Devitts Cemetery, Blackstock

The stones are unsafe, beware

This blog has been a great opportunity for a number of reasons. First it allows me to wander through my photographic files and see if there are any nuggets of charm or humour or beauty hidden away that suit the theme that Sid and I have chosen. Much of the time, particularly nowadays I think, images go into electronic storage and are rarely brought to the light of display.

I like the idea of the photographic still shot, captivating images of places that we normally just blur past in our cars and transportation, in our daily routines, particularly the small places like the crossroad and corner lot, or the family cemetery as depicted above. Sometimes it seems like we're just travelling too fast to see anything.

I also have to admit to an interest in signs, the things that are put up to inform or warn, name or declaim. Sometimes they bring to mind a mental image that is not quite as originally intended. Keep the gate closed so the stones don't get out and are harmed, or enter at your own risk.

Colin

Country Cemetery

This is a photograph that was taken some years ago. I was driving along 'dusting' the country roads possibly near one of the small towns like Cavan or Enniskillen, Ontario (I can't recall exactly where it was) when I glanced to the left and saw this little cemetery. I turned the car around, drove back to it, parked and then entered through the open gates.

Most of the gravestones were not standing, they were neatly laid on the ground in a semicircle around a central monument which had this carved on it. I liked the detail of the work, of course, a whole relief of early Canadian country life. I had to boost the contrast just a wee bit to make some of the details a bit clearer.

Colin

I decided to come back to this post to include a shot of the whole cemetery, converted to black and white to keep to the original shot's tones, because sometimes I think my descriptions can't capture the essence. After all a picture is worth...

me again

Monmartre Cemetery: Part 2 - La ville des décédées.

Unlike most cemeteries, the one at Monmartre in Paris is located below the current ground level.  As I mentioned in my previous post, initially I didn't know how to approach this subject.  However, after focusing in on the details in one section, I returned to street level to survey the cemetery for my next location.

Interestingly, from that angle the graves and tombs had an architectural look, as if I was viewing a city from above, and I ended up staying where I was and shooting on that basis - as if it were a city of the dead.

- Sid

P.S.  If someone reads this and says, "Hey, that's not really how you say 'City of the dead' in French, my apologies.  I will be happy to correct the title if someone can provide me with a proper translation.

Monmartre Cemetery: Part 1 - The Devil is in the Details.

I photographed the cemetery at Monmartre in Paris in the final stages of a three-week trip for my fiftieth birthday.  At that point, I was a little burned out after three weeks on the road, and a little stressed by five days of struggling to survive on my high school French in Paris, and as such I don't really feel that I did justice to my subject.

Unlike some of the other cemeteries that I'd photographed, Montmartre lacked that sense of decrepitude and decay that tends to interest me photographically.  As a result, I felt more than a little lost as I wandered the laneways between tombs.  However, little things began to catch my eye, details and decorations that had lost their perfection over time, and that was when I started to find it interesting.

The figure of the crucified Christ whose head starts the gallery above was an astonishing image. It's difficult to imagine how this statue would have looked before decades of verdigris and dirt had marked it; I suspect it would lack the drama that Time had provided.

 

When working on the images for this gallery, I did something that I've never tried before, and desaturated the background. It really didn't make any difference, the strength of the central figure made the background irrelevant. Nonetheless, here's the alternate version for the purposes of comparison.

 

 - Sid

Brompton Cemetery, London

Ah Brompton, an incredible site, much of it overgrown, a photographic dream.

Sid, who had visited it a few years ago, brought me along for this visit and for that I am extremely grateful (and if you're lucky he might post some of the shots he took then, they are wonderful as well).

She wore ivy

Under a canopy of leaves

In a sea of grass

Quoth the raven

 Colin

Doll-headed Angel, Brompton Cemetery.

Doll-headed Angel

Considering that all of these pictures have been taken in graveyards, I've never found it to be in any way unsettling to spend an hour wandering around photographing monuments to the dead.  However, this crudely molded, one winged angel with its second-hand doll's head did seem a little bit creepy somehow.

- Sid

Old Town Cemetery, Stirling

We know of no sweeter cemetery in all of our wanderings than that of Stirling.

William Wordsworth

Old Town Cemetery with Stirling Castle in the background.

I found that there were two names for this cemetery, one was Valley Cemetery and the other was Old Town Cemetery. The latter name was defined as the area between the Church of the Holy Rude (founded in 1129 and just to the right and behind me out of the shot) and the castle. If I'm not very much mistaken that cluster of buildings and fortifications at the top of the photograph is the aforementioned castle. It may be that the cemetery itself, which is quite extensive, may be divided into two differently named sections.

Rock and Stone

When I looked again at this image I felt that the whole thing was a bit tilted. I could have straightened it but decided that I liked the dynamic so I left it as it was.

James Renwick and company

I also liked the stone outcroppings in combination with the monuments.

I'm sure in other postings we'll be revisiting this site.

Colin

Canongate Kirk, Edinburgh

How sad that we have chosen such a fragile thing as stone for our memorials.

By the way, this theme will probably show up in my posts here again - I think that it's a combination of working with type for many years added to my ongoing photographic interest in textures and shapes.

- Sid

Lichened Onto

This is a site that I literally drove past at least a hundred times. I only really noticed it after probably fifty. It took me likely another year before I finally actually visited. It sits by itself beside the road on the west side between Markham and Stouffville, Ontario.

Many of the headstones are lying down, some cemented into a grouping of which this was one, and although the grounds are tended the stones themselves often support new life.
 

First Markham Baptist Cemetery, 9th Line, Markham, ON

Every place you go there are the dead if you but take the time to see where their shadows lie.
                                                                                                                                                                                    Colin

Blind Angel, Edinburgh

Blind Angel, Old Calton Cemetery

Forget nothing or, by the blindness of my sockets, I will have your hearts out. 
Mervyn Peake

I find that I tend to treat memorial statuary like portrait photography.

 - Sid