Girl in the Bamboo Grove

Sometimes a whole bunch of life's situations all lead back to the same place. There was a big old 1920's vintage Spanish style house in Coconut Grove owned by Jerry Weisberg, an attorney. It wasn't exactly a crash pad because all the people who lived there were gainfully employed, but there were a bunch of peole calling the place home. I guess that I first met Jerry through a photographer, Bob Greger, that I'd met at one of the Wilson Hicks Photojournalism Conferences at the University of Miami. Then my best friend, John Patteson, was using him for some legal work. A few years later a young lady who worked for Charlie Johnson Public Relations, the firm that had the City of North Miami account, turned out to be one of the residents also. Since I was doing the photography for North Miami I'd go there on occasion to deliver pictures.

The landscaping around the house could be described as lush, tropical, overgrown, and perhaps even a bit unkempt. The back yard had this nice stand of bamboo. This young lady wanted to get some photos of herself and we went out into the back yard. It was a nicely overcast day. She was illuminated by the sky from one side, with the house blocking the light from the other, giving a soft but very directional effect.

It was taken with my Leica M4 and a 35mm f/1.8 Canon lens. The scan is off a vintage print, probably on DuPont Varilour paper.