Wabi-Sabi and Digital Photography
MAKING SPACE FOR IMPERFECTION
The day I fell in love with photography, I was walking my dog, Charlie, across open countryside a few miles from my home. It was a sunny June morning when we set out. There were wildflowers everywhere, a summery chaos of pinks, golds, blues and purples.
Then a storm rolled in off the Atlantic. The sky darkened quickly, the wind grew fierce and soon rain would sheet in. I decided to turn back.
I thought I’d take one more shot of Charlie before the rain arrived.
As I raised my camera, the wind battered me, the first raindrops stung my skin, and I accidentally pressed the shutter button before I’d lined up the shot. Oh well. I stowed the camera, and we hurried home through the storm.
Later I uploaded my photos — the usual snapshot visual record of our walk. Nice memories, very ordinary images.
I came to the last shot I’d taken, that fumbled, misfired shot. It was skewed and blurred, a shot of nothing in particular. I was about to delete it. But something made me stop. The wildflowers were a wind-thrashed blur of muted colours. One corner was grey sky, black cloud leaking across it like an ink stain. There were smudges and smears where the raindrops had spattered on the lens.
