Landscape

By the Seaside and The Beauty of Women

ERWhittington 1 Comment

I hope everyone is having a happy new year so far… I’ve been feeling a tiny bit ill (and so a tiny bit grumpy), but am definitely making the most of small pleasures; as if stationery didn’t make me happy enough as it already is, I today discovered that staples are available in different colours while on an incredibly boring but necessary jaunt to buy a new receipt file (the joys of keeping things for SIX YEARS). Pink, blue, green and yellow. My inner fourteen year-old girl is buzzing. I also got some very beautiful new towels today; I am easily pleased (well, that’s not strictly true, but for the purposes of this blog post let’s say I am). And I’m doing pretty well with my extreme multi-tasking idea; I want to improve my German and French this year, morphing the knowledge I have into actual practical confidence, to be tested later in the year on various trips, and am squeezing in some audio lessons during very short stints on my exercise bike. I wonder if I will forever associate particular words with the view of my speedometer.

Anyway, one thing I am very pleased about is to be able to mention that three photographer/artists I’ve worked with are all exhibiting at the same time. Mark Davy-Jones, Gregory Brown and Jeff Wack will all be showing work at ‘The Beauty of Women’ at The Menier Gallery, London 8-19th January. I know that some images of me are being featured by Mark, though I don’t know which, and will have to go along to find out if I’ll be featured in any more.

Interestingly, the Guild of Erotic Artists says of the exhibition:

‘THE BEAUTY OF WOMEN is an exhibition that is designed to allow the visitor to view the female form as a thing of beauty that is generally considered too private and intimate for public display. If shown at all, a woman’s body is usually presented in a negative fashion, generally within the context of pornography, intended, in almost all cases, for the exclusive pleasure of men. The goal of this exhibition is to remove these indecent inferences, contained in works of art over the centuries.’

I’m hoping to visit in between modelling for the Yerburys at the annual SWPP convention at the London Hilton on Edgeware Rd, which I’m really looking forward to. If you’re planning to be there, come and say hi!

Seems fitting to finally blog some images Mark Davy-Jones took of me and Kayleigh Lush a while ago. I love these!

(The biddies in the background didn’t pay us much attention.)

And this has reminded me that I need to plan a quick visit to the Isle of Wight again for March/April – will get on to that soon, though am all in a flux at the moment about when to visit Paris (4th-9th April?) and am also itching to get on with planning my trip to Scotland (early May; big proper tour, unlike my last year’s piddly foray into just Edinburgh, as stunningly beautiful as that city is), amongst others. Planning planning planning.

Otters, Rocks and Water Lilies

ERWhittington 4 Comments

Just in case you don’t notice, I’ve now re-jiggled my blog here to have its very own stand-alone ‘Travel Plans, Schedule & Events’ page (see the new tab at the top!). Pretty snazzy, eh? I’ll be attempting to keep it regularly updated with dates and locations, so it’s the place to glance at now and then if you ever find yourself wondering about my wanderings.

I’ve also added a widget on the right hand side which enables you lovely readers to enter your email address into the box to get immediate notifications directly to your inbox every time I update this blog with news and new images. You might find you like it. (And if not, you can unsubscribe at any time.) Do it! 🙂

*****

At the end of July I went on another two-day adventure with Perry (Imagesse) to Pembrokeshire in Wales. I annoyed myself throughout the trip by having a cold which meant I couldn’t breathe amazingly well (urgh), but apart from that it was another very enjoyable adventure! I had my own beautiful little self-catering converted barn in Lamphey, so that was a nice treat (although I vaguely remember demanding that Perry remove a spider from my bathroom shortly after arrival. I am such a girl, it’s embarrassing).

We visited various locations which Perry had thought looked interesting, and as usual there were some beautiful and striking scenes involved. Sometimes a shoot is a bit like a nature-spotting hiking trip in disguise. 🙂 With thanks to Perry (and hoping to shoot again sometime!), here are a few of the results:

With my dance wings let loose like a cape…

In a tiny old chapel set in a cliff:

Down near the water…

And in a huge lake filled with beautiful water lilies. It was quite difficult to find a spot to photograph here, as to be honest, the lake wasn’t exactly very private, but we took the risk… I love the inky hues of Perry’s mono conversions here, but will also add a couple in colour to show off the amazing vibrant blues and greens!

And of course, I promised otters. Well, aside from joggers of the picturesque-location penchantery, this location was also a hit with otter-spotters. One poor man told us all about his efforts to witness their existence, with little success, before moving on. Around three minutes later, we saw one repeatedly popping its little brown head up before swimming around to a slightly different part of the water, sending ripples and bubbles everywhere and popping up again… We were totally spoiled with otter omnipresence! So obviously Perry grabbed a quick snapshot or two (though he hadn’t got the most appropriate otter-watching lens on at the time!):

Cuuuuute! I really hope the man we spoke to saw one or two before he went home.

I love my job.

Cracked Earth, Sleek Fashion and Tumbleweed

ERWhittington 10 Comments

Very excited to show you these, from my most recent photographic adventure with photographer J H. As you may have noticed, we do end up shooting in some fun places, and when I mentioned to J that I’d be in California in October he took the opportunity to visit too! I am having a bit of a dilemma here about which images to post first, but think I’ll go for the ones taken at Lucerne Valley dry lake bed. (Edit: I might be lying; I’ll probably post everything.)

