World Food Photography Awards

"In photography there is a reality so subtle that it becomes more real than reality." Alfred Stieglitz

The photograph above has just won the World Food Photography Awards - the overall winner and also the winner of the Food for the Family caegory. It was taken in Sichuan Province by Xiaoling Li As you can see it depicts a group of old Chinese ladies eating spring rolls, and enjoying each other's company. There's a lot going on it the picture, from the photographs on the wall behind them, to the colourful clothes, the structure and colour of the wall behind them, the wheelchair, the old ladies themselves ... I guess it illustrates another famous photography quote:

"Great photography is about depth of feeling, not depth of field." Peter Adams

I'm not sure that it was my favourite of the photos I have seen so far. The website for the competition doesn't seem to have all the winners up there as yet, so I have perused a few other sites for a selection - some just finalists, some actual winners. No doubt the official website will have them all up soon. It's a pretty recent event in London at which Yotam Ottolenghi, no less, announced the awards. A postscript here - all of the photos - winners and finalists are there - just click on the Galleries button.

As you know I love photographs so I couldn't resist sharing some of them. They are not all about people - about life - some of them are contrived studies - like painted still lifes I suppose, and some are landscapes. All so striking though.

"Taking an image, freezing a moment reveals how rich reality truly is." anon - so here are some that perhaps illustrate that concept. Although I really should, I am not going to go into who took them, or even what category they won, or represented. Just the photographs. If you want to know more about them visit the official website - or try PetaPixel which seems to have a lot of them. So here are a few that freeze a moment - in different ways.

And some that are purely artistic still lifes - there are so many to choose from here that are simply stunning in all sorts of different ways:

"Photography takes an instant out of time, altering life by holding it still." Dorothea Lange

There are certainly lots of photographs in the selection of winners and finalists, that illustrate an instant out of time, but whether they actually alter life is possibly somewhat grandiose. Maybe this comes close - it's the winner of the Wine section - Produce - so that's wine. But it's creepy isn't it? It could put me off wine forever. And it might well illustrate this quote from Joan Miro - who may well have been talking about painted pictures rather than photographs, but nevertheless the same principle would apply.

"You can look at a picture for a week and never think of it again. You can also look at a picture for a second and think of it all your life." Joan Miro

Enjoy.

POSTSCRIPT

I have partially - well mostly solved my software problems with the help of Wix's ChatBot which is a bit alarming really but very impressive because my questions were a bit complicated. I'm not quite convince yet however. Holding my breath.

YEARS GONE BY

May 31 - the last day of Autumn. But the sun shines.

2024 - The pleasures and pitfalls of dining out - with your sons that is

2023 - Sesame seeds

2022 - Art in the kitchen

2021 - Upside down is in

2020 - Deleted

2019 - National scone day

2018 - Wine to the glass - more to it than you think

2017 - Nothing