The Mooring Ring, Montjean-sur-Loire

Nobody photographs the mooring ring. They photograph the boat it holds, or the river it sits above, and they walk over the ring on the way to both.

It is a good object. Hand-forged, bolted flat into the stone of the quay at Montjean-sur-Loire, worn smooth on the inside curve by however many decades of rope. In hard afternoon light it throws a shadow with more drama than the ring itself has any right to. The granite around it is all grain and grit and small failures.

The same quay gave me the flat-bottomed boats. I crouched on it for a while getting this, which is not a dignified way to spend an afternoon, and I would do it again. Most of what holds a place together is ironmongery that nobody looks at.

Printed at 45 × 30 cm through WhiteWall in Berlin. Choose Ilford or Baryta paper, as a plain print or framed — what the finishes actually mean.