google abstract

Sydney

 

As art, it looks early 20th century, doesn't it?  (Click to enlarge.)  Some forgotten acolyte of Mondrian, perhaps, who never made it as a modernist because he couldn't let go of earth tones.

This one is in a bottomland southwest of Toowoomba, Queensland.  Bottomlands in general are a feast for the abstract-loving eye, as they are the only landscapes without much trace of a watercourse.    Amid these vigorous patches and stripes, the roads are reduced to gossamer, while the dotting of farmstead buildings, each with its little drive from the nearest road, jostles the eye pleasantly, like an intentional imperfection that reveals the purity of the rest. 

(Previous Google Abstract post, and manifesto, here.)

Comments

[dale]

Wow. That's marvelous.

[Teresa]

This is a great post, Jarrett. I'm thinking shouldn't there be more green in bottomland, or have you black&whited the photo? Also, I seem to remember a google shot of Barcelona (?) in one of your posts last fall. The one about the intersection street corners being cut off, and that diangularity showed up in the shot. Also made crossing the streets take longer.

Anyway, the abstract patchwork effect of this shot is quite lovely.

Teresa

[Jarrett]

The colors are original. You can see a little green patch in the upper left.

Now that you mention it, I do think part of why I was attracted to this image was its near-black-and-white quality, the muted and uniform colors that give focus to shapes and patterns.

[wanderer]

Jarrett, it's very beautiful, in itself, and in your description of it, and the colours as they appear make it that much more hypnotic, but...

I think the little green patch at the upper left is not a clue to the colours being original, but a clue that they aren't. There is a vertical line approx a tenth of the frame in from the left magin, and it actually divides discreet shapes into 2 different colours.

Not that I care about artefact; what isn't?

[Jarrett]

A good eye, wanderer! The line you mention cuts all the way across the frame and is a boundary between two different aerial photographs taken at different times. So I suppose the two sides of the line are still both true, but true at different moments of history. I'm sure there's another season where the whole composition is mostly green.

Cheers, J