looking back at older work #8
Before I thought I knew so much about photography I took pictures like these. I wonder what effort would be needed now to shoot like this. But then again what makes it here online is about .002% of what I actually shoot so for all you know I have albums full of truck tires and cows. But these are not simply pictures of tires and cows.
There is no real way a photograph ought to look of any particular thing. Wheels or cattle or whatever it how can you be so sure what you want until you have it? Even when you might not care either way the result of the way time and space is turned into form through a lens can work out to be something suprisingly interesting. I don’t know what I was thinking when I took both pictures. How about that? ==> it does not really matter. Right? This is what has been working over and over in my mind for a long while now. I feel that judging a photograph based on how well it meets what the photographer wanted to “say” does not work so well when the person who made the picture can’t recall why they took it in the first place.
I think the first one was taken on a day trip to Kansas with a Canon point and shoot camera through a car window in probably 2003(?) and the one with the cattle and prairie was with a Nikon and a 135mm lens. Possibly in 2000. Looking through older pictures that I took for no reason has been a cure for the pit of “street photography” I was spinning my wheels in for the past few months. It’s been a while since I put a 28mm lens on a camera and strode into a crowd crossing the street, all clicking away and burning through film.
“I don’t know what I was thinking when I took both pictures. How about that? ==>”
This has been something I’ve been thinking about a lot lately. I was told during my last photo crit that I need to maybe think less when I shoot. Hearing that makes me want to cry; just the idea of not thinking (that in order to do so, one must actually think, thereby causing one’s head to explode) makes me queasy and uncomfortable: one of the reasons I photograph (I am sure) is that it is a way to control the world - or my own world - and somehow by capturing my perception, I am reinforcing my own importance.
If I don’t think, does that make me unimportant? Not to push Cartesian logic down the throat (my philosophy class is certainly making me rethink all things Descartes) but there does seem something more contrived about not thinking when photographing than thinking (because when you’re not thinking, you’re actually thinking about not thinking anyway…) - !
Okay. So it’s all enough to make you just want to go out and photograph. But then how? and what? After everything is said, how do you refuse the proclivity to second- third- fourth- guess yourself out of taking any photograph at all?
I’m scanning right now, and I just scanned an image that I don’t like - that I don’t really understand - just to spite myself. Maybe that’s what all this talk of not thinking means.
Who knows?
Comment by Justin — 11/16/2006 @ 4:40 am
Justin, It is impossible not to think at all (unless your dead) so lets not dwell on that. I think the people in your crit were actually trying to tell you not to force your thoughts on whatever it is you are photographing. Let the photographs tell you what they are about…not the other way around. I try to think of my photographic process as a conversation that I am having with myself. For there to be a good conversation(in my opinion) there needs to be some sort of a balance between all that are speaking. If one person is talking too much, the potential for what could be learned is dramitically decreased. I guess to put it bluntly maybe you need to shut up for a little bit and let your photographs talk. I think letting up on the reigns of control would be good, even if it is only temporary. Sorry if that makes you think that I am a dick.
bradley
Comment by Bradley — 11/16/2006 @ 12:45 pm
Bradley,
I certainly don’t think you’re a dick (or at least, it’s not what you have to tell me about photography!) - and I think I know what you mean… However, I’ve heard that phrase “let the photographs tell you what they are about” a lot, and have nodded like I know what that’s supposed to mean, and I realize now that I don’t have a clue. Isn’t that just post-justification or post-rationalization? How does that affect the act of photographing itself? It seems like everything is a matter of editing.
Maybe if I had someone else edit my work and show it to me, I could actually learn something.
Otherwise, isn’t it always going to be the blind leading the blind?
Comment by Justin — 11/17/2006 @ 12:18 pm
I am not smart enough to know whether the whole “let the photographs tell you” is post rationalization or not. It feels like it is something different for me though. I guess that I feel that my work is always ahead of me and that I am just this dumbass who doesn’t get if for about 3 years. I have also found that anyone can pretty much justify anything, at least to himself. It is especially hard for me since I am such a stubborn bastard. I try to come up with semi-elaborate arguments for why I shouldn’t have to change any part of my thinking or behavior. It is safe in my mind when I am always right. I guess it comes down to whether discovery is your motivation or not. It is for me that is why I try to have a loose contol over the image, to leave some room for discovery. This might quite possibly be the worst analogy you have every heard but it is like trying to hold wet soap. If you have a kung fu grip you just end up looking at your feet being pissed at yourself. You know how to take “good” picture so just go out and make some picture of things that interest you. Don’t think about why they interest you or whether other people will think they are interesting. I don’t know if you remember this but for about three semesters I photographed nothing but close line polls. I still have no idea why (maybe it has to do with OCD, who knows). But a person appeared in one and then my work shifted. That seems to be how it works. I photograph what interests me then one photograph shifts the work. I dare you to make a bunch of work where the images don’t seem to fit together. I can’t think of a single time in which I have seen your work where you even had one image that didn’t seem to fit within the group. I guess that I am surprised since you don’t seem like the type of person who likes to focus on one particular thing in any other aspect of your life (I could be wrong) but you seem multi-tasking in everything else. Anyway it is late and I am not making any sense. I will talk to you about this more later. Good night.
Comment by Bradley — 11/17/2006 @ 4:14 pm