I've had a couple of posts that deal with what art might be and why I create black and white images. This got me thinking about why I chose photography as my medium, as opposed to architecture or painting or underwater basketweaving or any number of other ways to express oneself. To begin with, I was going to be an architect. This was back in the days of mechanical pencils and vellum, rulers, triangles and drafting compasses. There was no software to plan with and certainly no personal computers to work on. Talk about old school. I loved the mechanics, but there was always something missing, or better put, there was something missing in me. I just could not grasp how to communicate what was in me with the tools at hand. There are many who can and have, but unfortunately, it wasn't for me. So I moved on and dabbled in paint, in graphic arts, in charcoal, in fibers, in metal work, but each had its drawbacks. Although I didn't realize it then, my way of communication was more immediate, more connected to what was in front of me at the moment than what was in my head. I had someone tell me recently that there are two kinds of people... those that are goal driven and those that are resource driven. I am most definitely the latter. Those that are goal driven know where they want to go and plan accordingly. Resource driven individuals don't really worry so much about where they are going... they are very comfortable whenever they get there. If they aren't, they find the resources at that time to move on. That is me in a nutshell, and that is my photography. I don't know what I am going to photograph, the inspiration happens wherever I am. Do I always succeed? Most certainly not, but I've never known a photographer who succeeds 100 percent of the time either. I make images the way I make images. It is what it is. Photography to me is a way to capture a moment, not literally, but interpreted through my thoughts and vision. This is the way I communicate. It is my interpretation of the world that creates the art through the photographic medium. I could not do this with architectural drawings, with painting, or other types of artwork. They slowed me down in a studio or the medium was a slow process in and of itself. I kept losing my way, and they didn't fit me or the way I worked. Photography was different. Shooting with a camera made me go out and find what was there, and once there, I had to interpret what I saw in the moment. I had to wait for the right moment, and once it arrived had to make the image or it would be gone. It was engaging like no other medium was and it fit my restless personality. Once I discovered photography, I began making images to capture the moment, but soon realized there was no such thing as photographing reality. Everything is an interpretation, even images that look like records of events are interpreted. My favorite photographers were the ones that made me realize what they shot was their vision even though everything was supposed to be captured in the moment. Take a look at Ansel Adams' "Mount Williamson - Clearing Storm". Amazing rock formations and heavenly light... it must have been a sight. But turn 180 degrees and you would have seen the Japanese 'War Relocation Center', full of dust and wooden structures that the Japanese Americans who were sent there had to live in. The clearing storm was real, but its photographic interpretation was no more reality that any two dimensional could be real. So what does this mean? Photography, regardless of what one may think, is never "real". It is always an interpretation of what the photographer sees, and this interpretation doesn't capture the moment so much as it captures the experience of the moment. When I photograph, I am trying to capture my experiences through the images that I take. When I transform the image with software, I am putting my vision into the work to evoke what I saw and felt at the time. When I go out and photograph, the process of taking a photo allows me to slow down a bit and appreciate the view, something hard for me to do. I am easily distracted, always jumping from thought to thought, like a bee hopping from flower to flower and never resting. I am able to be in the moment when I am creating a photograph, something I could never master with other media. I enjoy all art, but photography holds a special place, especially black and white images. Now that I have embraced the digital world, I can take my time working with my images in the comfort of my home, no longer chained to a specialized darkroom with little time to do what I love. With digital, there is the added advantage of easily exploring color image making to see where it takes me without breaking the bank. I can explore feeling and expression, playing with light in ways before unreachable due to monetary matters. This freedom of exploration is why I must photograph, why this specific way of communication fits the way I work and who I am. No other medium will do.
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