s.p.q.b. [bruges, west flanders, belgium, 2014]
untitled #240 [bruges, west flanders, belgium, 2014]
'Senatus Populus Que Brugensis' means 'the Senate and the people of Bruges'.
It can be found on the Bruges coat of arms and an ornate water pump featuring a swan in Bruges, as I found in 2014 during my time there.
pink petunias [bruges, west flanders, belgium, 2014]
From Wikipedia: The Maya and Inca believed that the scent of petunias had the power to ward off underworld monsters and spirits. Their flower-buds were bunched together for magical drinks. According to New Age folklore, Petunias will only thrive where there is "positive energy" and will not grow in places where there is "negativity".
When given as a gift, Petunias have (in the language of flowers) two mutually exclusive meanings, symbolising on the one hand being comfortable with someone, and on the other anger and resentment.
A somewhat clichéd image, the interpretation of petunias in the language of flowers feels appropriate right now.
It's a tribute to how comfortable I felt with my friend Anthony at all times. And the anger and resentment I feel in waves (mingled with melancholy and intense, overwhelming sadness) for the fact that his life was cut short.
And so many of the comments and posts I've seen about him since he passed highlight his gentle nature, positivity and enthusiasm.
hotel ^^^^ [grand hotel casselbergh, bruges, west flanders, belgium, 2014]
untitled #176 [bruges, west flanders, belgium, 2014]
So, I'm trying to be a bit more planned and less haphazard with what and how I share my work with my patrons this year.
Although there'll still be plenty of room for me to be spontaneous, I thought it would be helpful for me to have a bit of a pattern/routine in sharing some of my photography.
With that in mind, the past two Sundays I've shared early-access posts featuring newly edited images from my sepulchre series.
I'd been weighing up how to work these into a weekly programme. Having a hashtag-worthy concept without sounding too flippant, morbid, or offensive.
I'd started weighing up #CemeterySunday (I couldn't bring myself to alliterate to the point of #SematarySunday) but, being the semantic stickler I am, I couldn't settle on that. Some images would be from churchyards, graveyards or other burial places, not all would be taken in cemeteries.
I'll likely use #CemeterySunday appropriately on social media depending upon the subject. But, for Patreon, I'm thinking of this collection as #SepulchralSunday, falling back to the (now glaringly obvious) use of my overall series name for the alliterative and catchy collective term for these images.
#SepulchralSunday images will include those from my stained glass series, season's grievings curated series and any new curated series. As well as one-off photographs appropriate to the theme.
Another genre within my work 'upvoted' in my recent polls on Patreon (which are still open until the end of the month!) was my travel photography. So I'm going to default to social media type and declare this the first of my #TravelTuesday posts. It seems particularly appropriate to focus on these one day a week while most of us can't travel far from home.
As these are two genres strongly represented in much of my photography, it seems like an incentive to gradually work through editing images long overdue to see the light.
Without any particular catchy hashtag to accompany them, I'm hoping to share a more in-depth post with you each Friday. A small series of images focussing on a specific place or subject, likely accompanied by a bit more writing than I might offer on other days.
With these new plans, sepulchre and travel images won't be restricted to Sundays and Tuesdays*. But I hope they'll become regular features my patrons come to eagerly anticipate in their inbox.
Along with my new Love letters to London series, I'm hoping to write a new instalment of my postcards from another's life series to share with my patrons each month.
I have more plans for this year, but let's start with these.
And let's start with a view of Bruges taken in 2014.