Stealing Oreos?

/ Su Leslie
tppa

Protesters against TPPA, Auckland, 2015. Image: Su Leslie

“Taking pictures is like tiptoeing into the kitchen late at night and stealing Oreo cookies.” – Diane Arbus

The tiptoeing part of that quote definitely resonates with me when it comes to photographing people, particularly candid shots. It’s not something I do often, and my general rule of thumb is to make my presence known, but unobtrusive.

And when I’m happy with the results — definitely an Oreo moment.

Image: Su Leslie 2019
Image: Su Leslie
Image: Su Leslie 2019
Image: Su Leslie 2018
Image: Su Leslie 2017
Image: Su Leslie 2019
Image: Su Leslie 2018

Lens-Artists’ Photo Challenge | candid

39 thoughts on “Stealing Oreos?”

  4. Su – you captured a bit of humanity heart tug with a couple of the shots today – the child near the cross and the one titled “hosier lane-a” with the lady’s hand on face and the art walls – powerful
    —
    and you know I like talking my candid street shots yet sometimes I HATE it because there is a gray area here – that privacy thing – but when I saw your post – and many others this week – I was reminded that there is value in capturing these photos – we are celebrating and sharing in a culture rich way and maybe we are helping to preserve something for future generations – –
    and nice way to use that quote

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    • Hehe. Global brands eh. Even if they weren’t sold here, I am familiar with them from references in popular culture.
      I’m not an Oreo fan, though my son loved them for a while, so we had them in the house.

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  12. I love the idea of ‘Oreo moments’ 🙂

    I haven’t yet reached a stage where I’m comfortable taking photos of strangers in a crowd. There are so many wonderful candid moments available … as you’ve proven! Nicely done.

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      • I had a very bad experience once with a reporter from a local TV station.
        I was at the scene of a house explosion and stopped to take a few photos. The reporter had exited his vehicle just as I was taking a photo of the street scene. Not only was I not trying to take his photo, he wasn’t even in the frame I actually took … but he immediately started yelling at me anyway for taking his photo without his permission.
        He was really making quite a scene and I was mortified. Yeah – I’m very careful about not taking photos of people if I can help it.

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  15. Love that quote!!! 😄 And it’s a new one for me so it goes straight into my quote journal (I decided to do this when even for me the myriads of loose paper slips on my desks became too many for me to handle!😂). I haven’t done streetphotography lately anymore because privacy rights have taken actually a turn for the worse around here -meaning that you are not allowed to take photos of strangers anymore and especially don’t post or publish them without written permission. 😯 That even prevents many parents from taking pics of their kids’ first day at school. I’ve heard that it’s not as strict in other countries though I can imagine there’s going to be a time when they’ll have the same problem. Takes a lot of art away from people.😯

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    • A quote journal is a great idea!!
      The privacy laws here are still quite relaxed in terms of photographing people — adults — in public. I can kind of understand wanting to make them stricter as more and more images are posted online, and facial recognition software become more common. It is sad though as Street photography can be wonderful.
      It will also make taking tourist photos harder — how many family snaps have strangers in them who accidentally got into the shot. 🤔

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