Contemplative Photography Workshop - Day 4

The theme of today's workshop was 'Simplicity', where we were to be mindful of focusing our cameras on one object without the background distracting from the image. It's harder than it sounds!

Here are the prompts that Peter used:

"The ability to simplify means to eliminate the unnecessary so that the necessary may speak."
(Hans Hoffmann)

"There can be great power in trying to say one thing well."
(Christine Valters Painter)

And here is today's poem:

Eyes
(Written in 2002 by the Nobel-Prize-winning Polish poet, Czeslaw Milosz)

My most honorable eyes. You are not in the best shape.
I receive from you an image less sharp,
And if a color, then it's dimmed.
And you were a pack of royal hounds
With whom I would set forth in the early morning,
My wondrously quick eyes, you saw many things,
Countries and cities. Islands and oceans.
Together we greeted immense sunrises,
When the fresh air invited us to run
Along trails just dry from cold night dew.
Now what you have seen is hidden inside
And changed into memory or dreams.
Slowly I move away from the fair of this world
And I notice in myself a distaste
For monkeyish dress, shrieks, and drumbeats.
What a relief. Alone with my meditation
On the basic similarity of humans
And their tiny grain of dissimilarity.
Without my eyes, my gaze is fixed on one bright point
That grows large and takes me in.

Here are the images I recorded that tried to accomplish the goal of simplicity.

Enjoy!