Wagner James Au / New World Notes

Cajsa Lilliehook covers the best in virtual world screenshot art and digital painting

Siobhan Muintir is someone who experiments all the time, shooting pics that illustrate songs, characters, and ideas. One of her obsessions, though, is photographing birds. She recently did a study of Flamingos with musical accompaniment by The Flamingos’ 1959 song, “I Only Have Eyes for You.” [click here] This small study enchanted me. Perhaps because flamingos are such recognizable birds, she went in a very abstract direction that is very much about color and inference. Look at this picture, we don’t see the birds clearly, but is there any doubt what they are?

For more flamingos, click here:

“Loft” shows another flamingo, perhaps less abstract, but with the color story, it becomes one with the water and the sky. It’s such an exciting picture. I love how the angle of the wings aligns with the cloud that obscures part of the sunset. I just love everything about this picture. It is so vital.

“Pavanne” is in sharp detail though with the color story, it still has the feeling of being outside the natural world. She is using classic composition rules with the horizon and the bird placed by the Rule of Thirds, but then she flagrantly and brilliantly breaks another rule which is always have the subject face into the picture. Not here, this bird is dancing right out of the frame. The space in front of the subject is called the active space, behind them is the dead space. Generally, you want more active space than dead space. But sometimes rules should be broken. 

I love Siobhan Muintir’s photostream. She has several albums exploring her many interests. I mean she has over seventy pictures of corvids, an album devoted to the various birds of Second Life which has more flamingoes, along with penguins, gulls, and corvids. You really cannot pin her down to one thing, which is what I find exciting. 

See all of Cajsa's Choices here. Follow Cajsa on Flickr, on Twitter, on her blog, and on her Ko-Fi.