On the collision of the curated and the entirely accidental

/ Su Leslie
Seen in Selfridges window, Oxford Street, London. Photo: Su Leslie, 2015. Shot with iPhone4, edited with Pixlr Express.

Seen in Selfridges window, Oxford Street, London. Photo: Su Leslie, 2015. Shot with iPhone4, edited with Pixlr Express.

I seem to have developed a habit of photographing shop windows. I’ve only recently become aware of this, and have been thinking about it quite a lot. I think it’s because I love the interplay of items placed and framed deliberately — often with great care and at great expense — against the totally random nature of the world reflected in the glass.

photo 2

Still life with coral – and a couple walking their dog. Seen in window of design store, Munich. Photo: Su Leslie, 2015. Shot with iPhone4, edited with Pixlr Express.

Is it street photography? Abstraction? Or in the case below, self-portrait?

Captured in a store window in Bordeaux. "Jellyfish" made of fabric, chandelier, armchair, street scene and the photographer. Photo: Su Leslie, 2015. Shot with iPhone4, edited with Pixlr Express.

Captured in a store window in Bordeaux. “Jellyfish” made of fabric, chandelier, armchair, street scene and the photographer. Photo: Su Leslie, 2015. Shot with iPhone4, edited with Pixlr Express.

This post was written for Sally’s Phoneography and non-SLR Digital Devices Photo Challenge at Lens and Pens by Sally.

17 thoughts on “On the collision of the curated and the entirely accidental”

    • Thank you; I love the fact I could have stood in the same place for hours and had so many different images. I was tempted, especially in Oxford Street — but the boy-child had other ideas 🙂

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  3. Pingback: Phoneography and Non-SLR Digital Devices Photo Challenge: Challenger’s Choice (Abstraction in Architecture) | Lens and Pens by Sally

  4. Great photos! I love photographing shop windows too — the layers, as you said, and also just wondering who thinks up such creative designs, what kind of job is it, etc. I come home from each trip with a couple of dozen window shots.

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    • Thanks. I know what you mean about the content of the windows themselves. I tend to photograph shop windows when I’m away from home, and it’s seeing something unusual or clever that gets me started. I guess the reflections are a happy by-product of not getting it “quite right” in terms of shooting the displays. 🙂

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