Darkness to light - Day 47

Day 47 (Tuesday 16th January 2018)

47 years ago, on the 16th January 1981, Leon Spinks (the American professional
boxer who in only his 8th professional fight won the undisputed heavyweight championship
in after defeating Muhammad Ali) was mugged and robbed. After being attacked in the
street he was taken to a motel and had $450000 worth of clothes, accessories and jewellery
taken, including his gold teeth. Spinks' boxing heavyweight title was short lived and
after boxing he became a wrestler, winning the world title in 1992 (he is the only person to hold
both the boxing and wrestling world titles). He has suffered heavily as a result of boxing - in
2012 he was diagnosed as suffering from shrinkage in his brain due to the impact of opponents' punches

Today is my father's birthday. He is turning 87. He is an amazing man (and a much loved father and grandfather) and I hope he has a wonderful day. 

The author of today's post, the highly talented photographer Paul Clarke, took a wonderful picture of my father at my eldest son's 21st birthday and I treasure it. If you have not seen his work, I urge you to click onto Paul's website: paulclarke.com - it's no wonder that he has won multiple awards. He has an eye for detail (he writes beautifully too - his blog on his business site is worth reading). You can also find Paul on Twitter, Flickr, and Facebook. He is witty, engaging, perspicacious and highly intelligent - a joy to spend time with.

It perhaps should come as no surprise that a photographer has much to say about darkness and light.

PS I have used various photos that Paul took this year to illustrate his post - you can see them (and more) on his blog and website.

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In my professional world, the world of photos and images, nothing happens without light. Literally, nothing. Seeing it, shaping it, playing with it – that’s what we do.

If I look back over the last decade as I’ve made the shift into this world, I can pick out distinct points when I started to think of light in different ways. How it might be brought into focus; how it behaves in a tight field of view; what colour it is (even when it’s “white”) and how it’s less important whether something is generally bright or dark, but much more important how light and dark contrast with each other.

This was taken in bright sunshine using the sun as the "lightbulb",
 but tightening up the camera to enable only the brightest light to get through

Over 2017 there’ve been times of deep personal darkness for me, but also plenty of light. Shakespeare nailed the very human need for contrast in Henry IV Part One, of course: “If all the year were playing holidays, to sport would be as tedious as to work” - and we have many modern equivalents.

We need the light so that we can recognise the dark, and the dark so that we can appreciate the light.

As I’ve hauled my way slowly into this new industry (from a post-40 standing start), my own lights and darks have happened in different ways. Sometimes they’ve been about finding any business at all. Or about overcoming some technical difficulty, or unfamiliarity with equipment.

This collection of more than 190 antique and modern pieces of photographic equipment
was neatly arranged and photographed by Portland-based photographer Jim Golden.
The equipment was borrowed from members of Portland’s photo community.

But the later stages have been the hardest to conquer. Putting it simply: if you try to do something well, you’ll get better at it. If you get better at it, you’ll attract tougher assignments. If you get tougher assignments, you’ll set higher standards for yourself.

It’s a spiral of expectation and challenge, and in the second half of this year it bit me. The particular client will never know of course – we’re good at hiding our own terrors in this regard. The job always gets done, and done well. But the process – that moment of realising that you’re through to a new level, and must deliver, can be awfully painful.

Composition study: shells by Amiria Gale

I think it’s something that’s particularly tough in the creative arts. What I make – by definition – has never existed before. I produce concepts, not just outputs. Were I making steel rivets, there’d be some opportunity to make a better rivet, but not much. I’d be measured on speed and consistency of delivery, but the product would be a known.

Making unknowns – whether in words, music or pictures – is different. Working with humans, as I do, means that the subject’s reaction to the unknown thing yet to be made will also be an unknown. Unknowns piled on unknowns! Where’s the light to be found in all of that? It’s very easy to fall into the dark.

I did fall, and at the lowest point I felt like giving it all up. If I lost confidence, then there’d be no creativity. No creativity, and there’d be no clients. No clients and… and so the spiral descends.

But I pulled back from the edge, this time. Going back to the simplest principles of how light works with dark. Sticking with my instincts about where the strength of an image would really be found. Stripping away composition and complexity to tell a story with as small a number of elements as possible.

October wedding photo by Paul Clarke

The job was delivered, eventually. The client was happy, immediately. The dark… didn’t recede as such, but took on a new texture. And so did the light. And so we head into a new year.

