Project 27

As discussed in the text book circular forms are generally formed artificially and do not occur very frequently naturally, especially within a city environment.  I can think of a few exceptions, the moon, even the sun would work as circles, with good weather and a long enough lens.  Implied circles formed via arrangement are also fleeting in existence, from the right viewpoint groups of people will form circles as they stop to discuss or listen to one another, an example would be a tour group.

In working up images for this project I found many round objects, but was unable to present them as circles due to perspective and lack of a viewpoint square onto the subject.  Some examples are

Tables at a cafe - this group of tables formed a great example of rhythm and pattern

Another common subject is the humble man hole cover - this one was too big to image as a circle

The following two images are circular features in walls, again my angle was unable to avoid the elliptical profile

The next image is the use of a circle, a watch, used in a traditional watchmakers shop sign

The next image provided a better opportunity to image the circles in proper proportion, the hint of red is provided by a brush hidden behind this board.  The repetition of the circles and the ropes attached make this visually interesting, but I have no idea what it is

Finally I managed to find a number of circular objects that permitted a photograph without any perspective distrotion.  The first image is a light set into the cobble stones of a pedestrian shopping street.  This image might have been better with the light actually on, to create more contrast in the image

The following image combines three circles, a modern sign, an historical relief and the front wheel of a bicyle chained against the sigh post.  As the sign post is declaring that bicycles have priority on the path to the left, the bike is part of the message

My third image is another architectural circle, but this time formed by the brickwork in a domed roof in Munich's Glyptothek museum of Greek and Roman art. This is a repeating circle and avoiding any perspective shift needed careful placement of the camera

My final circle is a shop display, which combined a ball made of wound rope and a snake, an interesting display, but am not sure what the message was intended to be

I can conclude that circles are pretty common in a city environment, but almost all are artificial in origin.  As compositional elements they are powerful, especially when repeated such as the blue board or the cafe tables.  I did not find any implied circles or circular arrangements, so must draw my inspiration from the text book:

96 - I have already referred to this image as containing a clear triangle, but one formed within the circle of the models arms.
18 - In this still life my Roger fenton, he has arranged the fruit in a broadly circular composition
37 - the garbage in this very real image by Martin Parr forms a neat circle around the overflowing rubbish bin from which it has probably tumbled

Within the text book there were many images using a circle as a compositional element, but few that used a circular arrangement of separate items