London, day two.  Well, blog two.  Beneath the images we all know we should see, is a feeling about London.  Centuries.  Wisdom.  Literature.  Architecture.  Color.  People.    Beyond what to see is the personal experience of the journey.  The spirit of London, the aura of the journey.  These images try to tell those stories.  Want more?

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The Eastern State Penitentiary in Philadelphia was built in 1825, served until 1971, and represented an intense and compassionate approach to imprisonment–isolation and anonymity as vehicles for repentence.  Even today the power of the architecture and the sense of isolation challenge both the camera and the visitor.

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On October 30, 2009, a local Albuquerque radio station strung bras across one of the bridges that cross the Rio Grande River, the Montano Bridge, to raise awareness of the need for research for a cure for breast cancer. The bras were later donated to a shelter. I saw this as an opportunity to photograph something in nature that is not found in nature and that is rarely even seen in public. As it turned out, the colors of some of the bras exactly complimented the autumn colors of the fauna along the river and the sky above the river, and a social statement blended with an aesthetic value.

More of my work can be found at: www.zhibit.org/janswan

Jan is a fine art photographer living in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

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I particularly like the way that Bruce has pushed the color, creating powerful visual impact. I’m drawn to both the color and the composition. Hope you enjoy the photos as much as I do. Here’s what Bruce says:

“My photographic intention is to find what is beyond the picture. I try to find a spirit in the image, a sense of what is present even when we can’t quite articulate it. Staying true to that principle, the original photograph focuses on the spirit that draws me. Later, in “the darkroom,” I look more closely for what I feel is the source of that spirit and by cropping and pushing things like contrast, brightness and color saturation I develop the image that satisfies me, and I give it a name, and I file it.” – Bruce Wagner, professor in the Intellectual Heritage department at Temple University.

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