However brightly or dimly the light shines for you this year, I hope that you find plenty of contrast. That’s really what keeps us going, after all.

Seagulls by Paul Clarke

A life lived well and true - Day 12

Day 12

12 months of the year, depicting rural tasks
in the Salzburg manuscript, early 800s
One of the oldest calendars of its kind
in Vienna's National Austrian Library
Image from Wikimedia Commons

I am honoured to count David Goddin as a good friend, as well as a highly effective professional expert whom I value and enjoy working with. He regularly blogs on business related matters (www.peopleperformancepotential.com) and actively uses Twitter (@ChangeContinuum) as well as other forms of social media. He has a quick, dry wit, a calm intelligence and a depth of compassion that combines with his genuine interest in others to make him stand out from the crowd. After a successful career, culminating as a COO, David founded his own business which helps others thrive, particularly during times of change. David is values driven and brave, as the following post demonstrates...

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It's funny. Trying to think about what I might write on the theme of "Paths & Perceptions" I realise just how far from "the path" I have wandered. It may not be perceptible to you or others but I see and feel it. Thinking back I see that my wandering means that I've been following many paths.

Our English Coasts, 1852 ("Strayed Sheep") - William Holman Hunt
image sourced from the Tate Gallery, London

That makes sense of the unsatisfied feeling I've had on and off. Being on many paths is clearly both stretching and unfulfilling...

Aerial view of Colarado River delta
Found on scienceclarified.com

I know that over the last year or so I've been consciously and deliberately shutting doors. Things I won't do, places I won't go, people I won't be with. It's been important and liberating. It's allowed me to focus more on being me. My perception though was that these doors were on a single path that I've been following. However, I realise that perception was not entirely true - some of those doors I had to shut weren't even on my path... bloody Twitter!

Closed Doors by Estonian artist Miraccoon

Don't get me wrong. This isn't an existential crisis. I know who I am. I know what I need. I know what I value. I know how I can create value. However, this tension can't be sustained anymore. It's ridiculous to even try. I just need to maintain a good perception of my own path.

Is that the challenge of a life lived well and true?

Leaving behind some of those other paths I sense that in liberation there is both a perception of danger and opportunity. A perception that it will test friendships and relationships. I could fail or fall... It's testing my faith and my confidence. There is no other way though is there?

Brave Steps
(bridge in Northern Pakistan)

So I'm saying goodbye and in some cases good riddance to the other paths. I'm sharing my path freely with those important to me, to help them have a truer perception of it and of me. I need their support. It's probably testing how others perceive me - that's good. It's certainly testing my own resolve - that's good too.

It's still a tense time but I know that uneasy tension will pass and change into something better. My path will change and evolve with the landscape of time. I think longer term that is perhaps what I'm looking forward to the most. I trust in it. Perhaps that's the truth of the matter?

A life lived well and true comes from knowing your own path, perceiving it well and trusting it to lead you into the unseen and the unknown.

Path through Happy Valley, Orkney
from www.allfivesenses.com

Here's Looking At You

Constructive criticism is a good thing and, even when said in jest there is often a grain of truth behind a person’s comments.  Last week the inimitable David D’Souza said that my Leading Light posts are “samey” – he was commenting on the range of topics I tend to combine together, but then, rather than encouraging me to stick to a simple subject, he challenged me to write a post using a selection of topics of his own choosing. So here goes…

Constructive criticism

Before I start, I must confess that I am useless at saying “No” to a challenge and I also would like to make David’s life a little nicer than it has been of late – not just due of the broadband problems he has suffered when moving house, but because he recently underwent an operation on his eyes and has been forced, like a Marvel comic villain, to wander the streets of London in a pair of sinister dark glasses (he reminded me slightly of Dr Octopus, minus the fused bionic arms, although, like the Doctor, he is super-smart and seems to have tentacles reaching into a lot of things).  David’s laser eye surgery has been amazing and, like any good super hero, he now has better than 20/20 vision.
  

Doc Ock - from the film Spider-Man 2 

My father also suffered from poor eyesight – he didn’t realise, until he was nearly ten, that most people can distinguish the individual leaves on trees.  Once he had been prescribed spectacles, he proved to have excellent hand to eye co-ordination and became a fine cricketer, indeed he played for the Yorkshire under-19s. Sometimes it doesn’t take much to effect a significant change – in my father’s case it was a perceptive doctor who enabled enlightenment. I suspect that one of the reasons why I find the Learning and Development side of HR particularly rewarding is because of its ability to nurture desired change, with at times remarkable results.

