We collected another eight metal prints from Orms Print Room in Cape Town last week. They’re going to be showcased in Metamorphosis, my fringe exhibition at the Johan Carinus Art Centre during the National Arts Festival 2018. The four monochrome prints are pictured here. They’re unusual because they don’t have any white. Instead the brushed aluminium shines through and the grain from the metal gives a great texture.
Metamorphosis is my theme for this years’s exhibition on the Arts Festival Fringe at the Johan Carinus Art Centre. I’ve got 50+ images and more than 40 are new so with less than three months before opening I’m in constant communication with printers in Cape Town (Orms Print Room) and Port Elizabeth (Walker Digital).
I’m also really excited about my online store for digital downloads. All of the images from Metamorphosis will be there in low resolution (suitable for web sites) and high resolution (suitable for print) versions. There’ll be an announcement here once it opens for business.
My popular series of Grahamstown landscapes will be a feature in the exhibition and the first batch of these prints have just arrived. I’m using different photographic paper this year: Hahnemühle German Etching. I really like the texture and print quality that the paper gives. You can’t really see that in this slideshow so you’ll just have to come along to the Johan Carinus Art Centre for the full experience! The exhibition’s open from 9am to 5pm for the duration of the Festival from 28 June to 8 July.
This last weekend we hung 14 of the pictures from my Hogsback Series at the Wild Fox Hill Eco-Cabin. You can see the full series of 17 images (with prices and full descriptions) beneath the slideshow. They are printed on brushed aluminium Dibond by Orms Print Room which gives them great impact. At the end of June they’ll move down to Grahamstown for the duration of the National Arts Festival 2018 where they’ll be showcased in my exhibition ‘Metamorphosis’ at the Johan Carinus Art Centre. Contact roddyfox@mac.com if you are interested in buying (the prices here don’t include postage) or come and enjoy them during your stay at the cabin (it’s on Airbnb) whilst you are in Hogsback.
Madonna and Child Waterfall (297 x 420 mm) R1250
Madonna and Child
39 Steps Waterfall (400 x 400 mm) R1500
39 Steps Waterfall
Swallow Tail Falls (297 x 420 mm) R1250
SwallowTail Falls
The Big Tree (297 x 420 mm) R1250
The Big Tree
Redwood Trees (297 x 420 mm) R1250
Redwoods
Twining Trees (297 x 420 mm) R1250
Twining Trees
Misty Morning View (297 x 420 mm) R1250
Misty Morning View
The Military Path (297 x 420 mm) R1250
The Military Path
Dawn Light over Hogsback (400 x 400 mm) R1500
Dawn Light
Star Trails over Wild Fox Hill (400 x 400 mm) R1500
Star Trails over Wild Fox Hill
Moonrise over the Three Hogs (420 x 297) R1250
Moonrise over the Three Hogs
Tor Doone in the Mist (420 x 297 mm) R1250
Tor Doone in the Mist
Red Hot Pokers (420 x 297 mm) R1250
Red Hot Pokers
Three Hogs and Three Dogs (420 x 297 mm) R1250
Three Hogs and Three Dogs
Dream Forest (420 x 297 mm) R1250
Dream Forest
Misty Road (420 x 297 mm) R1250
Misty Road
Elandsberg Panorama (1000 x 374 mm) R3500
Elandsberg Panorama
It’s an unusual place – Grahamstown – located in a basin at the headwaters of the Kowie river. The poor black population in the eastern townships look across to the middle class suburbs on the other side of the valley. There are not many South African cities where black and white are so closely juxtaposed. I live in Sunnyside, on the south side of town, and our house is quite high up on the side of a hill. A lot of my pictures look down into the valley. I’m frequently photographing into the light too. The cathedral is nearby – further down Hill Street – with the northern suburbs lying beyond. Makana’s Kop is another Grahamstown landmark. It dominates the eastern side of town – across the Belmont Valley.
I wanted a set of black and white pictures so I needed to capture textures and shapes. South African townships are typically laid out on rectangular lines. This makes for clear compositions. The two pictures here were both taken in winter with low angled light. Before dawn Vukani was wreathed in mist and smoke. I managed to catch the first rays of sunlight cutting across the mists. Monument to Makana was taken just after a storm had passed at sunset. Highlights of rain outline the regular street patterns. The 1820 Settlers Monument is the large rectangular building that lies in the foreground of the picture.
In summer we are likely to get thunderstorms – but many of them drift eastwards past the town. From the stoep of our house you can see them over the horizon – behind the spire of the Dutch Reformed Church. Of course some of them do hit the town bringing heavy rain and dramatic lightning.
Off to the north west is the Rhodes University campus. It’s surrounded by tree lined streets. Some exotic monkey puzzle trees are in the foreground of this picture. Belmont Valley lies to the south east. It’s where the Kowie River runs down to the sea. The leafy suburbs shown here are above and below Hill Street. They are beside the old road down to Port Alfred.
The last two pictures are also taken from the south side of town. They’re higher up – on Mountain Drive – where we take our dog walking. Both of them are looking right over the bowl containing the old districts of Grahamstown. The townships have now spread right up Lavender Valley and out on to the plateau at Hooggenoeg. The mountains on the skyline are the Amatolas. The last picture is looking north-west – into the semi-arid Karoo. It shows the Winterberg range that is approximately 80 kms away.
Contact me at roddyfox@mac.com if you’d like to purchase any of these images. They’re reasonably priced. All of the pictures were taken with my Olympus OMD EM5 MarkII. I’ve edited them in Lightroom using the Nik collection of plugins.
We will be missing two Poetry at Reddits occasions whilst we are away in Sweden: my contributions are here though. There are two of WS Merwin’s poems and one of my pictures of Hogback’s trees. All inspired by Beth Moon’s special book Ancient Trees: Portraits of Time – thank you Kate for the wonderful gift.
Twining Trees at Hogsback
Trees
I am looking at trees
they may be one of the things I will miss
most from the earth
though many of the ones I have seen
already I cannot remember
and though I seldom embrace the ones I see
and have never been able to speak
with one
I listen to them tenderly
their names have never touched them
they have stood round my sleep
and when it was forbidden to climb them
they have carried me in their branches
The picture I’ve chosen also reminds me of another of his poems, I think because of the way the trees twine around each other.
Separation
Your absence has gone through me
Like thread through a needle.
Everything I do is stitched with its color.
Looking forward to our next Reddits in October!
We’ve been having lovely autumn weather with clear air, blue skies and low angle light that brings out all the changing colours. I’ve tried to capture this in these images and combined them into one pattern of autumn harmony.
Autumn Harmonies
Going clockwise from the top right the inspiration was a bare tree in front of the after sunset glow. At bottom right is a red leaf in a sea of green foliage. The bottom left picture is a flower in the bracken and the top left is the bark of a birch tree. Here’s how the bare tree looked.
Bare Tree and Belt of Venus
And here’s a detail of how it looked after combining and overlaying the image eight times.
Autumn Harmony detail
I’m often asked if my images are for sale and the answer is yes. I’m exhibiting again on the fringe of the National Arts Festival at the Johan Carinus Art Centre, Grahamstown from 29 June to 9 July. If you’d like to purchase one of these, for example, then just email me using this contact me link and I’ll provide a quote. Cost for a high resolution 50cm width print of Autumn Harmonies will be approximately R1000 including packaging and courier to South African destinations. I have also organised having prints made and delivered overseas.
