Phew, it’s been over three months since Helen and I added something to our Imagine project. I planned to update at least once a month, but I just found it difficult to get out of my comfort zone. I blame my surgery (how many times can one use such an excuse?), I found it weakened me more than I expected, and lack of energy kept me from photography. And when I had some energy left it was just enough to do my usual landscape photography without giving it too much thought.
But one quote Helen send me a while back left a little seed in my brain, and last week I finally found the moment to execute it. For some reason I don’t understand just yet, it is again a selfie. I am not sure I really like it, I still struggle with these text-assignments, but that was the whole idea of the project: try something different, get uncomfortable, and see where it leads. Well, this time it led to my bed…
Helen found a great poem to accompany my photo of a cat, which I boldly translated, although I don’t think that is really possible. So I don’t know if it still makes any sense in English, please forgive me for my clumsy translation!
#3 June 20
Helen’s text for Aukje
“Er was een groot bed in waarop ik lange brieven aan Tineke schreef. Soms legde ik, vlak voordat ik naar het werk ging, iets onredelijks op dat bed: een tube tandpasta, een borstel, zodat ik ’s avonds thuiskomend dankzij mijn slechte geheugen een ogenblik verrast zou kunnen staan en denken dat iemand, en wie anders, even langs was geweest.”
/
“There was a large bed on which I wrote long letters to Tineke. Sometimes, just before I went to work, I put something unjust on this bed: a tube of toothpaste, a hairbrush, so that coming home at night, thanks to my bad memory, I could be surprised for one moment, and think that someone, and who else, had stopped by.”
Text: quote from Hoe mooi alles; een liefde in oorlogstijd (how beautiful everything; a love in time of war) van Mirjam van Hengel (2017), (p. 306)
Photo: Leica M240 with Summilux 1.4/50mm.
Aukje’s image for Helen
“Ze zien mij hier liever dan dansende balken
of een misvormde vrouw. Waarom? Mijn naam is haas
en wie ’t weet, die zegt het maar:
wat moet ik op dit grijze plein? Was ik niet beter
een fontein, of een beroemd konijn?”
/
” Here they rather see me than dancing beams
or a deformed woman. Why? My name is hare*
Your guess is as good as mine:
what am I doing on this grey square? Wouldn’t I rather be
a fountain, or a famous rabbit?”
*Note from Aukje: ‘My name is hare’ is the literal translation of a Dutch saying meaning ‘it’s nothing to do with me’. But I thought the reference to a hare was meaningful, so I used the literal translation.
Text: Ingmar Heytze, Utrecht voor beginners & gevorderden (2015), regels uit het gedicht (from the poem) ‘Tobber op rots’ (p. 18)
Photo: Leica M2 with Kodak Ektar 100