things i noticed

چیزیں جو میں نے دیکھیں، رکھیں، پھر لوٹ کر دیکھیں

small evidence of where my eyes have been.

athens, paris, desks, paint, afternoons, things with no category.

the world i live in

places, objects and little things I photographed because something in them made me stop.

A black-and-white photograph of an Athens doorway almost buried under climbing bougainvillea, with potted shrubs on a marble step.

Looking up into a plane tree in full leaf against a blue sky, Haussmann-era Paris buildings behind it.

A quiet café corner: a pendant light, wooden chairs at a woven table, houseplants, and a framed ink illustration on a white wall.

A souvenir stall of decorative marble tiles in Athens — patterned squares, Parthenon scenes and small caryatid figurines.

I photograph doors as if one of them will eventually answer me.

two coffees. I remember the conversation less than I remember the walk after.

Two iced coffees in a moulded paper carrier from Dialogues Coffee, set down on a concrete floor.

Two ducks resting on a mossy embankment at the water's edge, the photographer's legs and trainers in the foreground.

A single stem in a glass carafe on a round café table, a deep-red curtain and a Paris street blurred through the window.

Magenta and pink dahlias and calla lilies crowding a white pot in bright garden sunlight.

The open sea — deep blue water rippling out to a hazy line of mountains under a soft sky.

things i kept

some photographs stay because I still don’t know what I was looking for.

A café table: a Pret coffee, an open book about Herbert Hoover and Paderewski, and a notebook with a handwritten quote from the Guru Granth Sahib dated Friday 26 May 2023.

A still life of old things — a French ledger from 1940, a tarnished silver teapot, a teacup and a framed portrait of a woman.

A bookshop display of art books — Van Gogh, Manet, Impressionism and 'Seurat and the Sea' — with peonies and stained glass behind.

this stayed in my camera roll for months.

what it became

some things I notice stay photographs.

others return later as colour, movement, texture or something I still can’t quite name.

through the window

a continuing series about movement, colour and the emotional landscapes I don’t always know how to put into words.

A studio desk from above: work in progress, a colour-test sheet, and a row of black brush markers.

A paint palette seen from above — thick blobs and smears of green, teal, yellow and white worked into one another.

through the window · 01

This one began after a period of trying too hard to know what I was making before I made it. I stopped controlling the painting and let colour move first — greens folding into yellow, curves arriving before explanation.

Looking at it now, I don’t see the creative block I was in. I see the moment movement found me again.

original work · painted by rea

prints available

find it in the print room →

through the window · 02

I stopped thinking I was painting shapes.
I think I was painting movement.

Greens, blues, pinks and yellows became the emotional landscape I was carrying that day. Curves became currents, brushstrokes became breath, each colour pulling another forward until they began listening to each other.

Sometimes the painting knows what you’re trying to say before you do.

original work · painted by rea

prints available

find it in the print room →

Through the Window 02 — an abstract painting of flowing pastel currents of pink, green, blue and yellow.

A painting in progress on paper with a white border — rows of orange blooms and leaves inked into green squares, marked 'day 2'.

some things leave the studio.

a few pieces from through the window have become prints — made to live somewhere beyond my own walls.

see available prints

kept here, for now.