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Kal Khogali | all galleries >> Transition >> New Images > The Trouble With Trains, Somwhere On A Train 2008
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01-FEB-2008

The Trouble With Trains, Somwhere On A Train 2008

From the new gallery "Digital Kisses"

Canon EOS 20D
1/160s f/3.2 at 17.0mm iso1600 full exif

other sizes: small medium large original auto
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Guest 05-Mar-2008 23:09
Awesome!
Marisa Livet10-Feb-2008 19:05
This photo is very well composed, like a triangle where the three characters are the vertices.
I’d be a little too cautious about finding too many metaphors.
I perceive it a display of a typical aspect of the trip.
People on the train are in a temporary close universe, which makes them a little absent, as if time took a different dimension.
I think we cannot get into the single thoughts of these people and I think it’s maybe wrong to give them thoughts which are just out of our own imagination.
What I think it’s impressive here is the slow rhythm of the visual composition, which echoes the rhythmic movement of a train.
Excellent!
Marisa
Ray Rebortira08-Feb-2008 20:18
Hitchcock used trains as a sexual metaphor --- erotic, romantic, perverse. Since this image is part of the gallery, 'Digital Kisses', I assume you have similar intentions. And you have pushed the metaphor so brilliantly to the edge: the woman looks exhausted and the men fretful, anxious, sucking their thumbs. There is melancholy in this photograph, I'd even call it post coital sadness. And that probably is the trouble with trains --- souls are bared but the nakedness is uncomfortable.

Bravo, Kal.

Ray
Phil Douglis08-Feb-2008 19:10
This is an image of echoes, Kal -- the hand to face gesture is instinctive, symbolizing such varied states as thought, boredom and exhaustion. Trains, as Steve points out below, can suspend time -- these people are caught between
departure and destination, and can only think and snooze until they get to where they are going.

(Both of us have been inspired by Jen Zhou's amazing "Migrant Mother" image athttp://www.pbase.com/angeleyes_zyl/image/32210561 -- a train shot that tells the story of not only migrant workers but also is an iconic statement on motherhood and on the nature of China itself. As you note in your comment there, it offers both a universal and intimate perspective, and I think you are doing something similar here. I know that Jen's Migrant Mother image was in the back of my own mind when I made this shot on Japan's Kobe-Kyoto express:http://www.pbase.com/image/58757212 which thrusts the viewer into a private space normally meant for others.)
JSWaters08-Feb-2008 16:11
Maybe the good thing as well? A time to rest, reflect, regroup. They remind of small children trying to self soothe with those hands to their mouths.
Jenene
jude08-Feb-2008 16:10
apparently you have to touch your face to be on a train..lol
i like them in their own little worlds.
Stu08-Feb-2008 13:02
The trouble with trains indeed. Well observed - I like the very minor differences in the way they are thinking too...the man at the back displaying happiness, the woman on the left showing peace of mind, and Karl Marx trying to remember if he left the iron on!
Silvia Roitman08-Feb-2008 12:07
great!!!
Rob Rosetti08-Feb-2008 10:13
Fantastic tryptich!! Brilliant catch!
Guest 08-Feb-2008 09:13
Somme-where en quelque sorte ;-)
Steve Viscot08-Feb-2008 09:09
excellent Kal!! Modern life depicted in a very classical way. This shot might as well be taken in the 40s (if there were thalys trains then:) ) a timeless image -v
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