Cape Town Daily Photo
Cape Town Daily Photo
Blog: Cape Town Daily Photo
Type: Photo
I am not a great one for photo blogs but this one had an unfair advantage with me. The first ten years of my life were spent in that beautiful city at the southern tip of Africa and so I was interested as soon as I saw the blog’s name.
It did not disappoint me. The photographers have an ability to see interest and beauty in unexpected places and their photographs are a pleasure to look at, although many could have been taken in any city in the world. That is part of what they have to say, however – that, although set in unparalleled scenery and an exotic place for most of us, yet it has aspects that are familiar to us too.
The photos that were identifiably of the Cape were the ones that won me over, however. And, when I came to the post named Snowflake, all my resistance collapsed. When I was very young, my father bought a painting by a local artist and that picture hung on our dining room wall throughout the first twenty years of my life. It depicted Cape Town docks and the Snowflake flour silo loomed large in it. In fact, it was larger than life for my father told us that, before he sold it, the artist quickly made the building larger, so much so that it was, on consideration, out of proportion to the ships in the harbor. This was for composition purposes, for it was not noticeable until you had spent your youth looking at the picture from across a dining table.
Clearly the painting entered deeply into my unconscious mind for the sight of the photo in this blog brought the memories flooding back. And now I have admitted why I chose to write about the blog.
But it has other qualities too, aside from my personal experience. The authors have written about each photo, giving us some background and helping us to appreciate what we are seeing. Too often photo blogs expect the photo to tell all and they become an endless series of meaningless snapshots as a result. Only the very best of photos can stand up to that sort of treatment.
The blog design is simple and unobtrusive, the black background drawing the eye immediately to the pictures, the lack of adornment around the edges adding to this effect. It is a design entirely without pretension or clutter. And I like that.
So there we have it, a snippet of me and a snippet of them. Go take a look at one of the most beautiful cities in the world by clicking on the header up there.
