You might image my surprise when I was poking around Bing images last week in-between events when I did a search on “Contemporary Landscape Photography” to see what might come up and the very first image was….mine!
Yep, the photograph above, Winter Field, JiaShan, that I created while staying in the city of JiaShan, China in January of 2008. And to be sure that I was not hallucinating, I just did the same search again on Bing and yep, very first image was this one, again. Amazing!
I had posted this landscape photograph with a short discussion about what potentially makes a great Contemporary Landscape Photography in March 2008 shortly after my return from my third trip into Eastern China.
Trust me, I do not believe that I have created the definitive contemporary urban landscape photograph although I think that this is one of my better urban landscape photographs that I made during this series of trips to China. As to why contemporary? Perhaps that the composition is very banal and ordinary in appearance and for me as the author, a bit more about my quiet introspective mood at the time, no real “subject” other than the frozen tracks in the field leading from the foreground towards the horizon. The furrow on the right also leads the reader to the horizon with a momentary break created by a lone, stark and barren tree. Thus the narrative is indirectly about a journey that has some melancholy undertones, probably a bit of how I was feeling going into my third week on this last visit.
That this photograph is getting such a primo spot on Bing is probably more about the power rankings of the internet. The more frequently seen, the higher up on the dog pile it goes. Really nice to be on top of the dog pile!
Cheers,
Doug
Featured photograph: Winter Field, JiaShan (Wo Zhi KanKan – I am just Looking), China, 2008 copyright Douglas Stockdale
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