Visit to the Great Glasshouse

As promised, an image from my visit to the Great Glasshouse at the National Botanical Garden of Wales.

This is obviously of some sort of succulent - I've no idea what. I should say that I've no real interest in the plants that I photograph beyond their sculptural or other photogenic properties.

Plants, especially flowers, are also very useful for highlighting transience as a central subject of photography. When you look at a photograph of a person who is unknown to you, you speculate as to when the image was made and where that person is now. Their mortality is a central issue here - you're trying to judge, for one thing, if that person is likely to be still in the land of the living. However, unless there is strong internal evidence in the photograph, speculation is all you have.

With a flower there is no room for doubt. That organism will have inevitably perished and the image that you are looking at is the only record of the short period when the bloom was at its best. The epitome of transience, captured forever(-ish) by the power of photography.