Photograph Works

  • Statement On Iran

    This is out of my usual range of diary topics.

    And I just want to say one thing to those who may wonder at President Trump’s position in this.

    You can see it clearly from his speech in Riyadh in 2017. So what is happening now is not a surprise but a step on the way of a stated objective.

    This is an extract from his speech, the part that he addressed to Iran,

    Starving terrorists of their territory, of their funding, and the false allure of the craven ideology will be the basis for easily defeating them. But no discussion of stamping out this threat would be complete without mentioning the government that gives terrorists all three — safe harbour, financial backing, and the social standing needed for recruitment. It is a regime that is responsible for so much instability in that region. I am speaking, of course, of Iran.

    From Lebanon to Iraq to Yemen, Iran funds arms and trains terrorists, militias, and other extremist groups that spread destruction and chaos across the region. For decades, Iran has fuelled the fires of sectarian conflict and terror. It is a government that speaks openly of mass murder, vowing the destruction of Israel, death to America, and ruin for many leaders and nations in this very room.

    Among Iran’s most tragic and destabilising interventions, you’ve seen it in Syria. Bolstered by Iran, Assad has committed unspeakable crimes, and the United States has taken firm action in response to the use of banned chemical weapons by the Assad regime, launching 59 missiles at the Syrian air base from where that murderous attack originated. Responsible nations must work together to end the humanitarian crisis in Syria, eradicate ISIS, and restore stability to the region and as quickly as possible.

    The Iranian regime’s longest suffering victims are its own people. Iran has a rich history and culture, but the people of Iran have endured hardship and despair under their leader’s reckless pursuit of conflict and terror. Until the Iranian regime is willing to be a partner for peace, all nations of conscience must work together to isolate it, deny it, funding for terrorism, cannot do it, and pray for the day when the Iranian people have the just and righteous government they so richly deserve.

    Drought

    Actually, there is something else to say, something that doesn’t hit the headlines. Iran is not the only country in the region to suffer drought,but Iran’s problems are off the scale.

    Here is an update I wrote just a few days ago:

    The drought continues. Authorities have started rationing water at night and President Masoud Pezeshkian has discussed evacuating the capital.

    Iran invested heavily in large-scale dams in the late 20th century, and there are over 500 dams in the country. As of now, though, roughly 64% of the reservoirs are empty and nineteen major dams across the country are at less than 20% capacity.

    The drift from the countryside continues. Because of drying wetlands and the inability to sustain farming, approximately 31,000 villages, nearly 45% of Iran’s rural settlements, are now deserted.

  • Orchid Festival At Kew

    The orchid festival at Kew Gardens in London began on 7 February and continues to 8 March 2026. So if you are local, there’s still time to catch it.

    Tamara and I went a couple of days ago.

    Heere’s an interesting little snippet. The word “orchid” comes from the Ancient Greek orkhis, meaning ‘testicle’.

    It was coined by the botanist Theophrastus, who named it from the twin tubers of European orchids that resemble human testicles.

    When European botanists explored further afield and discovered exotic orchids, the association shifted from the tubers to the vulvar look of the flowers.

    The orchids in the orchid festival were from China, and we could see repeatedly, five petals as a backdrop for the main event that displays itself for the world to see, like in this Oncidium hastatum, which is one of many, many hybrids that specialists have grown.

    That said, some are more modest, like the delicate pink Cymbidium, with petals that cover the main event rather than peeling back to display it.

    Even without hybridisation there are an around thirty thousand species. And for them to grow successfully they are dependent on the fungal network in the soil.

    No funghi; no orchids – at least not in the wild.

    Orchids depend on mycorrhizal fungi, which form a mat-like network of hyphae in the soil and around the plant roots. Without the mat, the orchid could not take in nutrients and water.

    What the mycorrhizal fungi get in exchange are products the orchids make through photosynthesis.

    The thing is that each species of orchid is particular about which mycorrhizal fungi it will work with.

    Gather two grams of soil from around the roots of the orchid and there are more than five hundred fungus species.

    And that is a problem for English botanists of wild flowering orchids. In the case of the Lady’s slipper orchid, there is just one left of the wild. So which fungus is it associated with?

    To solve the problem and reintroduce Lady’s slipper orchids into the wild, botanists are working the other way around by growing orchids in agar, then planting them out in nature to see which survive. And then seeing which fungus is preponderant over a number of orchids. It is a long business, taking years.

    And it is all happening behind the scenes at Kew.

    Oncidium hastatum
    Cymbidium

  • New Lanterns For The Year of the Fire Horse

    In preparation for the Year Of The Fire Horse New Year, the Chinese community in London putting up new lanterns.
    In preparation for the Year Of The Fire Horse New Year, the Chinese community in London putting up new lanterns.
    In preparation for the Year Of The Fire Horse New Year, the Chinese community in London putting up new lanterns.
    In preparation for the Year Of The Fire Horse New Year, the Chinese community in London putting up new lanterns.
    In preparation for the Year Of The Fire Horse New Year, the Chinese community in London putting up new lanterns.

    Chinese New Year (Year of the Fire Horse) in 2026 falls on 
    Tuesday, 17 February. In preparation for it, the Chinese community in London has been putting up new lanterns. Lots of them.

    You see lanterns strung up in Chinatown all year, and they didn’t look to my casual eye as though they are in need of replacing, until I saw the old ones on the ground after they were taken down.

    I took these photos over two days – the first when I was with some other photographers and we happened to walk through Chinatown. The second time a couple of days later when I was walking to Covent Garden and came through Chinatown. The first and the last photos are from the second occasion.

    The Fire Horse

    The Fire Horse (Wu Wu) is one of the personalities in the sixty-year cycle of the Chinese Zodiac. In traditional Chinese metaphysics, the Horse is associated with the element of fire.

    The year of the Fire Horse combines the fire of the Horse with the Fire element to make double fire, double energy.

    The last year of the Fire Horse was sixty years ago.

    In 1986 China was in a state of high-energy transformation. The student demonstrations began that year and eventually led to the Tiananmen Square confrontation in 1989 and the crackdown. Some estimates put the dead at 10,000.

    Hu Yaobang, the General Secretary of the Communist Party was a favourite of the reformers. The authorities blamed him for being too soft on the students.

    The decision to remove him was finalised in late 1986. His death three years later was the catalyst for the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests.

    Now in 2026, the Chinese leader Xi Jinping has dismissed two of China’s most senior generals and basically torn apart the command structure of the armed forces.

    Does Xi Jinping consider astrology? Is it in his DNA?

    Does he think now is a good time to act and invade Taiwan because of the energy of the Fire Horse?

    How might his calculation be affected by the recent actions of President Trump? It is not hard to think that Xi Jinping might consider President Trump to be less predictable than President Biden or President Obama.

    Maybe a falling out about strategy is what led to the removal of the generals.

    Whither now, China?