My current house sits along an alley. Not a dark, rat plagued alley, but a decent sun-filled alley where my garden thrives. You might say it’s one of the ritzier alleys, as alleys go. Like any alley though, nighttime brings the inevitable peculiarities that seem to go hand-in-hand with backstreets after dark no matter where one lives. New York City, Boise, Chicago, Paris, the evening backstreet festivities are much the same. From my second story window I can (and do) look out at any hour of the night and find something happening within 50 feet of the house. The most habitual offenders are the urinators. Men and women alike, both seem to share an indomitable need to empty their bladders, usually in or near my vegetable garden. Then you have the wobblers, the drunks who undulate from one side of the alley to the other, lurching and veering perilously but somehow managing to more-or-less remain vertically oriented. The wobblers occasionally become rollers when the lurching gets the better of them and they finally collapse in a heap in the alley or as luck has it, my garden, where they insist on rolling and somersaulting across the vegetables. Then you have the screamers, the drunks and the touched alike who find five am to be the ideal time for howling about the return of Malcolm X or the state of the union. Of course, no alleyway is complete without the requisite taggers who insist on spritzing the houses and fences with not only urine, but catchy phrases like Boner King and shapeless blobs of paint drip that would cause Banksy to weep openly. Now, don’t mistake my snarky rendition of the nightlife to mean that I don’t love it – it’s certainly far more riveting than anything on TV at 3am.
I’m convinced that I am the only one in the neighborhood who notices the rumpus happening just outside. The only one to know why there is a gaping hole in the neighbor’s garage door and the only one to know how there came to be thirty oranges strewn across the pavement. And, most importantly, the only one to know specifically which heads of lettuce in the garden to avoid eating.
The arrival of spring has swiftly grown and emboldened the nightly congregation. Last night there was the usual troupe of wobblers, but one disconsolate passerby, ostensibly piqued by the sheer temerity of my radish bed decided to blight the soil (and the brick wall) with what once may have been edible prior to an all inclusive tour of the human digestive system. You get the drift.
So, after excavating the funky offender and the surrounding earth and double wrapping the sullied mass in garbage bags, I set off in search of something worth photographing. Being spring, flowers seemed most appropriate and easily available and a perfect antonym to my befouled radishes. A cloudless Prussian sky and a white sun invited me to photograph with my back against the warm grass but a swarming gang of biting ants drove me back to me feet within minutes.
Fashion photographers are often asked where they get their inspiration. Many reply with enthusiastic prose about the current London collections and the past lens masters, but for me – this is where I get my most vivid inspiration. The rays of the sun filtering through the textured petals and veined leaves and the gusting wind trembling the slender branches – that is what inspirits me. If art imitates life, what more better part of life to imitate than this?
For those who care about such things, the photos were taken mostly with a Canon 85mm F1.2 L lens, probably the most glorious piece of glass ever. Lots of sun, lots of wind, lots of color.
If you really like these photos here are three links to download a zip file of them to use as your desktop wallpaper or screen saver. As always, reblogging is encouraged – just stick up a link to www.nickzantop.com
Click here to download if your screen resolution is 1024 x 768 – Size 5.7 MB
Click here to download if your screen resolution is 1280 x 800 – Size 7.2 MB
Click here to download if your screen resolution is 1440 x 900- Size 8.4 MB
Rock on
