You might not be able to tell at first, but this photo is ironic.
I was wandering around Harlem, camera in hand. I stopped, lifted my camera, and pressed the shutter.
You’d think from looking at this picture that the women were meant to be my main subject, that I pressed the shutter to capture them. They are, after all, the only animate objects in the scene.
The irony: these women looking at the building wasn’t what sparked my interest in photographing it, but rather my shooting it captured their attention. Their response only occurred because of my presence, which is the opposite of what happens with typical street photography.
Then, of course, as the building caught their attention, they caught mine. I was no longer interested in my original subject–the building–but rather my new subject, the two women observing it. An added layer of irony.
This post is a response to the Weekly Writing Challenge: Oh, The Irony.
Victim to Charm 
This reminds me of when I was shopping in a Japanese department store, where they frequently had “bargain tables”–mounds of clothing that you have to pick through to find something interesting (and cheap!). Being tall and blond, invariably if I stopped at a table and spent more than a minute or two going through the items, soon several Japanese women would come to that table to see what the gaijin was finding. My interest piqued theirs. We are all truly social creatures!
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I love this post! I guess we all want to know what’s intriging the other :-)
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Exactly! Thanks, I’m glad you liked it!
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Thanks for posting. Mark Twain writing about how Tom Sawyer persuaded his friends to do his fence whitewashing work for him is what comes to mind for me!
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Also a good example of irony. Thanks for sharing!
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Your smartness is scaring me. ;-)
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All those years of honors English paid off!
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