I like your swans. It’s hard to write about seemingly everyday things (although nice swans are rare, really) well, and without seeming sentimental, but you manage it. I like how your work is gentle, and rooted in nature without being a protest poem (although this isn’t me dissing eco poetry, I think that’s important too & I love some ecopoetry - but yours is quiet, full of craft, and effective in a way that is uniquely of its own).
Anyway, cool swans.
A codicil - I know nothing about photography. I work with photographers, I admire their work, and they could be talking Greek for all I understand. So this is very subjective feedback.
I like your swans and houses, and I like that image not just because of the swans, but because of the juxtaposition with the backs of the houses (important that it’s the back of houses, not their facades).
I love the colours in the colour version, and prefer that to the black and white. You could, if you wanted to, experiment with using something like
colour splash - - but I think it would look gimmicky and wouldn’t do the subject justice. But it is the colour version of that image that is my favourite of all those posted.
The green tones in the ‘trio’ are lovely, and it’s as if the swans have posed for you! It ‘feels’ to me like the image has been digitally retouched in some way (I could very well be wrong) but again, the colours are gorgeous.
I think this bodes so well for your blog. I am (of course) not sure, but I hope you put these together with your swan poetry to illustrate/amplify/dialogue with the words. And also to promote on social media if you are going to do that. The latest WordPress template is quite nice, btw. I’ve been experimenting with it. It might be worth having a play with it (if you can ever find the time) and upload some of your images - that way you can also put them inline in your eratosphere posts if you want to (I can show you how to do that if it helps- I’m getting less busy at work now).
I’ll come back to look again at the swans/houses image. Have you read
Berger’s ‘Ways of Seeing’? It’s old but I still love it. And there's an interview with Berger on youtube which talks through the ideas, too.
I like how your ways of seeing the swans relates them, and their familial circle, as central, the houses relegated to a watching distance. I like how it presents a picture of an urban environment that isn’t all brutalist architecture.
Sarah-Jane