Dust

The other day I was in the college I used to work in and sitting on a shelf I saw an Angineux 12 - 120 zoom lens.  I immediately recognized it as the zoom lens Gerrit, my father used on Amuigh Faoin Speir.  It was clean and had been used recently as far as I could tell.  It got me thinking.  There are so many things now that seem redundant due to technology that sit on shelves gathering dust.  I think that this is sad.  I have spent the last couple of months gathering all this old technology so that it has a home.  Besides I'm sure there will come a time when I will need it.  Just because it's old doesn't mean it's obsolete.  You hear that film is no longer in use, but most times when I work I seem to shoot film.  The other day I sat in my fathers old studio looking at cans and cans of film wondering what I would do with it all.  It's been gathering dust for 15 years since he died and it's time the cans were opened, looked at, cleaned and cataloged.  I spent many years working with him.  I also spent many years working with film.  I like film, it's great to shoot and if you spend time with it the results are fantastic.  I wonder where all this data we shoot nowadays will be - whether the drives will spin up and whether all work will be intact.  I wonder whether in 50 years from now my son will be sitting in my studio looking at my work wondering what to do with it?

Nature does Matter!

Well I gave 2 talks in the last 36 hours.  On Sunday I spoke about Gerrit my father and it went well.  I was very pleased with the response.  It was very nice to talk to my friends and strangers about my Dad and I was particularly pleased that people I hadn't seen for several years came.  Also something struck me - a book about my Dad would be a nice thing to do - now there's a thought.

Secondly I went into my children's school and talked about hibernation and drawing birds.  The age group was 4 to 6 year old children.  It was an absolute pleasure and thanks Gerrit for the wonderful illustrations and slides - great to do and I'd love to do it again.

Nature Matters

I spent all day scanning work of Gerrit, my father and pictures of him, some of which I include here, this is for a talk entitled "Nature Matters" I am giving about him next Sunday the 15th in the Nature Room of the Pearse Museum, St Endas Park, Rathfarnham at 2pm.