Street Photography: The Colors of Sixth Avenue

Several of my recent posts where about photographs that involved the juxtaposition of messages appearing on various signs.  Other posts were about the psychology expressed through the eyes and other body language.  Going back further, there are photographs that are all about the shapes formed by architecture and lighting.

With this photograph, my eye was lured by the colors.  When that big red bus passed by, the black of the light pole became more intense as did the blue shirt and hat.  The coordination of the colors was another motivation for me to click the shutter.

The red of the bus relates to the red of the flag.  The verticals of the dark tinted windows and the vents on the bottom create a clean, modern ,abstract feel against the black pole and even the dark windows on the white bus.  That white bus also has some yellow lights to go with the yellow letters of the sign above it.  The man is entirely blue – his duffle bag, shirt, and hat, which connect with the blue in the flag directly above.  And I like how there is a ghostly reflection of him against the bus.

Many of these color fields are within lines that form squares and rectangles.  Even the man’s shoulders and arms form a rectangle, which makes his round head stand out more within the composition.  Finally there is the left-to-right diagonal of the duffle bag, which mirrors the same angle of the flag.

None of these attributes were noticed individually by me at the time of the photograph.  I just saw them as one united composition.  It’s only afterward, with the image frozen in time, that I can analyze it and break down the components that formed an urban landscape interesting enough for me to want to preserve it.

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