Poems and photographs

This week I went to see Leaving My Found Eden, an exhibition of Poetography by Ron L. Zheng. His images are beautiful—abstract-like black and white photographs of passing moments, overlaid with tanka poetry expressing the sadness of having to leave his lover when he was deported from the US.

This exhibition is showing for the first time in the UK in a former public library in Lewisham, south east London. It's a fairly low profile venue, it's a little bit out of the way, but it did mean that I had the gallery entirely to myself and had the privilege of meeting the artist.

The idea of combining words and images in collaboration with a poet/writer has been bouncing around in my psyche for maybe a year or so. I bought a book called Writing the Picture featuring the photographs of Magnum photographer David Hurn when it was published last year. I loved the photographs, but the poetry by John Fuller didn't quite do it for me. I found myself covering up the text so that I could enjoy the images on the opposite page.

In contrast, the poetry of Leaving My Found Eden is something that makes me stop and think and ponder. The photographs are not of things or places, but of moods and feeling and memories. The text and the imagery work together perfectly.

I'm very inspired by this exhibition and I feel fortunate that I was able to go. There is a book—I've ordered it from Amazon US—but seeing the large canvas prints on the gallery wall and meeting the artist was a privilege.