nothingness

As I was sitting in my room one day, I thought of how everything around us is man-made. You might reply with: "Oh yes, obviously", but the way we surround ourselves with things, and even our eagerness to build and make things, and if not, buy things is to some extent actually crazy. It is with our eagerness to make and build things that we found civilizations. And almost all of us cherish the concept of civilization. But sometimes where civilization brings us, imho, a little too much. As someone who had to move things back and forth for 4 years, at some point I couldn't help but ask myself: "Do I really need this much stuff?" I moved to the US and I bought things to decorate my room and then I would move back home and  buy clothes and bring even more stuff back with me to the US. That meant I would have to carry even more stuff when I come back home to Istanbul. The burden of carrying all my stuff with me back and forth really made itself obvious when I had to go back home from England and I had almost 4 suitcases of stuff when I was only allowed to carry 2 with me. A few weeks before I was to move to Turkey from England I watched the movie 'Up in the Air' with my roommates and remembered how George Clooney's character gave seminars on how to own only a carry-on size bag much of stuff. To me, that's something impossible to accomplish. However, I am also now more careful not to clutter my life with stuff I don't necessarily need. Remember the aphorism by the charismatic Tyler Durden of Fight Club: "The things you own end up owning you." And to some extent, this is very true in our culture. Fashion and trendiness is all about making judgements about a person by evaluating what they wear. We also tend to feel an affinity towards people who shop from the same places as us, or wear similar clothes to what we wear and use similar gadgets to what we use. I'm not saying I don't engage in any of these behaviors, but when I realize that I do, I tend to come to the conclusion that it's quite unnecessary.

Before we started building and making things like we will never be satisfied, there was the nothingness of nature. I found a photography blog with some photos of 'nothingness'. And here are two that are my favorites. I like these two because there is nothing in them that are man-made (like roads, houses, etc.) and no artifacts.

Here is the link to the website where I found them, if you want to look at more photos: http://www.photographyblogger.net/29-pictures-of-nothingness/ Also, there is a little story, which I heard/read a couple times before, about a fisherman and a businessman on the website that makes a nice point for our work- and stuff-cluttered lives.

posing tomatoes

Everybody Loves Brighton

The title is the feeling I had when I lived in England for the short duration of 6 months. Everybody in England, at least the people I met, loved Brighton. They called it "sunny Brighton" or just "the beach". Wikipedia calls it the "gay capital of Europe", and it is also very well-known for its edgy population, most of which knows no boundaries in clothing, hair and make-up. I personally think Brighton is a heaven for hedonist, music-loving bohemians, and elderly people who are happy to live with younger, colorful personalities. I came to love this small city located in southern England by the English Channel as I was doing my photography project, from which I posted photos before. But I found another bunch that I liked and had edited. So here they are:

some pub at the North Laines

some street art in the North Laines

some street

Street musicians are abundant in Brighton, especially in the North Laines. And they are very friendly performers, interacting with the passers-by and maybe having a beer or two along the way.

Sometimes people noticed my semi-voyeuristic scrutiny and asked me with their eyes what the hell I was doing as I stood there directing the camera at them.

The best thing about Brighton is that on a cold spring night you can walk down the street beside a musician who is playing his guitar as the stores roll down their shutters. And whoever is left on the streets either hurry home or to the nearest pub.

And he said to him: "Let's loot this place."

Kiki de Montparnasse

Aesthetic and witty in many ways, Man Ray's photo of the Parisian model more famously known as 'Kiki de Montparnasse' is one of my favorite 'body' photos. The cleverly painted F-notes on Kiki's back is a symbol for how Kiki's body is an instrument, in this case a violin; thus the title of the photo Violon d'Ingres. Kiki does not have the second name Ingres. The attribution comes from her looking like the subject of a painting by a nineteenth century artist named Ingres. On a side note, Ingres was also an amateur musician. So you can see the many underlying themes and jokes in this simple but elegant photo.

Source: Photography by John Ingledew

Photography Project

It's been a long while since I last updated my blog, mainly because I was busy with projects near the end of the Spring Term at Sussex and then I just flew off to travel right after that.

But I'd like to share my Final Project for my Photography Class. It's a portrait of the people in an area called the North Laines in Brighton. In my opinion it's the most exciting place here, since the district is full of hundreds of independent stores and always bustling with the most interesting characters you will ever see. I decided to mainly focus on the store-owners, although there are a couple photos in there of people who just happen to be standing, or sitting right outside the store. We had to choose 6-8 photos for the project, so here is my final 8.

The lady at the second-hand clothing store To Be Worn Again. I feel that I owe her a lot, since after asking her my meek attitude in asking people to pose for me transformed into a more brave one.  She acquiesced right away and posed in this incredibly self-confident attitude. I love how her red sweater contrasts with the blue background.

The veteran man who was sitting right outside the tobacco shop. I walked past him and I really wanted to take his photos but was too shy and intimidated to ask. After taking a turn to another street, I decided to go back and ask him. 

The guy in front of Amps and Guitars

The owner of the music store Borderline

The pink haired girl in the second-hand store

The guy who works at Dirty Harry

The hair-stylist from Mr. Toppers... Great Haircuts

My buddy from juggling store Oddballs. I call him my buddy because I always stopped by at this store whenever I went to North Laines to take photos. All the people that worked here were incredibly laid-back and quite fun, and would always ask me how my project was going.

Cows can have portraits, too!

I chose cows as the subject of my mini-project. Personally, I am scared of a lot of farm animals. You might ask why, well first of all I find chickens treacherous (I got attacked by them in the past, and they never feel full- they'll eat ANYTHING.). In fact, I find many birds quite evil (the other day on campus I got attacked by a seagull, who tried to steal my salmon and cream-cheese bagel from my hand, and it was quite huge, not exaggerating.) The thing with many birds and farm animals is that you think they are harmless and all that but then they fly at you with the little flying capability they have and try to poke you with their beaks (chickens), or suddenly walk onto you and open their mouth and let out a big boo (cows), or stare at you for hours (cows and sheep). At least with wild animals you know that it's not safe to be around them, so you basically avoid them. But farm animals and birds, those are animals we trust, and birds are basically a part of our daily lives. So you don't avoid them, and then they end up pooping on your head as you're walking under a tree. Not cool.

Anyways, I decided to portray some cows. Thought they'd be more interesting than human subjects. It's interesting how when you direct the camera at any animal they tend to stare back at it. 

What do you see?

There's a church in Stanmer Park, where Paul wanted us to take close-up pictures of the patterns we see on the Church's walls outside. Here's some I saw:

not-so-happy moss face

hand of the Almighty

p.s there's more I'll add them.

More from Stanmer Park

fallen tree

tree reflection
dry leaves

Stanmer Park

Stanmer Park is right down the hill from our school, very rustic and pastoral. The fields were very green and looked georgous with the dramatic lighting of the clouds and hazy weather. Although I used to think I don't like scenery pictures, I realized I actually do.


I took the first picture on the top of the hill on my way down. When you compare it to the fields below, it looks very desolate and barren. It's weird because there are farms below everywhere and trees cover the hills across.