Lula Show & Tell - September: Light, Gesture and Color (Part 1 of 2)

September’s prompt came straight from Jay Maisel. Light, gesture, color. Catch two of the three, we said, and see what happens. You sent us all three, again and again.

Vladimiro Pompili opens this issue with a storm off Sardinia and a poem he wrote to go with it. One whitewashed lighthouse holding its ground as the sky closes in. Read the poem, then go back to the photograph. They make each other better.

From there it’s sunrise on the Charente, a stilt walker at a London summer festival, and one small plane crossing an eclipse over Erie. Neil Jolly spent six years on a ranch in British Columbia and saw the light in his aspen frame one time. Lorin Duckman walked with Jay himself, and you can feel those lessons in his picture.

Thank you to everyone who sent work. This is our favorite part of the month. Part 2 lands next, with more of what you shared.

Enjoy the issue.

Vladimiro Pompili

Outpost

The shelf drops off into iron.
The sky hangs low, loaded with miles of Atlantic gray,
bruising the water until the water turns to glass.
Out here, the ledges keep their own time.
Ancient basalt, cold salt,
waiting for the squall to break.
And at the seam where the world goes dark,
a single tooth of whitewashed stone.
Unblinking.
Unyielding.
It does not ask the storm to turn. It simply stands,
and burns a hole right through the dark.

Nikon Z50 II, 18-135mm at 20mm, f/8, 30 seconds, ISO 100, GND 16 and CPL filters.

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Roddy Hays

I think this may have the light, colour and gesture you are looking for…

This is the river Charente at Port D’Envaux, SW France, at sunrise

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Lorin Duckman

Jay taught me to look more. On walks with him, he’d say look, you will see something. He stressed that you go out without a specific shot in mind. And he liked air that could be seen. This image is of my photo friends on a photo walk at the Boca Museum. Part of becoming a better artist is appreciating the works of others and not taking them or yourself too seriously. Paying attention helps, as does knowing your models.

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Roger Lee

Korean War Memorial, Washington – Light and Colour – film scanned to digital

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Jayanand Govindaraj

I was photographing an exhibition called “Mi Third Eye” by legendary Argentinian photographer Aldo Sessa at Maman Fine Art Gallery in Buenos Aires when a hand suddenly popped into view, giving the resulting frame a bit of mystery. IMHO this frame
fulfils all three tenets of Jay Maisel: Light, Colour and Gesture.

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Steve Rosenbach

I was photographing in DUMBO (Brooklyn, NY) and noticed this amazing geometric mural on York Street.

I immediately felt that a great image would be to let people walk through it. I went through several minutes without getting what I liked, when suddenly this young woman in a white dress walked into the scene. I had my camera on “machine gun mode,” so
that I’d be sure to catch a good stride, and sure enough, this one fit the bill. It’s one of my very favorites of a style I call “Walk On By.”

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Maxnex

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Clifford Ando

A performer on stilts during a summer festival in London.

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John Manger

Early morning run

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Matt Kaarma

This image, soft in light and color and soft in gesture captures an intimate moment between mother and child.

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Rusty Joerin

Mountain View Jam: Ozark music festival where musicians from all over come together to make music. The seasoned guitar player was totally blown away by the young man’s playing. The look says it all.

Salutation: people watching a sunset in Maui

Both photos made over a decade ago

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Neil Jolly

I am a firm believer in the notion that in order to capture nature’s beauty optimally you have to live with it. To that end I have spent the last 6 years living on a remote ranch in British Columbia’s Cariboo region. I have photographed a huge range of conditions of that 6 years. In all the time I have been there I have only witnessed the conditions I had when I captured this small grove of aspen once. The fog isolated the grove from the row of trees behind it and the light breaking through illuminated the grove of trees covered in fresh snow perfectly.

LuLa: Thank you for sharing this special moment.

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Mike Rank

Smokies Sunrise – This is a south facing view. You can see the sun beginning to fill the hills & valleys in the distance while the foreground shines with wonderful sidelight. The fog provides the gesture. Pentax K-1mk2 with DFA*50mm.

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Patrick Malone

I took this photo in San Miguel de Allende MX last October 2025: A street vendor selling homemade tamales to a morning commuter who had just gotten off a bus. The sunrise light was coming in from the right along the street, and I noticed with a couple of prior transactions how the light put a spotlight on the exchange of cash for food, so I set up nearby to catch the next sale.

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Clifford Ando

A car performing during a Santa Fe, NM Lowrider Day Parade.

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Pierre Robert

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John Freud

I am on the board of directors of a Nonprofit with a mission of natural resource conservation and community education. We have a piece of land in Boerne, TX. One of our donors, a mother, made a donation to have a beautiful, very old live oak tree named after her deceased daughter. They asked me to make a photo of it for her. I did a few but settled on this one shot with the Olympus OMD EM1 in Art mode. This image is SOC. I chose BNW for the emotion. The gesture is the cloud formation – the soul of the tree; all its memories, grief, sorrow, laughter, smiles, love. The mother loved it.

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Hans Schmitt

An eyeabolic scheme at chalkfest.

Brian Woolf

Flamingo Garden, Florida, otter enclosure, this tricolored Heron flew in and the light happened.

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Michael Vervier

I caught this plane doing a fly-by as I was photographing a solar eclipse in Erie, PA USA.

I was set up a few miles from the local airport.

LuLa: Incredible.