J had in mind some images he’d seen of some dry, cracked earth, and I jumped at the idea, as I have never shot in a location like that before – one where you can literally see the ground splitting apart – and I knew it would make for some amazing shots! Luckily, we found an absolutely perfect spot and also managed to coincide our jaunt with a storm which was making its way in over the San Bernadino mountains, which made for the incredible sky you’ll see below. (No, it really wasn’t photoshopped in!). J has already posted a thread on PurplePort about the trip here, if you’d like to read his version of events.

As always, I’m very grateful to J for choosing me to model for him yet again, and in such amazing places! Some of these images are just so spectactular – a wonderful combination of landscape photography and figurative art. In this area we focused mainly on keeping the pose(s) simple while Jeremy experimented with perspective. I especially love the fourth shot here (which I then go on to post a million versions/crops of… sorry!… Help?) I think this amazing place deserves to be seen in both monochrome and colour. Any preferences though?

Previous to this set, we had visited El Mirage, another dry lake bed in the Mojave Desert, but one whose landscape is completely different. I really love how simple these shots are – in such a vast, empty space the poses are everything.. all the world’s a stage, etc., etc., and I love the dusty tones on the horizon. (Clothes provided by J.)

I like to call this the ‘Batwoman’ set:

And we also managed some quick nudes, despite having to chase the black fabric half way down the desert at one point. That wind was fast!

And finally, a quick set we did with some tumbleweed found on the side of the road. We were pretty determined to do this (dappled light = goodness!) and again the wind played its part; it took great restraint and gravity control not to be pulled around while lifting it up. They are surprisingly heavy. And utter wind traps. Pretty amazing little (big) things, tumbleweeds!

So, I’m afraid this has been another bumper blog post… I have been spoiled with images again (I also have square-crop versions of most, and the colour/mono debate is evident once more…) so please do declare your favourites with any comments! Thank you!

Beetroot and Rocks

ERWhittington 2 Comments

It is completely and utterly unnecessary, not to mention irrelevant to the purposes of this blog, to let you know what I had for dinner this evening, but I think what I just made needs to go down in history.

Beetroot, walnut and goats cheese spelt risotto.

Method:
– One onion (or a few shallots) in butter in big shallow pan
– Add garlic
– Two chopped cooked beetroots
– One courgette
– Handful of walnuts
– 100g wholegrain spelt (serves 2)
– Sizzle briefly (that’s the food, not the cook, though I was wearing an indecent amount of glamorous eye make up from today’s shoot)
– Add about 450ml of vegetable stock, and a splash of white wine for luck
– boil/simmer until the spelt absorbs most of the water
– grate in hard goats cheese
– Inhale gorgeousness
– Grind in a load of black pepper
– Admire the bright pink concoction as it bubbles away
– When liquid is absorbed, serve into shallow bowls and top with a handful of fresh watercress.

Delicious.

In other news, I’m happy to say I’ll be modelling for the Yerburys at the SWPP Photographic Convention in January (8th-14th at the Hilton at Edgware, London), for their two ‘Superclasses’, ‘Boudoir to Nude’, which has just three places left (on Tues 8th) and a portraits/creative lighting class (on the 11th) which has already sold out. It’ll be my first time there, and I’m sure will be a lot of fun! Maybe see some of you there, so come and say hi!

And finally, here are some shots made by the very lovely Bob Freund, taken in the stunning, surreal, wonderfully spiky Joshua Tree National Park in California. I spotted a coyote there one day (I was lucky enough to go there several times in the course of a week) and spent one evening lying against rocks in the dark watching the amazing star-ful sky! Very very peaceful and eerie. Bob found a particular spot in the park that he’d been searching for years, since photographing it once and wanting to go back; that’s not an easy feat, when the park is so huge, and required an initial detour to a patch of deceptively beautiful, violent cacti. Luckily, they didn’t get us! Thanks Bob!

Enchanted Forest

ERWhittington 3 Comments

Hello! Back from my trip away and raring to go again in this beautiful English autumn. I had an excellent trip but I don’t think I’ll ever shake off that wonderful feeling of coming home. I’m so glad I appreciate my country still, even after loving so many other places.

My inbox is bursting with an influx of photographic gems, some delivered drip by drip (mini blog posts bubbling away gradually) and some in big, unexpected shebangs of glory – every photographer is different – but now I have so many I want to show! It keeps my portfolio changing.

These were sent to me recently from a photographer I worked with in Scotland in May. I have already put one in my portfolio. By Calandra, from the ‘Kingdom of Fife’, headdress mania:

The last image I am calling Fairy Steps. Nearby was an area covered in wreaths, lanterns and coloured ribbons after some kind of Green Man ritual, so it felt like a very special place!

Update: two more!

Mr Cupid

ERWhittington 3 Comments

Hello! It’s been a while and I meant to post these shots (taken a few weeks ago) before I left for the land of tiny dogs, vast desert wilderness, supersized soft drinks and ‘manual stairs’ (because the ones where you have to actually use your legs are apparently remarkable rather than the norm, according to one overheard American). How lucky am I, getting to shoot with such a beautiful, ethereal looking horse as Cupid last month? Photographer Karen Jones isn’t bad either of course. 🙂 Just a quick set we did – horses aren’t the easiest mammals to control and it was all a bit of an experiment to hopefully work on more another time. Isn’t he lovely? The second is a fun outtake, where I look at him in excited dreamyment. 😉