(Nikon D70, Nikkor 180/2.8, 1/125 @2.8, vingetted in ACR)
I hadn't used my 180/2.8 lens for a while so I took it out for some exercise this afternoon getting ready for my first wedding of the season this weekend.
Here is a photo of Yang Shao period (~4000 BCE) clay jar which I purchased from my good friend and dealer of antiquities William Bradford of Imperium Arts in Southern Maine. Lest you think I'm spending thousands of dollars on priceless artifacts that I should be spending on camera equipment, I should tell you that William's artifacts are very affordable. We aren't talking about sacred burial objects, here. My jar was the equivalent of TupperWare in Western China in 4000BCE. William's ancient items are often mundane everyday use items that are discovered in digs a lot but have no scientific value to the archaeologists who uncover them. After they are catalogued, they are sold in order to fund further projects. This makes them very affordable to the average person who would like to own a bit of history. My vase for instance cost me less than $150 US even though it is about 6000 years old and it is still in perfectly usable condition today!
I'm an enthusiastic and unrepentant student of history. Being able to own a vase that was hand crafted before humans had any form of written language, without paying a kingly sum, was very cool to me.
1 comment:
Beautiful photo, Michael! You were too modest to mention that part of your arrangement for purchasing the vase was to barter for some FABULOUS photos of Will's wife, which she is still using for her publicity shots for her books... ;)
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