The Sincerest Form

Raphael Shevelev — Fri, 23 Dec 2016 22:52:59 +0000

Over the years, I’ve come across so many Ansel Adams wannabes, Wynn Bullock wannabes, Michael Kenna wannabes and many others who’d prefer to be someone other than who they are. I’ve been drawn to the conclusion that imitation is the sincerest form of mindlessness.

Category:

Art and the Creative Process

Mrs. Marcus's Bagels

Raphael Shevelev — Tue, 23 Aug 2016 17:15:29 +0000

After a stay in a hospital near my home in Berkeley, California, I received a questionnaire from the Administrator. I responded that I had been delighted with the courtesies and professionalism of the nurses, technicians and physicians, but I resented the antisemitism. On my second morning there, my breakfast tray contained a curious item: wrapped in cellophane was a round, cold, soggy bread-like substance, ashamed of its own pallor. The menu labeled it as a bagel.

Category:

Social Commentary

Prosperity and the Jewish Truck

Raphael Shevelev — Mon, 08 Aug 2016 00:26:38 +0000

Once a week, usually in the morning, the fruit and vegetable man drove his Jewish truck down our street in Cape Town, stopping outside our home and blowing the horn. Until I walked out to look at his truck, I didn’t know motor vehicles could be Jewish.

Category:

Social Commentary

The Gift

Raphael Shevelev — Fri, 01 Jul 2016 21:18:48 +0000

When my parents were very young, only a few years older than my grandson is now, they fled their Baltic homes from the growing ugliness of European anti-Semitism. Much of the Western world was closed to them, so they found refuge in South Africa. In 1936, in their mid-twenties, they were married in Cape Town’s Great Synagogue. I was born in December 1938, just nine months before Hitler’s troops invaded Poland and thus started the Second World War. Other family members, not having had their foresight, were murdered in the Holocaust.

Category:

Social Commentary

Test blog post

Raphael Shevelev — Sun, 15 Nov 2015 21:20:40 +0000

I want to chexk this out.

Several paragraphs,

Category:

Art and the Creative Process

This Time of My Life

Raphael Shevelev — Wed, 10 Dec 2014 23:17:58 +0000

I wore my best blue suit to meet Harry Springett. In a place where even modest dwellings were named, my parents took me to “Fairhaven,” 15 Flower Street, The Gardens, Cape Town. Mr. Springett was the first photographer I’d met.

Category:

Social Commentary

Seeking Inspiration and Finding It

Raphael Shevelev — Fri, 28 Nov 2014 17:33:51 +0000

I see a great number of images. I make a few myself, and I subscribe to remarkable journals put out by the Royal Photographic Society of Great Britain, LensWork, others devoted to the image, and those made by many artists, some of whom I know.

Category:

Art and the Creative Process

Judy and the Mayor of Pretoria

Raphael Shevelev — Tue, 11 Nov 2014 22:06:57 +0000

My wife nudged me awake and said “I have a pain in my belly.” “Not surprising,” I said, “given all the boerewors (farmer’s sausage) we ate at the neighbor’s braaivleis (barbecue) last night. Would you like Alka-Seltzer?” She said “I don’t think that’s the reason. I think the baby is coming!” Well, that certainly changed the day. She kept a small suitcase of personal items under the bed. It came along with us to the Marifont Nursing Home, a Catholic maternity hospital just two blocks away.

Category:

Social Commentary

The Mechanical Fetish

Raphael Shevelev — Mon, 25 Aug 2014 18:04:00 +0000

A friend who is a fine, accomplished and well-published poet recently stopped by. She looked at one of the pictures on the dining room wall and said "Photoshop?" I said "Cerebrum." Then I asked her what word processor she used to compose her poems. From her chastened look, I gathered the message had leaked through.

Category:

Ideas in Photography

George Washington and my Fiftieth Fourth

Raphael Shevelev — Fri, 04 Jul 2014 14:30:58 +0000

Davey Neipris of Boston, Mass., gave me a left-profile portrait of George Washington. It’s crafted in metal, fractionally short of an inch in diameter, and cost him no more than 25 cents. That was in the days when you could get a cup of coffee, including a refill, for 5 cents.

Category:

Social Commentary