The Joys of Being Wrong

“If you're not prepared to be wrong, you'll never come up with anything original.”
Sir Ken Robinson


You need to try lots of things and be prepared for failures, fiascoes, botches, disappointments, bombs, let downs and catastrophes. It's just a growth process, learning from your mistakes. When you're getting good at this people will often say you're wide of the mark, off topic, off kilter, off message, outside the mainstream, too far outside the box, and just plain wrong. The important thing is to ignore most of them most of the time. The hardest part is to know when to listen to them and when to listen to yourself.

It takes a while to learn to trust your own judgment. Some people never do. When you do, sometimes you will appear (no, you will be)  pig-headed, stubborn, obstinate, quixotic and unreasonable. More power to you. When you are a success in the face of criticism and everyone agrees you did it right, the adjectives will change to more favorable ones like resolute, stoic, firm, determined and maybe even visionary. With luck, this will come when you’re still alive and can enjoy it.

Looking at Photographs

“Books are for people who wish they were somewhere else.”

Mark Twain

I love looking at photographs and have been fascinated by all kinds of images since I can remember.  Holding a print in your hand or seeing one in a quiet gallery may be the best viewing experiences but it’s not always possible to do those things. Over the years I’ve collected a number of photography books to feed my hunger for images. While books may not be the ideal way to view a photo they are certainly optimal for leisurely perusing, reviewing, understanding, learning, examining in detail lots of images. In a book  you may not get the privilege of seeing the vintage Robert Frank print right in front of your eyes but you don’t have to travel 250 miles or more, burn gallons of expensive fossil fuels, pay bridge and tunnel tolls, (don’t forget parking fees!) then wait on long lines to pay your museum admission just to get elbowed by the hundreds of other gallery gawkers like yourself who are jostling for just the right viewing angle in front of Parade-Hoboken, New Jersey and Trolley-New Orleans.  If you go to the exhibition you should also buy the companion book. Going to the exhibit and buying the companion publication is the best of both worlds. Take the memories and  photos home and browse at your leisure. Sometimes you should even read the essays in the exhibition book, obtuse as they often are…but that’s another blog post.

I found a wonderful book from the Phaidon Press the other day. First published in 1997, it’s simply called “The Photo Book.” I can assure you there will never be a single gallery show that encompasses all the images in this remarkable publication. With 500 images from as many photographers, a little over 500 pages and weighing in at over five pounds this is a serious photographic tome. It spans the history of the medium from the earliest daguerreotypes through the mid 1990’s. There are many dramatic, iconic images like Eddie Adams’ Street Execution of a Vietcong Prisoner and Ansel Adams’ Moonrise-Hernandez, New Mexico. There are also many others, less well known but equally compelling. The range of images of all kinds from all eras and genres is astounding, from straight photojournalism to conceptual art, to fashion, portraits, landscapes and others. There is precious little written about each photo (which is just fine with me) but included is just enough good data about each photographer and the date of the photo.

What I found most interesting is the fact that the photos are arranged, not chronologically or by themes the editors have invented, but in alphabetical order by the photographer’s last name. This makes for some strange, wonderful and thought provoking page spreads. We see Cecil Beaton’s portrait of Dame Edith Sitwell from 1956 opposite Bernd and Hilla Becher’s Industrial Facade #23 from 1980.  Makes one think about the nature of a “façade.”  Brothers Cornell Capa and Robert Capa share a page spread. Cornell’s image is Bolshoi Ballet School, Moscow. Three graceful dancers in flowing costumes practice at the barre. The Robert Capa image is Death of a Loyalist Soldier from the Spanish civil war, arguably one of the most recognizable war photographs of the 20^th Century. There is a tragic grace in this soldier’s sudden death as he stretches, falling to the ground on the Cordoba Front. 

