Pair of images with a garden and a poppy with a bee
Lens-Artists,  Photographic techniques,  Themed galleries,  Travel in general

Gallery: perfect (but contrasting) pairs

July 21, 2024 / 45 Comments

The greater the contrast, the greater the potential. Great
energy only comes from a correspondingly great tension of opposites.

Carl Jung

Photography is all about contrasts of course. Without those variations in lightness and darkness our images would be dull and flat. Whether contrasting black and white in monochrome shots, or harmonising and contrasting the shades in our colour shots, effective contrast is key to a good result.

But the term can also relate to our choice of subject matter. Do we go in close or step back? Do we look for a sense of history or modernity? Is it all about the place or the people? And so on.

According to London’s Tate Gallery, a ‘diptych is an artwork consisting of two painted or carved panels’. We can easily extend that to photography, by pairing two photos rather than painted or carved panels. Other definitions often insist that the two panels be hinged or attached in some other way. The hinge is difficult to recreate on a webpage, but we can certainly create a sort of virtual hinge. That is, we can create a relationship between the two images that make up our diptych.

This is exactly the challenge set us by Elizabeth of Albatz Travel Adventures. She reminds us that ‘to make a successful pairing there should be several things in common, and something very different, contrasting’. Let me see what I can find …

My feature photo was taken at Stokesay Castle in Shropshire, England, pairing a general view of the lovely cottage garden with a shot of an individual poppy. All my pairs were combined using the online collage maker, BeFunky.

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A pair from Yorkshire, England

Pair of images with a landscape with drystone walls and a sheep

On the left, the typical landscape of the Dales, and on the right, one of the many sheep that graze these hills and help to shape that landscape.

A pair from Liverpool, England

Pair of images with a small house and a sculpture of four men walking

On the left, Paul McCartney’s childhood home. And on the right, what he was to grow up to become, represented by a sculpture on the city’s waterfront.

A pair from Kvaløya island, Norway

Pair of images with a rocky coastline and seaweed

A simple pairing of seaweed covered rocks on the beach at Tromvik and a close-up look at one of those rocks.

A pair from Sofia, Bulgaria

Pair of images with a gold dome topped with a cross and a cathedral interior full of icons

An inside / outside pairing, with on the left the golden dome of St. Alexander Nevsky Cathedral and on the right a shot of the more sombre but richly decorated interior.

A pair from Seville, Spain

Pair of images with a city view and doll dressed in bull fighter's costume

On the left, a distant view of La Maestranza, the city’s bullring (taken from the cathedral bell tower). And on the right, a toy matador for sale in a souvenir shop.

A pair from Tirana, Albania

Pair of images with a house and a museum display of clothing and a photo

On the left the former home of dictator Enver Hoxha. And on the right a display from Bunk’Art 2, the former bunker of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. It is now devoted to a museum about the country’s secret police, the Sigurimi, under Hoxha’s regime. The display lists all those who died while imprisoned for political reasons.

A pair from New Mexico

Pair of images with signs and dried chillies

On the left a sign spotted in Chimayó, and on the right chillies drying outside a shop in Albuquerque. The state is obsessed with them!

A pair from Cartagena in Colombia

Pair of images with a traditional and more modern statue

On the left a statue of Christopher Columbus, who ‘discovered’ the Americas, a discovery that led to the colonisation of much of the continent by Spain and other European powers. And on the right a statue of San Pedro Claver, who fought for the welfare of the slaves employed by the Spanish to build and run their city.

A pair from Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe

Pair of images with waterfalls

On the left a shot taken as close to the falls as we were able to get, given the large amount of spray. And on the right a view of the falls from above, taken on a helicopter ride. Only the latter can give you a true sense of the scale (look at the traffic on the road and bridge in the foreground).

A pair from Phnom Penh, Cambodia

Pair of images with a cell containing a bed and a man holding a book

On the left a cell at the Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum in what was once Security Prison 21 or S-21. Between 1976 to 1979 an estimated 20,000 people were imprisoned here to be interrogated, tortured and then executed. On the right is Chum Mey, one of the handful of prisoners who had escaped being killed at the point when Tuol Sleng was liberated. He is posing with the book he wrote about his experiences.

A pair from North Korea

Pair of images with statues of two men and a waterfall

Contrasting an image we all associate with that country, statues of the ‘Dear Leaders’, with one that we perhaps don’t, its stunning landscapes. This is Rimyongsu Falls in the north of the country.

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