Hermanus, December 2023

The critic David Campany said something like,’ At a specific point, photography gave up its surface for that of its subject.’

Photographing this kid about to hit the brawling surf, with an old film camera, did a couple of things: The low film ISO forced me to use a slow shutter speed which blurred the rocks slightly and confused their materiality, and this added a dimension of flux and instability to the ‘kid jumping from a rock into the sea’ photographic trope; the lack of sharpness thrusts the image into the realm of the painterly which renders the scene emblematic and gestural, rather than particular and fixed; trying to slot within the limitations of the F3 while stumbling ungracefully across the rocks resulted in the wonky horizon.

Generally, as the dirty toes leave the rock behind above the spirit level horizon, the body mediates between solid and liquid, but not this time.

Archival Inkjet on 220 GSM Baryta paper

L 100 x 60 cms edition 4 +1 a/p

M 60 x 40 cms edition of 4 +1 a/p

S 40 x 26 cms edition 2+1 a/p