Graphical themes often flow wonderfully. We find Fredrick Evans A Sea of Steps flowing into an obscure Walker Evans photo of the back porch of an Alabama clapboard farm house. There is humor as well.  Let’s not forget Weegee’s The Critic opposite a William Wegman Weimaraner wearing swim fins and fake eye balls. There is something for nearly everyone here and well worth the price of admission. No crowds or elbows to the ribs, no tunnel tolls, no parking charges. You can enjoy a nice glass of Chianti while you study photographic history in your favorite easy chair.

Nothing Exceeds Like Excess

Photography has not changed since its origin except in its technical aspects, which for me are not important. 

Henri Cartier-Bresson

For some photographers it’s all about the technology and the equipment. It’s all about having lots of the newest, coolest high-tech stuff.  It’s about super-fast long zoom lenses, sexy camera bodies, filters for all occasions, dedicated flashes, expedition quality ballistic nylon bags, super-light carbon fiber tripods, all manner of enviable accessories. The equipment bug bites and gathering the “must have” gizmos becomes an end in itself. Sometimes hundreds of pounds of equipment are needed just to go out the door before a frame is shot

It is often a legitimate need to have only the most of the best and be prepared for all contingencies. Without question, if you’re running off to cover the revolution in Libya for Time magazine you certainly need the right equipment and you better have some back up plans. Do not miss the money shot of the mercurial Muammar in his latest Michael Jackson tribute outfit or you’ll never again get face time with, the even more mercurial, Time photo editor. Shooting your cousin’s wedding?  Same issue to a large degree. It’s happening now, happening once. Do not miss the bouquet throw or your aunt will never let you forget it. And oh, BTW, your cousin will never give you the phone number of that really cute bridesmaid who actually looked good in the sleeveless fuchsia dress with the taffeta rosettes on the bustle.

We haven’t even touched on the photo processing software, widgets, and plug-ins, monitors, monitor calibration tools, scanners, printers, the computing power needed to run it all and terabytes of storage for the tens of thousands of multi-megapixel “captures,” iterations and back-ups.

I understand this equipment need. I love equipment, do occasionally suffer megapixel or lens length envy and drool over the B&H catalog at every opportunity. But these days I’m more into relative minimalism. One 60D body, one short zoom, one longer zoom, remote release, polarizer, graduated ND filters for landscape work, a budget (but sturdy) tripod, an extra battery and a couple other minor accessories. It all fits in one reasonably priced bag I can carry on a commercial airliner. I don’t necessarily carry the whole kit with me all the time or use everything on every shoot. It really depends on what I’m after on any given day. Generally, I like to keep it simple. I also make every effort to avoid excessive “post processing.” The idea is to avoid getting lost in the foggy forest of equipment lust or miss a shot because I was fumbling in my bag looking for just the right gadget. In the end it’s not about the technology or the equipment. The only equipment Cartier-Bresson carried was a Leica with a 50mm lens. He knew the most important detail about good photography. When all is said and done, it’s all about the image.

Photographic Fear

I've been reading a book called "In the Yikes Zone: A Conversation With Fear" by Mermer Blakeslee.  It’s nominally about skiing. The vignettes and stories throughout the book are about skiers afraid of some aspect of skiing and how the author helps them understand and work through what makes them afraid. They learn how to understand their fear and work with it to improve their performance. The skiers experience degrees of fear from mild discomfort and frustration at not wanting to chance a challenging run to being literally paralyzed at the top of a hill, sometimes even the bunny hill, when they get off the lift. Some of them ski pretty well in their comfort zone but avoid anything remotely challenging. Others are so afraid they need to be guided down a small run with Mermer skiing by their side or skiing backwards in front of them, talking them through every little bump and turn on the way down. Some are new, inexperienced, afraid of their untested potential, of stretching too far. Others have been skiing for years, are very experienced and know well the painful consequences of overreaching.

Some are afraid of injury but most seem to be afraid of more than just getting hurt. They are afraid of confronting the uncomfortable. The extreme cases get anxious, afraid of being afraid which feeds more anxiety and more fear until they’re tense, stiff, paralyzed, can’t feel what their bodies are doing, can’t flow with the terrain. They’re so afraid they can’t begin to become better skiers.