Leaves on the trees

Individual transformation usually requires a personal commitment to breaking ingrained habits and to doing things in a different way.  Evolution is slower. Did you know that our eyes probably originated with the jellyfish – the oldest multi-organ animal, but not necessarily creatures that many people associate with sight, or think of as ancestors?  Initially it was thought that the ability for vision must have developed in complex “higher animals” - all of which share a gene, Pax-6, which is a “master regulator” of optical development.  Jellyfish do not have Pax-6 but they do have Pax-a and Pax-b – research by Hiroshi Suga at the University of Basel has found that it is possible to encourage the development of eyes in other species by inserting jellyfish Pax genes.  This seems to indicate that the foundations of vision for us all lie within these gelatinous creatures.  Although many jellyfish have little more than light-sensitive indentations, there are some with highly elaborate eyes (for example box jellyfish that can see colours and navigate around mangrove swamps and the Root-arm Medusa, Cladonema Radiatum, which has developed eyes above each of its “arms”, which can focus light onto a retina - creatures with genuine 360-degree vision)

Root-arm Medusa with eye indicated

The origins of things are often deeper than would appear at first sight (an appropriate thought in relation to an ancient marine creature).  The eminent French philosopher (frequently referred to as the father of modern philosophy) and exceptional mathematician, René Descartes, also made a significant contribution to our understanding of sight. In his work “Discourse on Method”, published in 1637, he outlines his approach for using analysis to reduce any problem to its fundamental parts and from which to then construct solutions. In the appendix, “Dioptrics”, he utilised this methodology to assess the problem of designing optical instruments.  To do so he commenced by defining light and the workings of the human eye – in the course of the former he articulated the law of refraction – thereby observing it independently from the studies of Willebrord Snellius, the scholar most frequently credited with the discovery (known as Snell’s Law), although in fact it was first stated in a manuscript by the Persian mathematician and physicist Ibn Sahi in 984.  Descartes’ appendix proceeds to consider what methods and tools could best be used to enhance eyesight.  It was the contemplation of lens shapes that resulted in his conclusion that a hyperbolic lens is best for use in focusing light, for example in telescopes.  He proceeds to design a machine capable of making them.  It is much easier to create a spherical lens than a hyperbolic one – the shape of two objects rubbed against each other gradually becomes a sphere with a spherical hollow to match.  Many of the greatest minds of the seventeenth century occupied themselves with devising ways to create hyperbolic lenses (Sir Christopher Wren submitted a paper on the subject to the Royal Society that resulted in international debate) and to this day their production has remained complex – hence their seldom being used in anything other than specialist equipment and machines that require accuracy such as copiers.

This gives the equation for a hyperbolic surface. The focal point 

can be determined to an extremely high degree of precision

Whilst writing this I wondered how the usage of hyperbolic, to mean something that is exaggerated or enlarged beyond what is reasonable, came about – it is a contrasting concept to the accurate, light-focusing lens.  A swift search has informed me that the adjective comes from the Greek huperbolē, meaning excess - the word literally translates as “throw above”.  This definition makes sense if you imagine throwing a ball to a companion, but, instead of aiming to within their area of reach, you toss it high above their head, resulting in an excessive throw – being avid sportsmen, this is what the Greeks considered the equivalent of making over exuberant statements and exaggerated claims.  One chap good with a ball (and considered to be an almost deity by many – indeed it is his bearded face that was used by the Monty Python team as the animated depiction of God in Monty Python and the Holy Grail) was WG Grace – the West Country Victorian GP who is often described as the father of cricket. 

WG Grace as "God" in Monty Python and the Holy Grail 

There is indeed much hyperbole written about him, but as with criticism, so in excessive praise there are often grains of truth.  Jim Swanton, the most influential cricket writer of the 19^th century commented:

“There never was such a hero: not even, I think, Don Bradman. Physically so unalike, these two men at the peak of cricket fame had two qualities in common: great determination and great strength of character.”

