Today I went to the monthly meeting of Viewfinders, the English-speaking photography club of Brussels.
I joined Viewfinders about a year ago. I find the Club’s meetings consistently inspiring and thought-provoking. Usually the meeting is built around a presentation by one or several photographers of their work and experiences. From time to time, the club also organises challenges and assignments, where members can submit their photos which would compete against each other. During the December meeting for example the theme of the challenge was Night Photography. It was quite refreshing to look at different people’s takes on this subject and to see the preferences of the judge and the public.
This time around the main presentation was by Natalie Hill. Natalie is an English photographer who lives and works in Brussels. I found the most interesting part of her presentation to be some images that she made while living and working in China: a sequence about a native Uyghur rocker from the Autonomous Region of Xinjiang, with which I associate particular memories, as well as a striking image of a 22-year wealthy expat enjoying his bath in a flat in a high-rise overlooking Shanghai. Natalie originally studied film and she showed some of her motion work, I particularly liked a very touching ad she made for the Missing Children Europe campaign. The ad is done using Canon 5D Mark II – which again demonstrates the amazing possibilities of this camera.
This is always a tcriky subject. Getting in another person’s face, without their consent, in order to take a photo is just downright rude and disrespectful. I think I’d actually scold a stranger for doing it if I saw it happening. I’m not sure where you draw the line on this it’s vague and fuzzy, and some people obviously have more stringent guidelines than others. If I were to take a photo of a stranger, but they looked visibly uncomfortable or a bit alarmed afterwards, I’d delete it. Now as for adorable kids honestly it depends. If a child is playing or looks happy, fine. I’m always very uncomfortable with photos of kids from 3rd world countries where they look sad, unless it’s from a news publication.