At last! We have a working camera after two protracted visits to the repair shop and finally the purchase of a used lens through ebay. The old lens was the problem, as it turned out, not registering anything with the camera body. I kept getting “error 99,” whatever that meant, when I tried to take a picture. So my little blog, with all its high-flung intentions, went neglected until I could post pictures.
After the lens arrived in the mail today I immediately attached it to the camera and fired off a couple test shots from inside and outside the house. Success! I then carried my painting outside for its long-awaited photo shoot and took some shots to transform via Photoshop. Digital images are so much easier than taking slides as you used to have to do. Now I don’t have to worry about what’s surrounding the painting, I just crop it out in the image preparation. After some futzing with the tripod and then a little touch-up after looking at the photos on my computer, the images are ready.
The painting is called “Unloaded,” and is a fair depiction of a familiar scene in a souk, or marketplace, in about any of the major cities in Morocco. This one is actually in Fez, but the important thing is that burros, such as the one standing prominently in the foreground of the painting, provide the predominant means of transporting goods into the market. Their ability to handle huge, heavy loads, their sure-footedness, and their resilience makes them the perfect adaptable transport. Not to mention the narrow, twisting corridors of the souks that they can easily traverse, which don’t lend themselves well to trucks of any size.
I like the strong geometric sense and contrasts of the composition. There is a hardness in those strong lines, reflective of the toughness of the donkey.