This photograph is from my series Floating Garden.
The story begins with a single rose. The rose my daughter received for her 18th birthday. Eighteen years mark adulthood, which means that my daughter is no longer a little girl but is becoming a young woman. So, this rose prompted me to think about youth, beauty, transience… I wanted somehow to preserve it from decay, so without much planning and thinking, I put it in the water and iced it. After a while, it came to me how to shoot it to emphasize the delicate structure of the petals and maintain its natural color. In addition to rose petals, I began experimenting with other flowers, leaves, twigs, grasses, and seeds – everything I would find in my garden. When I shoot, I pay a lot of attention to lighting and composition, frames, shapes, textures, and colors. My intention with this photo was to show maturation and fertility.
The photographs from this series are like an intimate collection of poetry revealing my most fragile emotions and thoughts about the nature of life. My emphasis is on transience but also on the beauty of all stages of life. Those photographs are not just photos of flowers; they are an ode to the organic, elemental life, as well as an ode to the cycle of life – which celebrates birth as well as death.
Nature has always been my favorite motive in my photography, an endless source of inspiration. In the natural and delicate world around us, I find many metaphors for life and the transience of our human existence.
What are the TWO most impactful features that make your image a good photograph? Don’t be shy!
I think that this photograph is visually and mentally intriguing. It seduces us with its colors and shapes but manages to convey an idea, emotion, and message. I believe that when you create with passion and from an inner impulse, you can create something authentic that people can identify with.
If you could make this photo again, what would be the ONE thing you would like to do better or different?
I wouldn’t change anything. It came out exactly how I wanted.
Maja Strgar Kurečić shared this photograph in the FRAMES Facebook Group.
Photographer
Maja Strgar Kurečić, Zagreb, Croatia
Equipment and settings
Canon EOS 6D, EF100mm Macro IS USM
1/80 sec., f/14, ISO 2000
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