Toy town Armenia....

Behold (finally) some of the new pictures from my trip, away from any 'Voyages' series this is going to be the main bulk of my work from my last visit to the Caucasus. From approximately 360 Medium Format (120) frames I would like a series of perhaps 15 - 20 images, now the editing process for this may take me some time! I agree that 360 isn't such a huge amount of images to edit down to 20, but when shooting in 120 I am already incredibly selective on my subject matter, taking time to think about each frame. This method therefore makes it often an incredibly difficult task. I currently have just 4 (out of 20) rolls processed and I'd like to show you as a start two photographs which I find at the moment very interesting (although perhaps not so much in the future...remember only time will tell!). These two photographs are composed from a large museum exhibit in the Museum of National Architecture and Urban Life in Gyumri, in the town of Gyumri, Armenia. I always find the provincial museums in the Caucasus very curious...usually I'm the only person in there whenever I visit, I'm followed by a light-switching attendant in every room and generally each museum has an 'exotic' array of fascinating provincial oddities. One museum I enjoyed in particular was the Mingechevir Regional Museum (Azerbaijan), which is actually the photograph on the header of my blog. The museum was complete with the usual array of archeological finds and so on but perhaps more interestingly the museum houses a collection of very peculiar paintings. One other aspect I enjoyed about this museum was the attendant's table (as seen in the centre of the image) partly covered with their possessions......

But lets get back to Armenia, I decided to photograph this display as a means of perhaps finding a metaphorical way to explore one's foreign presence and short stay within a certain town. The display oozes traditional Armenia, and focuses on both national architecture and population (not the small figure on the lower image)....exactly as the museum intends. These are my thoughts initially, my head is scrambled...perhaps I can get back to you on these in the near future?

© All images copyright Philip Mowbray