Framing

I've been thinking a lot about the linguistic concept of framing -- of defining an issue, setting its parameters, structuring the context in which it will be discussed and debated. One thing I like about Today's Pictures is the insight it offers into that metaphor. What piece of the world are you choosing to display? How does that selection affect your vision? Given the limitations of the frame, how can it nevertheless be illuminating?

Bored Couples is an answer to the last question. Here is a series of the most mundane scenes imaginable, interactions the likes of which I see daily (and, yes, occasionally experience) (sorry, Sweetheart). The frame highlights something that is ubiquitous. And yet the scenes of boredom are not themselves boring. This man's cigarette is wielded like a shield against conversation, and the space this couple inhabits is entirely their own despite the intrusion of the lens.

I draw two conclusions:

1. The shared experience is preferable to the isolating hobby. Boredom is romantic.

2. Journalistic photography has the capacity to document the fantastic -- the feat of strength, the foreign culture, the once-in-a-lifetime event. But some of my favorite journalism records instead the obvious, and shows me how even quotidian drudgery contains the possibility of epiphany.