"Clouds really teach you about transience: They come, they go. Like thoughts, like feelings, like so many things," says a cloud appreciator, quoted in "Nature’s Best Poetry of 2019: Clouds/Every day, members of the Cloud Appreciation Society post photos of the sky from around the world. This is why they stop to look up" (NYT).
Lots of photographs at the link, of course, and the page is structured in a kind of fancy way that I found too... controlling. I prefer to make my own choices about when to look at pictures and when to see the text. Here's the Society's own on-line gallery if what you prefer to look at is not the NYT.
Do you need a reminder to notice the clouds? I'm always noticing clouds — and not just in my sunrise photographs, where clouds are what make all the difference — positive or negative — in the interestingness of the sunrise. I don't use my "clouds" tag in my sunrise pictures — not routinely, anyway — but I'm putting it here — in part so I can see my own cloud pictures.
When are people who notice clouds motivated to take a photograph of the clouds? Based on the NYT article, I see 3 completely different reasons: 1. It's an unusual type of cloud (e.g., mamma, lenticular), 2. It's a showily beautiful cloud (dramatic lighting, size, etc.), 3. It looks like something ("Do you see yonder cloud that’s almost in shape of a camel?"/"By the mass, and ‘tis like a camel, indeed"/"Methinks it is like a weasel"/"It is backed like a weasel"/"Or like a whale?"/"Very like a whale").
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Clouds
https://rhhardin.blogspot.com/2011/08/great-and-sudden-mountains.html
click pic
Joni Mitchell?
I thought about adding Joni Mitchell here, but I didn't like feeling compelled.
I almost added Bob Dylan, actually:
Father of night, Father of day
Father, who taketh the darkness away
Father, who teacheth the bird to fly
Builder of rainbows up in the sky
Father of loneliness and pain
Father of love and Father of rain
Father of day, Father of night
Father of black, Father of white
Father, who build the mountain so high
Who shapeth the cloud up in the sky
Father of time, Father of dreams
Father, who turneth the rivers and streams...
Judy Collins, send in the clouds.
I’m a member. I joined it about five years ago for $10 I think. Got a pin and certificate in return. I never submit photos or look at the ones they post, I just like supporting a group of English eccentrics. And I loved the name.
Blue skies here, and a morning full moon.
A ducky and a horsie.
https://www.philipchircop.com/post/11245668821/what-do-you-see-arent-the-clouds-beautiful
a cloud appreciation society. i should have guessed that and searched for it long ago.
however, i'm not seeing the "pathetic fallacy" formations or orientation at their site, to wit, where the cloud formations present ~abstract formations via color, shape and depth/distance that evoke feelings or a recognition of the many aspects of human struggle and desire.
coffee in my clouds, coffee in my clouds
and, vain so you...
Clouds, when fused with sunlight, often create an aesthetic experience.
Clouds, when fused with sunlight, often create an aesthetic experience.
Rows and floes of angel hair
And ice cream castles in the air
And feather canyons everywhere
I've looked at clouds that way
But now they only block the sun
They rain and snow on everyone
So many things I would have done
But clouds got in my way
I've looked at clouds from both sides now
From up and down, and still somehow
It's cloud illusions I recall
I really don't know clouds at all
Joni Mitchell may have written it but the version by Dave von Ronk and the Hudson Dusters has to be the definitive version. Judy and Joni do it very well indeed but a bit chirpy.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=KMhBdIu8gaI
Obligatory Dylan reference: Bob credits dvr, jack elliot and woody g as his 3 major musical influences. Or did in the 60s. Dunno if he still does. Lost interest long ago but still listen to dvr from time to time.
John Henry
Rows and floes of angel hair
And ice cream castles in the air
And feather canyons everywhere
I've looked at clouds that way
But now they only block the sun
They rain and snow on everyone
So many things I would have done
But clouds got in my way
I've looked at clouds from both sides now
From up and down, and still somehow
It's cloud illusions I recall
I really don't know clouds at all
Joni Mitchell may have written it but the version by Dave von Ronk and the Hudson Dusters has to be the definitive version. Judy and Joni do it very well indeed but a bit chirpy.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=KMhBdIu8gaI
Obligatory Dylan reference: Bob credits dvr, jack elliot and woody g as his 3 major musical influences. Or did in the 60s. Dunno if he still does. Lost interest long ago but still listen to dvr from time to time.
John Henry
Today's Astronomy Picture of the Day is some cool mamamtus clouds.
I'm not clicking through because I think I've used up my allotted NYT views for now. I may clear my cache so I can see them later. The idea of poems about clouds amuses me because I assume there will be lots of metaphors describing clouds. I find this amusing because the word "cloud" is a metaphor. It comes from an Old English word that meant "boulder". Clouds are sky boulders.
The word "sky" comes from Old Norse and meant "clouds". If it was always cloudy, I can see why they would want to go viking.
Ironically, the Blue Sky initiative (e.g. Green Blight) may be a first-order forcing of [catastrophic] [anthropogenic] climate change, whereas clouds moderate our temperatures and keep our lawns green.
Behold, there ariseth a little cloud out of the sea, like a man's hand. 1 Kings 18:44
Clouds: Nature's Rorschach Test
I'd look at them more often if they werent so...lewd.
While out for my lunchtime walk at work the other day, I saw a feathery cirrus cloud that looked like a unicorn. Thought about stopping to take a picture but kept walking. A lap around the parking lot later, it looked less unicornish.
I'm really none of the above categories of cloud photographers.
The early 20th photographer and gallerist Alfred Stieglitz often photographed clouds not because they looked like something else, but because they made him feel something else. He called this series of pictures "Equivalents". It was left up to the viewer to determine what, if anything, the pictures were "equivalent" to.
Another photographer, a contemporary of Stieglitz, Edward Steichen, scoffed at this notion, saying "They're not equivalent to anything. They're just clouds." (He was a socialist. OK that's a cheap shot but it's true.)
I think that Stieglitz was closer to the truth. As Minor White (another, later 20th century photographer) advised, don't just photograph something because of what it is. Photograph it because of what else it is.
That, I can agree with. It is a pretty good summary of my personal approach the the art, and of course not just for clouds, but for everything I make a picture of.
AA: I don't think a tremendous amount of Dylan, but I have to admit that that hymn of his is admirable for its clarity and sincerity, which is often the case for music that is inspired by religious feeling.
I think maybe my favorite thing about Florida is the high fluffy clouds and dramatic skies.
When Carly Simon explained the lyric in her song “I’m Such a Vapid Starfucker....” err, I mean “You’re So Vain” it kind of ruined the “clouds in my coffee” line for me. I always thought it was bout when you first pour cream into your coffee, and it looks like clouds, but the illusion goes away in a second or two, but she was talking about a time that she saw the reflection of some clouds off of her coffee. I just have a hard time making that image work in my mind in the song. I guess she meant she saw them, but they weren’t really there, in her coffee...
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