The beauty of imperfection, by Alexey Kljatov
In the case you’ve been away from the news for a couple of days, or in the case that a large proportion of your social media contacts are not from the eastern half of the United States, let me summarize a good chunk of Facebook statuses and news stories from the last few days: It’s cold. Really cold. And it’s snowy. Really snowy.
There’s a lot of really un-beautiful things about the arctic snap that has seized the Lower 48: the plight of those without housing or heat, power outages, dangerous driving conditions, cascading travel delays. The list goes on (and it notably includes the temporary practice of referring to Chicago as “Chi-beria”).
But in the midst of my own weather-related weeping and gnashing of teeth, I stumbled upon these photos by the Moscow-based photographer Alexey Kljatov. Many will have heard the expression that no two snowflakes are the same, but I confess that the point was somewhat lost on me until I saw these images. More than that, the shots are a powerful reminder (to me, anyhow) that our eyes sometimes miss beauty that is in plain sight:
You can see more of Kljatov’s work at his Flickrstream. For those of you waiting out the cold and snow, stay safe and warm. For those of you in warmer climes posting screenshots of beaches and the Weather Channel where you are, well…don’t be hateful.
