I’ve long been an advocate of doing what you want in photography and I’ve seldom done anything else.
So the title of Stuart Freedman‘s latest blog post, The importance of doing what you want, struck a chord. He’s always an interesting writer as well as an interesting photographer and I recommend this article to you all.
You can also follow his work on Twitter and Instagram. Stuart isn’t a prolific blogger – too busy as a photographer and his previous post was in April 2018 – but his posts on Umbra Sumus are always worth reading and superbly illustrated.
If you had a classical education (I didn’t though I did pass O Level Latin) you will know the line from Horace, “Pulvis et umbra sumus” ‘We are but dust and shadows’. And set high on the south-facing wall of the Jamme Masjid Mosque at the corner of Brick Lane and Fournier St is a sundial with the text ‘Umbra Sumus’ and the date 1743 a thumbnail of which appears at the top right of the blog.
As you probably already know, Brick Lane mosque was built as l’Eglise Neuve, a Protestant Church for Huguenots in 1742, was sold in 1809 to the London Society for Promoting Christianity Among the Jews, who moved to Palestine Place in Bethnal Green in 1809 a few years later and passed it on to Methodists. From 1897 to 1976 it was the Spitalfields Great Synagogue, (Machzikey Hadath or Machzikei Hadass) .
Tags: blog, Stuart Freedman, Umbra Sumus