outdoor mall and came back a couple of days later to photograph it. Was amazed that neither council rangers nor police had asked them to move on

Precipitous descent

Decades of wandering through a hostile terrain, only to flounder in the sea

Ocean cliffs south of Little Marley, Royal National Park NSW [Aug-2020 544KB]

Remarks

This is a hand-held multi-image sequence, which had to be taken by carefully rotating the camera around the lens entrance-pupil. With a calibrated pano-mount it's easy, but had to eyeball it here as the mount was left at home to keep the hiking weight down. Luckily there were only a few significant stitching errors which had to be fixed in post

Braving the abyss

Despite challenging market conditions, and a negative return for your superannuation this year, we continue to deliver strong long-term returns. […] Significant market falls can be worrying, but staying invested remains vitally important. […] When we invest your super, our approach is focussed on the long term, to help maximise your retirement savings. But it also manages short-term risks in times like these. I want to reassure you, our members, that we remain committed to investing to help you achieve your best retirement outcomes. Bulk email from the CEO of Aware Super, 2022-07-08

Waterrun cliff-side, RNP [Aug-2020 668KB]

Remarks

Waterrun is a dramatic rock-shelf in the Royal National Park. The narrow river valley is surrounded by 50m cliffs, the tops of which allowed an overhead view. Unfortunately you had to climb out to the very edge of these things to get the best shots. Have done it twice, there won't be a third time…

Yellow Lambos to the moon

It was an era of unending optimism. Vast fortunes were effortlessly made. Families prospered, inflation was beaten and credit was easy at near-zero rates (until 2022). Average mums & dads became CEOs, collected NFTs and bet on cryptocurrencies. Stock markets inexorably rose, while house values appreciated to what looked like a permanently high plateau…

Living statue performer at Circular Quay [Jul-2017 253KB]

Remarks

A simple, almost throw-away candid shot acquires sinister meaning when you notice the children were prodding a stuffed crocodile

Lifelong entanglement

We would have followed you anywhere

Bethesda Terrace, Central Park NYC [Oct-2017 658KB]

Remarks

Noticed a family having portraits taken among the Central Park crowds. Most of the poses were rigidly formal, but one set-up produced this arrangement while mother and child waited for the photographer to adjust his gear

In the days of the citizen journalist

Broadcast-quality equipment was no longer required to craft good stories

Media-workers at the Sydney Opera House [Jul-2014 210KB]

Remarks

Media-workers had to adapt to a new environment for which they were mostly unprepared. How were they going to survive in an increasingly interconnected world, where they had to not only be proficient in delivering content, but also in using the increasingly complex tech which made it all possible?

It just works

Release now, patch later

Jensen Avenue at Dover Heights [Nov-2016 306KB]

Remarks

One of the most irritating things as a web-developer in the early 2000s was having to release feature-bloated software while it was still incomplete. Go-go management would often make wildly optimistic promises, which then fell upon us coders to deliver. So inevitably the software ended up being half-baked and bug-ridden. Which often turned out to be unintentionally fair, as many clients lacked the ability to pay their invoices and only wanted to bask in the glow of being thought of as dot-com entrepreneurs

Ponzimonium

Jeffrey Keith Skilling (Enron Corp); Walter Forbes (Cendant Corp); Richard Fuld (Lehman Brothers); Bernard Lawrence Madoff (Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities LLC); Satoshi Nakamoto (Bitcoin); Ruja Ignatova (OneCoin); Markus Braun (Wirecard); Sam Bankman-Fried (FTX); Kwon Do-Hyung (Terraform Labs); Changpeng Zhao (Binance); Sergei Panteleevich Mavrodi (MMM Global); Elizabeth Anne Holmes (Theranos Inc.)

Wedding Cake Rock, RNP [Jul-2019 211KB]

Remarks

Wedding Cake Rock was a social-media hotspot at the northern end of the Royal National Park. Standard barriers were erected to stop people from posing on the rock's edge, not only to prevent them from falling to their deaths (there had been a few), but also to preserve the geological structure for as long as possible. The irony was that despite the fence, many selfie-lovers were still climbing over and through the obstructions to get their snaps. So a few months later a higher, reinforced, cliff-edge to cliff-edge impenetrable mesh wall was installed

Keep us from harm

Every potential hazard was fastidiously identified and ameliorated

Drink bubbler at Erskineville Public School, Sydney [Aug-2019 293KB]

