Blog

Peter was a great believer in communicating about photography and got into blogging in its early days.

His blog ran, with some gaps, from 30 November 2006 to 2 September 2018.

You can visit the earliest entries via archived links on the right hand side of this page.

A Puzzle

At a party on Friday night a friend showed me this rabbit that came with this spiral. The idea is to place the rabbit alongside the spiral, stare into the spiral for about 30 seconds and then look back at the rabbit. For some strange reason the rabbit seems to grow in size. What the brain is doing I don’t know.
Apart from that I’m always a sucker for photographing rabbits. When I was young I used to shoot them with a rifle, sometimes for fun, sometimes for ecological reasons, and sometimes for food. As I get older I don’t seem to enjoy killing so much, but I still love firearms although unfortunately I don’t get access to them very often. Like many rural New Zealanders of that time, my father had quite an armoury, and was, upon reflection, remarkably relaxed about me having access to it. We also had compulsory military drill at school in which we were taught how look after rifles (and Bren guns) and were given the opportunity to shoot at targets. It’s extraordinary now to think of schools having firing ranges.

This afternoon I was in a clothes store in which they were rearranging their display. I was intrigued by an arm lying on the floor and couldn’t resist taking a snap. Later in the evening I went to an opening at the Govett-Brewster and Fiona Pardington was there. I took a photograph of her new tattoo, with my cameraphone, or camphone as I see them being called now. Good word I think.

The top photo I have included, not because it’s particularly interesting, but as an example of how I am drawn to limbs and fingers, and also how I use this particular composition over and over again. Usually the object will be coming into the frame from the right. I believe that we read photos from left to right so this is more likely to create a collision of sorts in the middle of the image. Whether Chinese read photos differently I don’t know, or does it have something to do with handedness and the way in which we scan the scene in front of us. If this is true I could be in trouble because although I was born left handed, in early life I was trained to use my right. In the past I have, by reversing negatives, experimented with printing photos in reverse, and the difference is very noticable.

Fiona has been a close friend for a long time and I’ve photographed her tattoos before. She designed this one herself based on her interest in traditional Maori art, and her interest in exploring her Maori identity.

Climbing Wall 2005

In the post below I included a photo of some birds, called Zoo Music, taken in the 80’s. On thinking about it
more I see that the birds aren’t the real subject of the picture, the real subject is the arrangement of the birds on the perches. The birds are almost the excuse.

This formal concern is something that keeps reappearing. In this photo above, which taken last year, is not really about a climbing wall, which is what it is, but about the spaces between the grips.

Zoo Music – BNZ CollectionJust arrived in the mail this morning is a handsome book that has just been published by the BNZ bank. It includes works from about 60 artists. In the 80’s the bank put together a large collection and this is in effect a catalogue.

One of my works that is included is Zoo Music, one of two images taken at the Auckland Zoo.

The book will not be available in shops but has been produced for BNZ clients and, apparently, copies are being donated to NZ libraries. If you are a BNZ client and ask for a copy it is possible that you may be given one, at least they may have viewing copies.

Planes, Trains & Automobiles

These are two of six panels from a building in New Plymouth where E. Mervyn Taylor was commissioned to
make a mural. It was around 1960. Originally the Post Office, it is now an ANZ bank. In 1996 Don Driver was instrumental in saving these. Taylor completed three commissions in New Plymouth.

As a boy I came across this style of mural quite often, but notably, there was one in the Farmers
store in Auckland. It used to fascinate me, and it was a work that I saw quite often as the Farmers was somewhere we always visited on our trips to Auckland.

Later I tried to make photographic versions of this style, never with any success. More recently, I have not felt so interested.


de Havilland Vampire

In New Plymouth we are lucky because there are two of these jets in flying condition and often in fine weather only of course , they are to be seen swooping through the sky. I am doubly lucky because I know a pilot who flies them and he has introduced me to the man who owns both aircraft. The second one he recently picked up in Switzerland. It’s ex-Swiss Airforce.

These planes mean a great deal to me, not only because they were part of my boyhood when the RNZAF flew some, but because I always get a thrill out of seeing elegant engineering. When there is such a pure blend of form and function, of such clarity of design, I feel in the presence of sculpture.

So reliable were these planes, and so smooth to fly, that the RNZAF never lost a single one. There were about 4,400 built of which more than 80 are still flying. Anyone visiting the Ohakea Airforce Museum can see a slightly dissected one. Two things are surprising. How little they are, and how much of the body is made of laminated wood.

Yellow-Eyed Penguin
Of all the bird photos that I have taken, this is one of my favourites. It’s a photo that I made in the late 80’s while visiting some islands in the Subantarctic. Shortly after taking this picture I was in a rubber boat, that with the force of the waves and the wind was tipped over. I managed to salvage the film, and with great luck, it was still, having been protected by the enclosing cassette, in good condition. The camera was finished.
This image has just been published in the Australian magazine, Photofile. Issue 79, Summer 2007.

E. Mervyn Taylor
Pataka 1947

In the entry below I’ve discussed how these wood engravings attracted my attention when I was at Primary School in Taheke, and later, in Ohaeawai in the Bay of Islands, in the Far North of New Zealand.

Published in NZ School Journals, who are about to celebrate their one hundreth anniversary, these pictures impressed me. The subject matter was so familiar, and the images charming.

This photo I took at Whakarewarewa, in Rotorua, in 1993. About 3 hours south of Auckland I had been there several times looking for this image. At the time I was particularly short of money, so a friend, Trevor Haysom, gave me the funds for the trip. Whakarewarewa is a site epecially built for tourists.

Kaka Beak


While at Primary School, one of the biggest influences on me were the School Journals, which arrived perhaps two three times a year. They were remarkable publications, filled with writing and illustrations by our very best.

One contributor whose work made a big impression on me was E. Mervyn Taylor. The woodcuts had a lot of presence I felt, like this image of a Kaka Beak, although some I liked more than others of course. I came from a home that had very few books, there was no TV then, and the two primary schools that I went to had no libraries, so the importance of these Journals was heightened.

The colour photo of Kaka Beak is one that I made last year. It’s planted it in my garden.

There has recently been a book published about his work, called E.Mervyn Taylor. Artist:Craftsman.by Bryan James pub Steele Roberts.I recommend it. It’s an attractive book with a great deal of material about the art scene in NZ at the time.

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