2023: Twelve Significant Images

With the birth of my daughter earlier this year, my most significant images this year aren’t the type to share on a public forum. Not coincidentally, my non-family photography was an afterthought in 2023, something to squeeze in here or there.

I debated whether to do a retrospective this year at all, or perhaps to cut it down to just 6 images. But actually looking back at the output, there’s something to be said about my production when I’m at maximum distraction. Maybe it’ll be useful in the future to use this year’s output as the benchmark year 0, and see how things build up from here again.

In 2023, I didn’t get a chance to travel exclusively for photography. I visited zero national parks, camped zero nights, and didn’t see a single sunrise, at least voluntarily. So, the subjects are mostly local to the San Francisco Bay Area, or are passing places or moments during family trips.

How’s the showing? Poor, naturally, and very disjointed. Like anything, without practice and intentionality, quality suffers. There are definitely a few I’m satisfied with, but for the most part, I’m happy I got to do any photography this year, and at least I didn’t quit.

As my daughter learns to walk, I plan to get out there more in 2024, and she’s coming with me.

I’d love to hear what you think about the images. Please share your feedback in the comments, or contact me @arthurkaneko on IG.

Here’re my 12 personally significant images from 2023:

Image 1: Hope Springs

Hasselblad 500 C/M, Zeiss 80mm f/2.8, Kodak Portra 160

Technically from the end of 2022, this didn’t make it in last year’s list. It is, however, the 2nd photo of a bathroom to make an annual list, and I don’t know what that says about bathrooms, these lists, or me.

This unassuming hotel in the town of Desert Hot Springs in Southern California was one of the most visually inspiring places I’ve ever been.

See more from this location in the Contact Sheets Project

Image 2: Redwood Creek

This is probably the worst photo to be in these retrospectives so far. It's from the first time I went out for a solo photography walk, almost 3 months after bringing our daughter home. It’s significant for a year like this one, despite its aggressive mediocrity.

Image 3: Red-Backed Jumping Spider (Female)

Staying at home a lot this year meant my subjects were also the ones at home. This jumping spider was a welcome guest for a few days in the spring, and was very cooperative posing for a portrait.

Macro photography is incredibly technical, but has its own unique rewards. While it’s not my go-to, I deeply enjoy it in the field.

Image 4: Calla Lilies

*Hasselblad 500 C/M, Zeiss 80mm f/2.8, Fuji Provia 100F*

Like many other charismatic species in California, the Calla Lily is a non-native from South Africa. It’s now a staple of the California coastline, with even some locations named after the flower.

There’s nothing amazing about the photo, but I love the way the colors, tones, and focus are rendered on this lens/film combination. This is why I’ll probably always shoot film alongside digital. Practically it’s a lot more cumbersome than the modern digital workflow, but it’s much simpler in other, maybe more important ways.

Image 5: Bench in the Shade

Street photography is difficult in a way that’s completely different from landscape photography, and it’s a genre I’ve long admired. I’ve dabbled in it here and there, but the timing, dexterity, and guts needed to really pull it off mean I’ll never be anything more than a permanent tourist in the craft.

For once, though, a street photo I’m proud of, probably the best I’ve ever taken.

Image 6: Ascension

In the early hours of the morning, fog pours through the Golden Gate from the Pacific Ocean, spilling into the San Francisco Bay. Across from that inlet is a ridgeline that dams up the flow of that moisture for a few hours before the midday sun burns it off.

On that ridgeline, with access to relatively consistent fog, are trees that capture moisture either directly, like redwoods, or indirectly, like these moss covered oaks. They reach, each in their own way, up.

Image 7: Fog Lifting

A foggy morning is a treat in and of itself. Sunbeams through a fog is as good as it gets.

Image 8: Afterthought

It’s been a few years since this particular patch of the Western Sierras burned, and the dead pines just stand there, waiting around. Below, pioneer species begin to fill out the barren ground, even as a nearby fire re-filled the valley with smoke.

Image 9: A Bicycle in Taipei

Taipei may be the most underrated city for street photography I’ve ever visited. Of course, it’s dense, full of activity, and safe, all important and helpful factors, but there’s so much more than that. It’s a city of intense juxtapositions between progress and decay, of overt affluence and quiet poverty, of a tranquil pursuit of simple day-to-day beauty and a subtext of militant paranoia.

Walking around for only 2 hours, I captured absolutely none of that, but I do keep wondering what’s written on that piece of cardboard on the ground.

Image 10: The Sprawl

One morning, my wife wakes me up early to tell me that it's foggy out. Very foggy. So for the first time with the baby in tow, we venture up to the woodland.

Hopefully, the start of many foggy mornings for the three of us.

Image 11: Beyond the Marsh

Wetlands are making a comeback in the Bay Area, with restoration efforts all around the shoreline. Part of what motivates these efforts is to bring back habitat for birds, spawning fish, and other organisms. Another motivation is carbon capture and storage, since wetlands are especially good at this. And yet another, is the mitigation of floods and inundation due to rising sea levels.

On the one hand, this is a rare win-win. On the other, a sign that the preventative phase is behind us, and we’re squarely in harm reduction.