Remarks

Having taught at a high school since 2009, it was always fascinating to witness the lengths that some risk-averse adults would go. This primary school drinking fountain illustrates it beautifully. Here the irony is that (1) most small children now cannot reach the water and (2) the hazard-area has been vastly increased, negating the purpose of having safety rails in the first place

The customer was king

Everything you could ever possibly want, at your fingertips

Supermarket checkout, Nepean Village Penrith [Apr-2003 119KB]

Remarks

Taking candid photographs inside supermarkets was not easy. You were constantly monitored by staff and management, who were worried about you trying to steal information about their pricing and product displays. Consequently, a special candid rig had to be developed which, although it had my rangefinder camera clearly visible, looked like it was merely carrying the camera instead of taking photographs

Tourism added value

Macro-economic growth models prove that tourism contributes towards complete growth and development of a country: one, by bringing numerous economic value & benefits; and, second, helping in build country's brand value, image & identity (Market Width Blog, 2018)

Christmas Day tourists at the Sydney Opera House [Dec-2001 296KB]

Remarks

The “2001 Black Christmas Fires” had again flared in the Blue Mountains, turning the western sky dark red. Most people at the SOH forecourt were staring at or photographing the smoke-obscured sun, except for this couple who were far more interested in themselves

The one sure bet

One of the interesting things about the years 1982—2024 was that markets always boomed, no matter what

Financial reporter at the Sydney ASX [Oct-2018 152KB]

Remarks

The original intention was to get photos of the predicted stock-market collapse for that day — presumably the same reason the financial reporter was there. Unsurprisingly the crash didn't happen and the market rallied yet again

The well-stamped passport

Take another selfie and move on, criss-cross the planet to only find yourself

Tourists scrum at Sydney Cove [Aug-2014 165KB]

Remarks

Like most western economies, there was an enthusiastic shift in the 1980s toward relying on tourism as a foreign-exchange earning and local-jobs boosting “export”. Then came the pandemic…

Driven by unceasing mobility

Remember the physical-distancing rule and only travel when essential

Waiting for the Cronulla Ferry at Bundeena Wharf [Aug-2020 305KB]

Remarks

During the lockdowns we were subjected to frequent messaging about social isolation and avoiding “unnecessary” travel. This image was taken at the end of a 28km Royal Coast Track walk, and the commuters' weariness mirrored the photographer's fatigue

Community standards

Our suburbs were strewn with eye-popping enticements from agile entrepreneurs

Dulwich Hill skate park [Sep-2015 113KB]

Remarks

The “sneakers thrown over power-lines” meme was comprehensively addressed by TikTok™ contributors: Some people do it just to be annoying. Some people do it as a memorial to a dead friend. Some people do it to advertise a drug dealer territory. Some people do it because they've seen it done and just think it's funny (Daily Mail UK, 2020)

Look back in covfefe

Part of being a winner is knowing when enough is enough. Sometimes you have to give up the fight and walk away, and move on to something that's more productive (Trump, 1987)

Trump impersonator on Broadway, NYC [Oct-2017 335KB]

Remarks

The election of the 45th US President in 2016 unleashed a torrent of invective from progressive activists, news-workers and academics. Many railed against “Trumpism” for years, as if all the op-eds and impeachment attempts and special counsels and house select committees and pussyhats and politically-timed indictments could reverse everything

Woke up this morning

With their exclusive focus on representation and identity, gallerists & curators agreed that contemporary art could only appreciated in complete blackness

Adrián Villar Rojas' “The End of Imagination”, AGNSW [Dec-2022 107KB]

Remarks

We were given plenty of opportunity to celebrate the Reductio ad absurdum of Art Practitioners. Aside: this was almost the final image in the project due to my heart attack a couple weeks later in January 2023

Cut-through messaging

Make your mark, repeat, move on

Vandalised rail-car at the Zigzag railway, subsequently destroyed by the 2019 summer bushfires, Clarence [Jul-2019 522KB]

Remarks

Photography as a time capsule. Found this abandoned rail-car while walking along the decommissioned Zig Zag rail line at Clarence in the Blue Mountains. Apparently it was still scheduled for restoration, despite being extensively vandalised. A few months later another wildfire swept through the area, and this time the carriage was completely destroyed

Bubble watch

Rising property prices were carefully manipulated to create more economic winners than losers

Spectators on the steps of the former CBC Bank, Martin Place [Apr-2006 278KB]

