Wednesday, February 24, 2010

Simply Thanks . . .

And before I go any further with tales of la Réunion, I would be remiss to not extend a great big thank you, mille fois merci, to Bernard and Valorie, who were our gracious hosts for a good part of our stay on that fascinating island. So if you happen to see this, well, really, we just can't thank you enough for your lovely hospitality. And I would especially like to thank Valorie, who very quickly realized what sorts of things I was interested in photographing, and she offered to stop on many occasions so I could get out of the car and put the camera to work on old wrecks of cars, abandoned buildings, interesting graffiti, and so forth. And it was she who spotted the light in the room here silhouetting an array of objects on shelves by the window one night, and asked if I maybe wanted to try to get a shot of it . . . which I proceeded to do from the car window. Many thanks V., couldn't have done it without you !
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13 comments:

CiCi said...

Good eye, Valorie. This is indeed a great photo. Sounds like you were fortunate to have gracious hosts while at the island.

Steve said...

And this hasn't been photoshopped? (Hush my mouth to even suggest such a thing!) Love the purple shadows superimposed on the wall... a real "wow" photo.

:: Karine :: said...

hello my dearest friend (on peut l'écrire comme ça ?!)

c'est une photo mystérieuse, envoûtante et pleine de charme owen !
tu as raison de remercier tes amis car il faut parfois de la patience pour ceux qui accompagnent des photographes passionnés :-)

merci pour tes mots doux chez moi et pour ta présence qui me fait toujours chaud au coeur !

merci owen adoré et très belle journée

Anonymous said...

Nice team work!

Jim

Lynne with an e said...

So who needs Photoshop?! Very artistic and intriguing. Nice team work. Sounds like you certainly lucked out with your hosts, full of patience and complicity, in the very best sense of the word.

I'm liking the contrast of dark and light, the warm tones, the wavy, distorted lines of the pot shapes vs the straight horizontals of the blind. I wonder if this would have been a picture, had you spotted the window first, that you would have captured unprompted? I do like how it's framed, with the dark imprints of the leaves. Actually, I bet I could have some fun with it in Photoshop...but why gild the lily. :-)

BLOGitse said...

I like these 'rough' or 'raw' pics of yours...
You do have a good eye!

BLOGitse

Selina Kingston said...

Another great one! I'm in awe of you people who have such a great eye...

La Framéricaine said...

Ooooohhhh! Aaaaahhhh!

Lovely image. Dreamy. Very "The Year of Living Dangerously."

Owen said...

TechnoB, very fortunate indeed, the cream of the cream...

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Hey Steve, bite your tongue ! I don't even own a copy of photoshop... this one is straight up, like whiskey, I wouldn't put anything else in it...

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Bonjour Karine, Of course tu peux l'écrire comme ça, et encore, et encore...
:-)
Tu as plus que raison, il faut énormement de patience pour tolérer des photographes... je me souviens à quel point quand on était enfant que l'on pestait contre mon père qui s'arretaient tout le temps pour photographier des fleurs pendant que nous étions en balade... et maintenant je suis pareil, sauf au lieu de photogrphier toutes les fleurs, ce sont des maisons abandonnées, des usines en ruines, des enseignes étranges, des graffitis qui m'attirent... j'ose espèrer que mes filles comprennent un peu au moins, et qu'elles ont plus de patience que nous avec mon père...

Merci Karine ! Bonne fin de semaine à toi !

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Jim, that's it... she gets credit for the assist there, for sure !

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Hi Lynne ! We absolutely lucked out with our hosts... although la Grenouille has known them for ages, we'd never really spent any serious time with them, beyond a few dinner evenings over the past several years, and hadn't seen them at all since they left for la Reunion two years ago... so it was really wonderful that we got on so well, and V. was really making an effort to help me spot photo ops, well, she shoots alot of pictures too, so it wasn't only for my benefit... but I maybe shook up some of her ideas about subject matter a little bit.

Hey, if you'd like to try photoshopping this image a little bit, please do, I'd love to see what you would transform it into... go to town !

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Blogitse, many many thanks ! Funny you call them "raw", the file names are "raw" type files, before converting to jpeg...

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Hi Selina, what's that line from an old french movie... "tu as de beaux yeux, tu sais"... you have great eyes, you know... guess it depends how the eyes in question are used...
:-)

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Hey Fram... errrr... Pliers... the year of living very dangerously... is that the new Chinese New Year ? Personally I love the tea pot on the top shelf, kind of pulls it all together... Happy packing !
:-)

Nevine Sultan said...

That's nice, Owen, to thank your hosts for their hospitality. I'm sure they enjoyed your company tremendously. And it seems Valorie has a great eye, either that, or you're just contagious!

I notice a spoon holder in that melee of kitchen items, and in there is a wooden spoon with a hole in it. Yes, yes, I know those are supposed to serve a certain purpose, but I have a traumatic dream memory with those particular spoons. And in your photo she's all wriggly and wiggly, and yikes! That dream is jumping out from behind my eyes. So, I'm going to just tuck it back into oblivion and say this, a question: Why is it every time I come to visit your photos trigger something? Though this memory is haunting for me, Nevine loves it, because now she has something pleasant with which to associate it in the future. So, there you are, Owen!

Nevine

Owen said...

Nevine, I am more than glad to be of service, in whatever small way, even as just a facilitator of sorts... so glad your dreamscape connected with this photo and found a point of anchor to weather future storms of uncertainties. And the tea pot on the shelf here, if you will rub it just a moment, a genie will emerge, and grant you three wishes ...

Ann said...

how beautiful.......i can say no more!!

Karine A said...

quelle jolie photo !
on dirait une tableau...