Fire escapes

Fire escapes, Greenwich Village, New York, (c) Rob Walls

Fire escape, Kodak House, Hobart, Tasmania (c) Rob Walls

 

Sunrise on Salamanca Market, Hobart

It’s nearly three months since I last posted here. 2011 was probably the most intense year of picture taking in the 50 years that I’ve been a photographer. In the last year or so, I’ve driven almost 50,000 kilometres across Australia photographing work for my project, This Working Life. By the end of last year, I had reached a point where I could feel that burn-out was imminent. Left with the choice of taking pictures or blogging, I decided to neglect the blogging. But now I’m back.

On Saturday last, I went to Salamanca Market to photograph the stall holders setting up for the day. Held every Saturday in Salamanca Place (or just Salamanca) as the locals call it, the market has for nearly 30 years been a bustling and lively scene. Last Saturday, I had reason to be there early and decided to get there in time to see the stall holders setting up.The early morning light, the interaction of workers and early-bird market goers, the mounds of fresh produce and the promise of a hot, sunny, late summer’s day was well worth turning out of bed in the dark for.

Setting up for the day. Good coffee and fresh donuts. My breakfast at 6.30am, © Rob Walls 2012

Stall holders setting up © Rob Walls 2012

Oranges waiting to be juiced © Rob Walls 2012

Lentils, oats and rice © Rob Walls 2012

Display of pumpkins, Harvest Feast, Salamanca Market, Hobart © Rob Walls 2012

Vested interest. My wife grew the beets and a lot of the herbs in this fine display © Rob Walls 2012

 

Attention to detail. Every carrot meticulously displayed © Rob Walls 2012

 

Good friends of organic produce, Michelle Dyer and Jonathan Cooper of Harvest Feast © Rob Walls 2012

 

MONA Museum of Old and New Art

While only indirectly involved in any way with photography (it is involved with this particular photographer’s life), I visited the Museum of Old and New Art in Hobart today.

To say that this privately funded institution is challenging, exciting, controversial is understatement indeed. That it exists in the backwater of Hobart is surprising…but then the whole raison d’etre behind entrepreneur, David Walsh’s generous enterprise seems to be surprise. Now all I’ve got to do see how many visits I can fit in before I set off on my trans-continental odyssey for This Working Life on April 4th.

Urban postcards…

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Though I live on an island renowned for its scenic beauty, I’ve always found the built environment more inspiring than nature. You can take a boy out of the city, but you can’t take the city out of the boy, I guess. These are just a few of my favourite urban views from Sydney, New York, Penang, Hobart, Kuala Lumpur, Malacca and Amsterdam.

Thinking about work…

Painters at work, Melville Street, Hobart

I’ve been thinking about the subject of work at lot lately. Some would say I prefer to think about it rather than perform it. But it occurred to me there are still many jobs that can’t be computerised. These two painters painting the window frames of this old Georgian store in Melville Street Hobart this morning,  can probably feel comfortable in the knowledge that their jobs are unlikely to be overtaken by the digital revolution, any time in the near future.

Camera: Canon Powershot G11

A POSTSCRIPT: driving past the day after, I see that the beautiful remnants of the words “Furnishing Warehouse” have now been sanded off the timber facade. Sad! But they still  live on in this photo.

Pure colour…

Too much history; too much black and white; too many old pictures lately…so I thought I’d post something I shot last week with my new walk-around camera, the Canon G11. This is the fire escape behind Kodak House in Hobart…still flaunting its bright corporate yellow though the company no longer occupies the building.

Fire escape, Hobart © Rob Walls 2009

One of the thousand reasons I live here…

Double Rainbow over the Derwent, Hobart, Tasmania

One of the many reasons I choose to live in Tasmania, is the beauty of the constantly changing light. At this latitude, even the worst of days is likely to offer something of interest to the photographer.

I photographed this double rainbow over the Derwent River a month or two ago. At my back was the vibrantly beautiful, pocket city of Hobart (population: 150,000)… and I was less than ten minutes from home.