On a sunny day I like to be holed-up in a darkened room. A museum or gallery will do nicely. Avoid those unforgiving rays, I say.
I recently mooched around Pollock’s Toy Museum on such a day. The light revealed dust, crusty labels and cases that time forgot. But you really wouldn’t want it any different in there. The charm of the place is largely in its un-modernised approach to display. And the higgildy buildings it is housed in. It is almost a museum of itself.
My visit led (inevitably, these days) to my taking lots of photographs. I have a bit of thing for museum cases, models and toys, as evidenced by my Flickr photos. It is hard to cut out enough of the glare to see what is in the cases and probably, perversely, I like the challenge of that. I tend not to want to Photoshop my pictures. So what I see is what I get.
A small glass-fronted case on the uppermost floor of the Museum (leading off to staff quarters) held me particularly spellbound. Full of tiny old Indian plaster animals, each about the size of a 50 pence piece. Mostly two by two, but not all. The dust motes and the silver foil shelves catching the bright sunlight from above made it even more special that day. The resulting photographs are a little bit Lomo without the Lomo.
You may see all the animal pictures here.
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