Every day, or so it seems.
As always when I talk about other photographers, I need to make it clear that the pictures on this page are mine, and she deserves no blame for them. Click on the links I’ve provided to see Keely Kernan’s work.
She’s a freelance photographer currently residing in Busan. I came across her work by way of a photo essay published in Busan Haps.
She seems to have spent some significant time in Costa Rica before coming here, and if you visit her website you’ll see gritty, starkly black-and-white images of young men from Somalia interned outside of San Jose, and Nicaraguan refugees in a village named La Carpio. It is journalism, and of the very best kind, the kind that doesn’t seek and emotional or intellectual response, or to persuade its audience toward some action or change of government policy, but rather simply states, “These people are here.”
She traveled to Port Au Prince and brought back images of the aftermath of the earthquake that took place there in 2010. What will strike you most is not the scale of the physical destruction but rather the faces of the people, at times inexplicably quiet and calm, sometimes brooding with anger just barely contained beneath the skin, and others vaguely haunting, as with a young boy who looks no more than 5 or 6 years of age, holding what might be a broken toy, and looking directly at the camera with an expression that describes deep intelligence and the possibility of an interior life of an adult’s knowledge of loss and pain, and endurance. She’s not shy about including children in her images, but she never succumbs to exploiting the cuteness factor – quite the contrary.
Many of her photos of Korea are not dissimilar to the kind I like to take – market places, and the people on the street – and when I view them I get the feeling she has the same kind of love and respect for the place that I do. I want to point to her blog, though she has so far only updated once for each of the past four years. Her most recent entry is about Chilburam Hermitage, and I’ll recommend it in spite of the fact that temple stories are usually not my thing.
It was still dark when mediation ended but the sky was beginning to lighten in tone. I noticed there was a man praying in front of the Buddha statues who didn’t stay the night. I later found out he started hiking up the mountain at 2 am to pray with the Buddha as the sun rose. Aaron and I carefully walked around Chilburam trying not to disturb the people chanting in front of the Buddha. We followed the path back to the top of the mountain to watch the sunrise. The mountains were covered with mist that flowed through the valley. We sat and watched the sun gradually rise and the fog circle around the mountain’s peaks, disappearing as it flowed down the valley. The movement reminded me of meditation practice, how you can’t hold on to anything. Just watch as things rise and fall and learn to let go.
I even like her portraitures.
The photo essay referred to at the top is called “The Light of Busan,” and includes several excellent shots of Korean streets that are not found on her own website. The largest collection of her work is on her Facebook page, where she is showing a photo of Korea everyday.
Go. Look.
