The Umbrella in Photography

One of my earliest published serious articles on photography was entitled ‘The Umbrella in Photography’ and perhaps one day I’ll hunt for a copy (I can’t remember now when or even where it was first published) and either post it here or die of shame on reading it.  I do remember that it looked at a number of pictures including two by Kertesz, one I think of people coming down a bridge onto a station platform seen from above and concerned largely with design, and another of a man beside a park bench with a broken umbrella serving staunchly as a metaphor.  It’s an image I saw again this week in an original print hanging among others on a friend’s wall, and given the current interest in Hungarian photography is almost bound to be on show currently in London, either at the Royal Academy or a dealer show. Together the two illustrate different aspects which always combine in photography, though in differing extents.

One Sunday last month, at the start of Refugee Week 2011  I found myself rooted to the spot on the steps coming down from the Jubilee/Hungerford Bridge as coloured umbrella after umbrella came down past me, trying to capture something of the event. I think this was my best picture:

© 2011, Peter Marshall

in part because of the two t-shirts ‘Proud To Protect Refugees’ in the centre of the image which make clear what the parade was about.  But in Refugee Week Umbrella Parade you can see quite a few of the others I took in that same spot, including more with the 10.5mm full-frame fisheye on the D300 and also some with the 16-35mm on the D700.  I think the fisheye works better in this situation, although the effect it gives of people walking out of frame at the edges isn’t always a help. The woman at the left I think it gives a useful added dynamic to the image, but the guy with the blue umbrella at top right seems to be doing his own thing (and perhaps about to jump of the side of the steps.) I suppose I could crop him off (or use a little distortion correct which takes out the corners) but then I do like the blue umbrella.

I did photograph the rest of the parade, from its start in Victoria Embankment Gardens

© 2011, Peter Marshall

to its finish on the South Bank

© 2011, Peter Marshall

and of course you can see rather more pictures on My London Diary.

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