The Transitory Nature of Flower (The End)
The Transitory Nature of Flower is a visual meditation on the transience of all things.
In confronting the human condition, one must acknowledge that everything evolves. Every person, object, idea, or feeling is fleeting. Nothing endures. Philosophical systems like Zen Buddhism and Stoicism urge us not just to accept impermanence as fundamental to existence, but to embrace it. This project chronicles my personal pursuit in embracing the ephemeral.
Flowers serve as an ideal metaphor for these ideas. The short-lived bloom of a flower clearly embodies transience: while admiring a flower, one is keenly aware that its beauty is fleeting, destined to wilt. With this awareness come further associations such as the inevitable progression of time and the inextricable link between life and death. In this way, a flower is a living symbol for all things passing. Meditating on these ideas can help lessen the pain caused by resistance to inevitable change.
In this project, the flowers are photographed in their natural state in the forested mountains and rolling hills of Marin County, California. Twelve images of flowers are presented. I elected to print the photographs on warmtone semi-matte fibre paper and to subtly bleach and split-tone the highlights to emphasize the delicate nature of the wildflowers. In Zen Buddhism, the number twelve is significant in its reference to Jūni-Innen; the Twelve Causes and Conditions. The twelfth Jūni-Innen, called Rōshi, means aging, decaying, or growing old. Rōshi is the inevitable, direct consequence of the eleventh link, Shō (Birth). Anything that is born must eventually decay and die. My hope is that the photographs presented here will allow the viewer to consider these concepts.
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Note: I am abandoning this project, and moving the final twelves images from the “projects” section of my website to this lowly blog entry. The work ain’t cutting it, and I’ve lost my motivation to pursue it further. I have other new projects in flight that I find much more exciting. My lesson learned here: it is good to try different things, but it is even better to know when to move on to something else when the work isn’t…well… working.