Remarks

This image was taken during the 2006 Anzac Day march, when everyone on the bank's steps looked up to watch planes fly over. What made the shot difficult was getting the timing right when using a film-based Hasselblad, mounted onto a monopod and triggered by a mechanical cable release

Ghosts of the CBD

The C-Suite resorted to upbeat-slogans, pleading and coercion to get employees to return to their city offices

Commuters at the new Central station northern concourse [Jul-2023 352KB]

Remarks

Candid people photography became a much riskier business than it was last century. Luckily people are so accustomed to seeing mobile phones used that when they see someone with an actual camera, then they assume it's only for shooting mundane things like flowers or birds or grandchildren

North to Avoska

Before mobile phones, perhaps-bags accompanied us everywhere

Totes diptych at Hornsby and Wynyard, Sydney [Apr-2005 248KB]

Remarks

Behind the Iron Curtain during the Cold War, people always carried shopping bags in case goods become available. Here in the west there were rarely shortages, but people carried similar bags nonetheless

The tallest tombstones in the world

Arithmétique Macabre: 9 / 11 = 2977 + 60 000

Church spire beneath a flight path, at Rockdale in Sydney [Dec-2013 149KB]

Remarks

The impact of the September 2001 Islamist attacks cannot be overstated. It has seeped into our culture in numerous ways, not least the ongoing apprehension that yet another crisis could come along at any time to smash things up again

The efficiency dividend playbook

A land full of equal opportunity, where respect for property, hard work, fair-play and fiscal prudence guaranteed a prosperous life

Darling Point ferry wharf, Sydney [Jan-2017 283KB]

Remarks

A pleasant summer afternoon transformed into an object lesson in social stratification, at the ferry wharf to one of Sydney's wealthiest suburbs

Late for the sky

The air was eaten, promise crammed

The final blast-furnace at BlueScope Steel, in Port Kembla [Sep-2014 97KB]

Remarks

“Scheduled Trackwork” meant having to catch replacement buses between Wollongong and Port Kembla. The problem was that they were infrequent and unpredictable. So had to catch a suburban service instead, which went up and down every side-street before eventually arriving at the final destination. Meanwhile, during the amazingly indirect journey, the weather clouded over and completely trashed the light. But after such a l-o-n-g trip you may as well walk out to the steelworks anyway. And then, as if on cue, the clouds parted and steam started to billow from the blast furnace chimney…

The memories we created

We knew exactly how the future will remember us

Tree growing in the old Fosters brewery wall (since demolished), at Chippendale in Sydney [Apr-2014 552KB]

Remarks

Had photographed the small tree a few times earlier, but got lucky this time when a couple of pigeons inserted themselves into the frame. A few months later the wall (and tree) was demolished when the Central Park development neared completion

Back in the CCCP

The centralised command economy disintegrated almost immediately

Street vendors on the day the Belavezha Accords were signed, Tverskaya St Moscow [Dec-1991 248KB]

Remarks

A lot of patience was required to capture this image. Dozens of people were milling around in front of the vendors, checking out the items being offered. So had to wait a long time (45 minutes in the freezing cold) for the crowd to part just enough to reveal the sellers behind. Found out later that most street sellers had lost their jobs in the post-communist dislocation, and were attempting to hawk their valuables to get some money to live on

Stakeholder

One could either use General Relativity equations to derive the Schwarzschild metric in n-dimensions, or else go shopping

Supermarket freezer aisle, Katoomba [Dec-2003 98KB]

Remarks

Again a custom Leica candid rig had to be used, with the added complication of having a supermarket employee discreetly following me around to ensure I wasn't photographing trade-secrets

The shadow workforce

The solution to mass unemployment was as simple as redefining what was meant by “employed”

Red flags at the Circular Quay promenade [Jul-1992 475KB]

Remarks

Taken from the Cahill Expressway, looking down at the paving at Circular Quay. What appears to be a huge knife was actually the shadow of a banner flapping in the wind

Cargo Culte

We lounged about in ill-fitting uniforms, languidly pressing buttons on small screens… waiting for the day He would return, bearing great gifts

Palm tree outside the abandoned St Mary & St Mina's Coptic Orthodox Church at Sydenham. Five years later it was damaged by fire in May 2017 and subsequently demolished [Sep-2012 355KB]

Remarks

It required a lot of patience to capture this Hasselblad image. This was mainly due to the timing and positioning of the aeroplane(s), which would often approach from different angles and spoil the composition. Or else you would get a small turboprop when what you wanted was a thundering 747, or sometimes for long periods there wouldn't be any planes at all. Either way, when shooting digital with a high FPS shutter it isn't an issue, but with A12 film backs you only had a dozen manually-wound shots to get it right

