Truth in Common #26
The Quality of Garish Light
Entry #26 from The Work
It has been a few months since I have sent out one of these offerings to all of you. I read your requests for more and I am sorry about the delay, but I hope you enjoy. This image below was created on my recent trip to photograph the Pacific Coast.
“Feeling much like a composer who creates a new container of sounds put together with systemic order and and considered choice, the good photographer-artist will, in his picture, create a sort of re-mapping of reality, connecting his subject with the natural elements of light and weather. In so doing he may claim to create a true photograph, one which feels as well as instructs, modifies but does not subvert the simple authenticity of something found.” -John Sanderson
"High Noon Hues” is a photo I did not expect to make because of the light that day. Without any of the more pleasant lighting scenarios to choose from, such as afterglow dusk, sun softened with a cloud layer — or any number of other vain atmospheric choices made in a attempt to render a color scene — the one here is entirely lit from above with garish sun. Rarely do I find myself able to create a consistent or convincing color picture using High Noon Light. When I do find a scene conclusive to such, I feel redeemed because it subverts the typical outcome of a failed photograph replete with harsh shadows, washed out colors and little balance. The luminosity range of dark to bright is often so skewed that the picture is impossible to work with because there is little range in the mid-tones to balance it all out. One of the precepts of my work is that there must be some reconciliation between highlights and shadows in creating a balanced picture. This scene lacked any of the baked-in faults that would otherwise react to high-noon sun negatively. I was gifted that day.
In my view, the elements which react positively to the garish light are the bright buildings surrounded with an array of geometric staffage. There is just enough deep shadow to outline each building. A gentle, pastel color palette throughout allows the natural form to emerge without the distraction of color. Structurally interesting is the foreground with the tall blank sign that activates a visual counterpoint between the fore and aft-ground. Such a relationship between color, subject, light and the context they create in unison is central to consider when rendering a scene. If a component is missing, the photograph may not feel “complete”. After making this image, I find it hard to imagine it in another lighting context, or time of day. It seems magical the way it is because each element in the frame is in dialogue with every other object. There is harmony.
High Noon elicits a mood within me that is worth exploring. The harsh, hot and oppressive type of light seen in this picture operates on my mind in a way I can only describe as a form of cognitive dissonance. While I do not like sunny days for “making” work, I do not mind experiencing them non-photography. If I completely shut off on sunny days and ceased looking at the World, I would have never found “High Noon Hues” here because I’d have given up. On days like this some strange duality emerges within me between “wanting” to make a picture and not being able to “convince” myself to because my natural feeling demands softer light to palliate the photograph’s inherent overburden of detail and information.
Finding a picture like the one here on a day such as this is rare, and a heightened excitement validates my diligence. I suppose I enjoy those sunny days because it is a different kind of challenge. Below is another example of bright light used to positive visual effect, this time with nature playing a big part. Look for it in an upcoming Truth in Common/Weekly Photograph post.
Thank you for reading and feel free to touch base with your own thoughts, opinions, or dreams.
John Sanderson
New York City
4/20/2026
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Journal introduction from The Work
The American landscape in my time. Thousands upon thousands of miles traversed in search of pictures.
They become pictures when I see something.
Something which cannot be explained in words, only related to on some level of empathy.
Feeling with the light, subject or an arrangement of the two.
Driving, walking, searching deeper and longer for that which eludes me.
What I search for is unattainable.
But what keeps me coming back is the Quest, for those moments where a picture lines up with my imagination.
It is a complete circle.
"To strive, to seek, to find and not to yield." -Tennyson