I see many parallels with fear in photographic situations. If you’re afraid of shooting a subject, whether it’s a person or a poisonous snake you’ll get tense, tentative. You won’t flow with the “terrain”. You won’t stay with a shoot long enough or get good shots while you’re doing it.  When you’re afraid in any photographic situation you get timid, tentative with the camera, bringing it to the eye only occasionally, furtively.

But what are we really afraid of? We worry too much…about too many things. We over-think. We’re afraid of being afraid before we even shoot. Afraid of confrontation when we point the camera. Fear of rejection when showing the photo. Fear of over-reaching. Fear of getting hurt. Get over it! Let it go! It’s not as bad as all that. You're not likely to break any bones. It’s only a very small fraction of a second and you're done.

Too Much Is Not Enough

Sometimes there is no substitute for wretched excess. There is benefit in frantic intensity, in frenzied passion, in a lunatic lust for aesthetic endeavors. This is often the image of the quintessential genius, possessed by the muse, creating breakthroughs, crafting new paradigms, inspired by lightning bolts of inspiration. No time for quotidian concepts like food, sex, tidying up, answering emails, checking in on the world. Well, maybe sex… but nothing that doesn’t feed the beast.   

Whose art is it anyway?

I’ve never made a living at photography although; from time to time the thought had crossed my mind to try to do just that. Quite a while ago, while attending photography school part-time in San Francisco, I investigated the possibilities; showing my portfolio, talking to prospective photographic employers, editors and art directors. I learned much about photography and the business of photography that was extremely useful. I learned that, typically, photographers start as assistants in an established enterprise, carting equipment and schlepping coffee, taking almost any assignment to get hired. In some ways it is a very exciting, fast paced way to learn the business and make a living. I also learned that assistants didn’t get paid very much and didn’t have any more time than I did to pursue their own projects. Indeed, many professional photographers didn’t have much time for “personal work” as they called it. They were too busy shooting what clients wanted, paying the bills and directing assistants to create their own work. During a job interview I asked one pro about his personal work. He admitted he had to “shoot a lot of refrigerators” in his studio to carve out a little time every month for his real passion, shooting landscapes in the Sierra Nevada Mountains. 

At the time of these career investigations I was attending school part time to pursue my interest in making pictures, not to change careers. I was already making more than twice what a photo assistant could make running paper cutting machines in a union printing company. If I were to quit my “real” job to be a photo assistant I’d have to take a big pay cut, I’d still, more or less, be punching a clock, and still not have any more time to make my own photographs.  I decided I didn’t want to compromise. I wanted to pursue my own work on my own terms. I didn’t see the need to be in the photography “business” to do that. 

Doing something for a living is quite different from doing the same thing for oneself. Unless you drive the whole enterprise and call all the shots, if you make photographs for money, any money, you have to ask “whose art is it anyway?” Even if you have “creative control” on an assignment you’re still working for someone else.  It’s a rare photographer who can make their living following their own vision without compromise.

It’s a conundrum, an intricate and difficult problem for many artists: Art for money, art for making a living, or art for oneself? Today, I’ll occasionally sell a print or get an assignment but on the whole it’s never been my intention to photograph for others or sell pictures. It may sound a little selfish, but I photograph for me.

Comfort, Audacity and Fear

"If your picture isn't good enough, you're not close enough."

 Robert Capa

Comfort is often a killer to creativity. If you're “comfortable” with your work you’re probably not pushing your limits. You're not learning, growing, developing, honing your edge. You may be getting very good shots but not necessarily the best you otherwise might get. If you really want to grow, as an artist and as a person you need to be uncomfortable, at least some of the time. You need to challenge yourself to be more audacious, take a risk, maybe even get a little reckless.  It’s hard to overcome the fear of getting closer, engaging your subject, taking the braver shot but the more you do it the easier it will get.