Which brings us back to heroes, famous for their determination and great strength of character.  The last topic given to me to include in this post was “Kung Fu Spiderman movies of the 1970s”.  You might think that this is a subject beyond my experience, but I must confess to being thrilled to reacquaint myself.  In 1978 my father was appointed the Attorney General of Hong Kong and we as a family moved to live in Asia.  It was an exciting time and Hong Kong itself was on the cusp of dramatic expansion.  One of the areas of growth was the film industry; I mentioned in a previous post that Sir Run Run Shaw invited me to the premier screening of Blade Runner. Hong Kong was a rising global centre for martial arts films, with Jacky Chan as the recognised international star. Not all the films were great, many of the releases were filmed for Cantonese or Mandarin speaking audiences and then badly dubbed into English – resulting in hilarious voiceovers of fighters asking their opponents if they could handle their “tiger style”, calling each other Monkey or Crane or imploring masters to defend temples and be prepared to die for the honour of the monks. I used to watch these martial art films in episodes on TV with my little sisters – a treasured memory before I was banished back to the UK to go to boarding school miles from my family. One that stuck in my mind was “The Chinese Web”, a 2-hour special starring Nicholas Hammond as Peter Parker/Spider-Man. I am pretty certain that I saw it initially in Hong Kong in 1979, before its global release by Columbia Pictures in 1980, during which it was renamed “Spider-Man: The Dragon’s Challenge”.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NKpOeFiLrCQ

On watching this again, I was transported right back to my childhood and the amazing sights I saw and the experiences we enjoyed when we first moved to Hong Kong.  Like good tourists, soon after arriving we went to the Jumbo Restaurant – the location where then sampans pick Spider-Man out of the water. My first proper job was in Central in a building with a view of Jardine House (the office block in the film with the circular windows – it was and is affectionately known as “The House of a Thousand Arseholes”).  Watching this was like stepping into the Tardis and arriving back in my youth – Hong Kong has changed almost beyond recognition since 1979, but to me its essence of what it is and will always be to me is captured in this film.

Poster for the 1980 Film Release of The Chinese Web, renamed The Dragon's Revenge

Dear David – I am truly grateful for the challenge you set me – I had forgotten my father’s link with cricket, until you asked me to write about W.G. Grace. I have watched your bravery post op and agonised that I have encouraged you to work on-screen for longer than has been good for your health.  Seeing you observing things clearly (IRL as well as in business) makes me smile – there is so much to amaze, amuse and wonder at around us. I have enjoyed learning more about the evolution of sight from jellyfish, through Descartes’ studies to fighting super heroes endowed with exceptional vision following a radioactive spider bites.  But for me the highlight was being reunited with “The Dragon’s Challenge”.  Unwittingly, you gave me my youth and made me see things in a different way.  Thank you! “Here’s looking at you…”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bW2o2aZkCyc

"I Can See For Miles" was recorded for The Who's 1967 album 'The Who Sell Out.' 
(other than the infidelity aspect, it seems and apt song to end with)

Sweet Rebel

Very occasionally in life you meet someone whom you know is extraordinary, who genuinely has an impact on the world around him or her and can be seen to be making making history, for me, Mott Green was such a man.  Mott was born in 1966 and grew up in New York and Oregon.  His real name was David Friedman and he came from an impressive academic and professional family descended from Russian Jewish immigrants - his father a respected physician, his uncle a genuine rocket scientist, young David was expected to follow in the family tradition of landing a well-paid and respectable job after graduating.  Mott was highly intelligent and could have succeeded in almost any field he chose, he was also a rebel and he found his cause...

Mott fell in love with Grenada and its people, it is where he chose to live, but he is probably best known for being a chocolate anarchist on both the local and global stage.  Much is said in modern business circles about the value of being disruptive, we espouse the value of being “Punk" in approach or “hacking” to amend and enhance the existing system - certainly, innovation and creative solutions require what can feel like significant change.  However, for many this is simply tinkering with the engine and not a from-the-bottom-up redesign.  

By training Mott was an engineer and he seemed almost at his most comfortable building things (from brave concepts to tangible, working objects to achieve his objectives).  He was clearly happiest when challenging convention and bettering the status quo.   Knowing him as I did, I can vouch for his being a passionate visionary with extraordinary drive and tenacity.  His enthusiasm was infectious and he had a wicked sense of humour.  This short video (a trailer for the wonderful film "Nothing Like Chocolate", in which he played a starring role) will give you a taste of the man, his values, extraordinary abilities and achievements: http://vimeo.com/38528342   He had charm which concealed a core of steel, but he also showed immense compassion to those who needed it and invariably stood for what he saw as right, be that :

• helping a rural farming community;
• making a stand against discrimination and abuse (including child slave labour);
• speaking out against the global exploitation that is the model for the majority of the chocolate industry; 
• taking action against climate change;
• building an award winning factory with his bare hands;  and 
• doing more to reduce the carbon footprint of his business than any other entrepreneur I know.  

