Flawed Optics: Exploring the ‘Spiritual’ Wolds

For more than a decade I have found myself constantly travelling, seeking new locations to explore with a camera. I feel as if my feet have barely touched the ground. And whilst these journeys have enriched my soul, I now find myself in a transitional period, feeling the need to stay home for a while. It's an opportunity to recalibrate and take stock of where I'm at on this creative quest. I live on the Yorkshire Wolds. It is a tranquil, undulating landscape; a peaceful place to inhabit, yet seemingly not 'dramatic' enough for landscape photography. Or so I thought for many years...

There is a particular energy to the Yorkshire Wolds. There are no jagged edges of the Peaks or the Lakes; it’s a subtler layering of history, chalk, and wind. For my current project, ‘Spiritual’, I find myself exploring sites like Wharram Percy and Duggleby Howe, not just to document them, but to wait for them to reveal their spirit of place.

As a professional, I usually reach for the clinical precision of my Bronica RF645 or the reliability of the Minolta Autocord for my analogue work. But for this series, a new tool has unexpectedly found its way into my bag: a vintage Yashica Mat-124G which belonged to my late Uncle. I've recently restored it, replacing the light seals etc, but it does have significant 'cleaning marks' - fine scratches in the lens coating (see pic below). In any other context, these marks would be a defect. Here, they have become a collaborator.

The scratched lens of the Yashica.

Photography is often a pursuit of absolute clarity, but exploring the 'spiritual' requires a step away from the literal. The Yashica’s distressed lens creates a natural, unpredictable 'bloom' in the highlights. When paired with the silver-rich CineStill BwXX (Double-X) film, the result is ethereal. The soft light of the Wolds sky bleeds into the dark silhouettes of sentinel trees and ancient mounds.

It’s as if the lens is seeing the atmosphere rather than just the objects within it.

Near the source of the Gypsey Race - the intermittent 'woe waters' of the Wolds - this combination of flawed optics and cinematic film stock captured something I haven’t quite felt with my sharper systems. The images move toward abstraction; they feel less like a recording of a landscape and more more akin to an interpretation of its energy. In fact in the above photo, it was very early in the morning and I felt half asleep. The resulting image feels similarly dream-like.

A project like this cannot be rushed. It is a process of returning, observing how the sunrise rakes across the subtle undulations of the land or how the sunset shadows stretch through the ruins of Wharram Percy. Using this 'character' lens has forced me to slow down even further, to embrace the 'happy accidents' of light and flare, and to find beauty in the imperfection.

‘Spiritual’ is still in its early stages, and while the Bronica will undoubtedly play its part - indeed the image at the top of this page was made with it - the Yashica has earned its place. It reminds me that sometimes, to see the energy of a place, you have to look through a slightly blurred lens.

In other news, I am reaching out to professional photographers, artists, and creatives who understand the challenges of keeping afloat in a somewhat abstract career. I'm looking for fellow creative folk to join me for a virtual 'Coffee Break' - you can read more about this here. It would be great to connect!

Talk soon...

Karl.

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