probably like the pictures he did not want to have by the end of his trip, no?

Agreeing with Charles peterson, a superb essay for BURN, and a lesson in photography not being exactly about photos.

There are a few types of images and I think the high contrast helps keep it cohesive. It’s an interesting mix with some very loose, some highly detailed stills. Somehow it works, I think normally would be very hard to put those together so well. The only one I question is #6. I wouldn’t remove it, but I kept moving it around trying to see if it would work better in another spot. Just a thought.

Beautiful…

Cuba, anywhere, lower latitudes, planet earth.

Excellent pictures throughout.

Of course there’s nothing wrong with a non-narrative approach, though I’m not sure that has entirely been achieved here. This obviously adds up to more than 21 singles. The photos hold together as a story, though what the story might be isn’t clear. As most of you know, I’m fine with that kind of language-less story, find it preferable actually. But one of the good things about narrative structure is that weaker photos can serve it well. Whereas without that structure, weaker pictures are just that. Weaker pictures. By my count you’ve got 15 or so strong ones. That’s pretty good. Very good, actually. And I really like the experiments with multiple exposures.

Mike.

Viewing this essay gives me enormous satisfaction, a real “kick to the eyeballs” as Paul says. The panoramic of the birds is just so beautifully composed.

I have to question the shot of the tree though; why would it be done in such bright sunlight using a slow shutter speed? It is this sort of thing where the desire for the supremacy of style-through-technique trumps practical technical considerations that generally grates on my nerves. The image of the howling dog also bothers me because of the tilt of the camera. My understanding of the Winogrand Tilt is that there should always be a line of interest parallel to one of the framelines. Look at the magnificent shot of the people in silhouette by the cabanas (?), where there is perspective-induced tilt; having that beautifully delicate vertical on the left anchoring everything in a tense space makes the shot complete for me. But with the howling dog none of this is happening. It is uncertain whether flash is involved here, or if there is just a natural reflection lighting the animal. If it is the former, then more thought should have been put into the composition; if the latter, then it is completely acceptable.

As I said, this essay is simply excellent for the most part, and I’m niggardly focussing on some issues to address a point that has been made above. We often see essays on subject matter that has been done before, to the extent that boredom sometimes sets in. I’ve been taught that on essays involving a big or important story, great images are not always necessary (though of course, always preferred), and that on less important stories – like, another essay on Cuba – great images are paramount. This is why I think Gustavo’s work works for us; it is driven by the aesthetic.