Wabi-sabi

Wabi-sabi, (侘寂) according to the ever-reliable Wikipedia,  "represents a comprehensive Japanese world-view or aesthetic centered on the acceptance of transience and imperfection. The aesthetic is sometimes described as one of beauty that is "imperfect, impermanent, and incomplete. Wabi-sabi nurtures all that is authentic by acknowledging three simple realities: nothing lasts, nothing is finished, and nothing is perfect." 

I only found out about this idea yesterday (while googling to find something about Japanese pots that I'd seen a while back and which this photo reminded me of) but as I read more it triggered a rare and strong sense of vividly explaining and illuminating something I'd half-thought about and started to recognise as a recurrent theme in many of my choices of daily photo - a sense of the profound beauty of transient and impermanent things, of imperfection and incompleteness. It turns out there is a seminal essay on the subject of Wabi-sabi from 1933, In Praise Of Shadows, by Tanazaki, so in an effort to learn more I'm going to read that next.