I love the serendipitous mirror symmetry in the photograph on the left of the pair of pedestrians in the distance with the street sign in the foreground. (“Gågade” means “pedestrian street” in Danish.) I did not notice the people when I was framing the shot, but now I see that they were clearly aware of me. The woman, jauntily animated and smiling, seems especially pleased to be a part of the scene; the man is skeptical. (Click, or tap, to enlarge.)
Although these photographs were taken in different locations, the street side cafés appear to be using the same chairs, which is something else that I hadn’t noticed before I put the two images side by side. The punch of red in the letter box of the lefthand photograph is echoed by the three Danish flags on the right, while the orange arch that suspends the letter box is mimicked by the pair of brass pipes atop the lamps. Green tones carry through both scenes: seafoam green in the tables and walls, forest green in the awnings and foliage. Resonances in tone and form are often the bases for my selecting photographs for pairing in diptychs. This example is unusual in that I tend to shy away from juxtaposing photographs with similar subject matter: I prefer the correspondence between the images to appeal to the right-brain rather than the left.