From lab to stage

What was once esoteric technology confined to a research lab, was now routinely used for entertainment

Stage technician, Campbells Cove Sydney [Jan-2019 234KB]

Remarks

Had been wanting for years to capture an image which not only celebrated the amazing capabilities of modern technology, but also hinted at the alienation it could cause

Magic sponge

During mass at our spiritual home in St. Bernardino, the archreferee would hold aloft the Sacred Sphere and bestow upon us His most holy blessing: Kind friends, VVIPs, WAGs and Ultras, we are gathered here on St. Totteringham's Day to drink beers and throw flares. To give 110% when sports-washing the unsaved. To throw sardines into the sea from the back of the trawler. To find the back of the net, a little with the head of Maradona and a little with the hand of God. For winners forever win big, and losers must fall hard. So please take a knee and raise your Vuvuzelas for the national benediction: Our Footy, who art in heaven, hallowed by Thy game. Thy Kingdom score, thy bets be more, on phones as it is in Qatar. In nomine Blatter, et FIFA, et Spiritus Alea… You may now invade the pitch

Sports promotion at Olympic Park [Aug-2017 188KB]

Remarks

St. Bernardino

Patron saint of behaviour modification advertising, communications & compulsive gambling wagering

Sacred Sphere

A hollow spherical object made of suitable material, with an external circumference between 680—700mm and mass of 0.41—0.45kg, and inflated to an interior pressure of 60.795—101.325 kPa at sea level

VVIPs

Very — very — important people

WAGs

Highly accomplished Wives & Girlfriends of players

Ultras

Highly accomplished association football fans noted for their black hoodies, self-restraint and civilised behaviour during pitch invasions

St Totteringham's Day

The day celebrated by Arsenal fans when Tottenham can no longer outrank them in the League table

110%

Spectator sport is the only known exemption to the 1st Law of Thermodynamics

Sports-washing

The role of media-workers when reporting physical recreation events

Throw sardines […] trawler

King Eric's 1995 epigram

Hand of God […]

The 1986 FIFA World Cup miraculous goal

Vuvuzelas

The national wind instrument of South Africa

Qatar

A Gulf petro-state which has denied any wrongdoing, ever

Blatter

Highly accomplished 8th President of FIFA from 1998 to 2015

FIFA

Federation Internationale de Football Association

Alea

Latin: “game of chance”

Outwardness within

The world was only as small as you could make it

Sightseeing at The Balconies, Royal National Park NSW [Aug-2019 634KB]

Remarks

The northern part of the Royal National Park tended to be overrun by day-trippers on weekends. Most of them spent their time posing for selfies, but occasionally you can also find people reflecting on what they saw

PETM reloaded

Nine-month summers, super El Niños, category-five hurricanes, wildfires, methane fumaroles, acidified oceans, cubic-kilometres of eutrophication and rivers awash with millions of dead fish. Years of drought followed by months of flooding rain. Millennium events every five years. Every decade and season among the hottest on record. The hottest July in 120k years. The sixth mass extinction. Aim low for +1.5°C and overshoot by at least 100%

Truck exhaust pipes at Woolloomooloo, in Sydney's east [Oct-2012 115KB]

Remarks

We lived in a world where roads were filled with 2-3 tonne petrol-guzzling monsters, racing each other to their own demise

Defence renaissance

After decades of cutbacks and savings, governments renewed spending on armaments and personnel

Anzac Day Air Force personnel, Hyde Park Sydney [Apr-2023 300KB]

Remarks

After a long break following my heart-attack in Jan 2023, it was good to be back doing candid shots of people up close. For a change used the SEL1655G, an outstanding lens despite its excessive barrel distortion at wider angles

Some semblance of community

Democracy continued to best serve those who were most invested

NSW election voting centre at Town Hall [Mar-2019 543KB]

Remarks

One of the great themes of the last forty years has been the gradual unravelling of western democracy. One could say it started with Watergate in June 1972, but you could also argue it began much earlier with the assassination of JFK in November 1963

Forget your past

Architectural awards counted for little when it came to prime development sites

Darling Harbour Conference Centre demolition, Sydney [Apr-2014 238KB]

Remarks

It was ironic to discover that the Darling Harbour buildings which were lauded in the 1980s for their innovative design, should thirty years later become yet more fodder for redevelopment