Stills

First, thanks for the introduction to Kenna's work. The only work of his that seems connected to Okinawa that I could find was a seascape, so is that the sea behind you?

This is a very intriguing shot as it mainly hints at things - characteristic Japanese landscape, peasant activity in the fields - but then sets plastic bags as the main object that the eye settles on! Then the bags don't seem to be connected to what is growing in the field (looks like grass to me), the woman on the left seems to be sweeping with a broomstick and the vegetation is scrubby. But the path on the left would certainly attract me to seek the view the other side.

Despite all the incompleteness, the elusiveness of activity and the annoyingly small scale of the figures the picture still seems to draw quite strong brush strokes.
 

There was a link in the bracketed language under my photo that was not easy to spot. Over my shoulder it looked like this:

http://www.michaelkenna.net/html/japan02/l23.html
 

That was the one that I found!
 

A whole career could await somebody in the field of 'what it really looked like when MK took the photo'. I always feel when looking at his stuff that they reveal much but hide more.

When I first saw this photo I wondered whether Japan was such a clean place that they vacuum pack their sheep before letting them out to graze....it took a while for the real subject matter to sink in.

I get the same feel of competing highlights that Doug mentioned.
 

Now Colin, your comment makes me feel like I am thick. I have come back to this picture several times and I fail to see the subject matter. OK, I see the plastic bags but... sorry, I don't see anything.
 

Stephane,

All I meant was that I had invented a subject that wasn't there. There are no shrink wrapped sheep.
 

An interesting idea -- to shoot the same place, but in another direction. I find myself wishing the foreground bags of whatever were not there. The figures are interesting, but it took me a bit of looking to find them and then to register what they were! Maybe that only says something about my deteriorating near vision, though!
 

Well, I had to look up Michael Kenna (interesting stuff). I'm not sure about this as it stands, but I think cropping off the top and bottom would really give you something. This would exaggerate the four parallel lines - bags, pickers, trees, sky.
 

I enjoyed exploring Michael Kenna's work although the quality of the web images was poor I would like to see some full size prints.

I am confused by the bags, shrink wrapped sheep, and the human interest which looks like they should be a part of the story is indistinct.
 

Rex,

Kenna's books are very high quality - some of the best that I've seen, in fact.

The original prints are quite small so you don't lose any sense of scale by seeing book reproductions.
 

Thanks for all the feedback. I'm with Stephane a little on this - no subject. But it does form part of an ongoing series of photographs in famous Japanese tourist photo-oportunity sites and then take the opposite shot. Started it in Nikko with a picture of the less famous bridge taken from the slightly more famous bridge.

From this shot the tourists arrive on the top left pathway walk around to look at the elephant rock formation then circle around and off again to the next site on the path to the right. This centre piece is plain grass and the ladies in the picture are picking out weeds...
 

This is a shot of the more famous bridge in Nikko taken from the less famous one. Will dig out the latter one from my archives and post.

http://nikko-jp.org/english/taiyuin/shinkyo.html