He was, in every way, inspirational.  He rewrote the rules and enabled value to be added at the source.  He made me laugh, he made me think and over the past couple of days he has made me cry.  He died unexpectedly at the weekend - electrocuted whilst mending some kit (not the in the factory, which is, I am pleased to say, continuing to produce its exceptional chocolate).  I and many others mourn his loss, but we should also celebrate an amazing life.  I know few who could do what he has done and the legacy he has created speaks for itself - it is an inspiration to all who wish to improve the world.  

Nyran taking wet beans out of cocoa pods in Grenada

Mott discovered his love for chocolate as a 15 year old boy, when accompanying his father to Grenada on a visit to the medical school.  Mott became fascinated by the fat pods encasing plump beans; the harvested crop, hulled and separated from the white pulp inside the pods, lying in piles, like russet brown pebbles, to dry in the Caribbean sunshine; the dapple of light through the leaves in the rainforest, where the cocoa plants grew; the pods hanging like Chinese lanterns and the taste of the fresh white pulp that surrounds the beans - sweet with a slight citrus tang (like passion fruit) - the raw beans themselves almost unpleasantly astringent, nothing like the processed chocolate that he knew from New York.

Cocoa pods

He was swift to realise that, although most of the beans are grown in the southern hemisphere, the majority of chocolate producers are located in the northern hemisphere, where there is a lucrative market for the luxury product.  Confectioners and other industrialists bought cocoa (often harvested by child labour), imported it, processed it into chocolate and were able to make a significant mark-up.  Mott noticed first hand the inequalities within the industry. A few years later, on returning to Grenada (have dropped out of university and spending some time in a commune), after living in the rain forrest for a while, he decided to settle on the island.  

The Grenadian rainforest

Inspired by the disparity in the cocoa trade, he dedicated his life to enabling production of world-class chocolate, from bean to bar, in the location where the cocoa grows.  In 1999 Mott founded the Grenada Chocolate Factory, with two friends.  He literally built a chocolate factory, welding pieces and using salvage to make machines based on designs from the 1900's (when there were more small artisanal chocolatiers in Europe), but powered by solar energy, to achieve his dream.  If you wish to know more about how chocolate is produced in a small Grenadian factory, here is the process: http://www.grenadachocolate.com/tour/process1.html

Edmond roasting cocoa beans, Grenada Chocolate Factory

He slept in a small store area of the factory and worked tirelessly to establish the operation on the island.  He encouraged local farmers to join his cooperative, paying them and him the same wage and taught them how to produce world class crops without resorting to harmful pesticides or environmentally damaging fertilisers.   One of the things that made Mott stand out from other cocoa producers and chocolate makers was his determination to be “green”, ethical and fair.  He declined to sign up to Fair Trade, as he felt that the approach of shipping produce to processors in wealthier countries, for them to capitalise on its value was unjust.  Instead he taught the local farmers how to enhance their crops and trained people from the island to produce high calibre chocolate (despite the problems of doing so in such a hot and humid climate).  

  

Kimon moulding chocolate bars, Grenada Chocolate Factory

Last year he took this one stage further and, using the power of the Trade Winds, he brought his bars of chocolate to consumers in Europe on a sailing ship.  This year he arranged to reduce the carbon footprint of his chocolate even further, by having the bars collected off the boat and delivered across Holland by cyclists.  I am so sad knowing that he will not see this dream become a reality when the ship makes land in less than a fortnight  You can read the poignant last post on Mott’s blog: http://mottontresshombres.blogspot.co.uk/?m=1

Mott, standing by the moored Tres Hombres
prior to delivering chocolate by wind power to Europe

His dreams have become a reality, he has made a better world and enhanced life for many (myself included).  We should all take inspiration from him and what he has achieved.  If you have a dream and the willingness to pursue it with tireless determination, it is amazing what can be done.

This wonderful song, co-written by Mott, celebrating the cocoa bean and the ethical production of chocolate, seems to me a fitting epitaph and ending for this post...  Please listen and smile in recognition of a wonderful man.

http://grenadachocolate.com/human%20beans.mp3

Cocoa pods - grown in Grenada and used for making chocolate