Postcards from the Creative Journey

449 - Just a Few Decades

A Shadow's Exit

Cary Elementary School, Cary, NC

On the other end of the spectrum, I recently hit a milestone in a very long term. “Passages and Portals” is a project covering my fascination with photographing doors. A few years ago my daughters proclaimed me “the best door photographer in the world.” I had never really considered doors as something I photographed, but once I started going back into my old files I was amazed at both how long I had been photographing doors and how many doors I photographed.

I started looking for old negatives and files to see if there was a project there. I was surprised to find a number of photographs that I thought I could work into a folio.

I guess the last two posts answer the question, “How long does it take to complete a photographic project?” For me, the answer would be sometime between two hours and thirty years.

Stop by my web site and check out Passages and Portals.

448 - Just a Few Moments

From "The Gift of Light."

Of course it has to be the right Few Moments to make a photographic project. There’s a new project on my web site, “The Gift of Light.” It’s a small project that was photographed quickly, edited promptly and put together in short order. In fact the biggest time killer of the project was figuring out how to get photographs from my iPhone to my PC. That’s right, a photographic project made with my iPhone. I was on vacation and the only “camera” available was part of the iPhone.

The photographs were made on the porch of a beach rental one morning while I was drinking a cup of tea. I was sitting and watching the sun light streaming across a porch. I sat and watched it for quite a while (still trying to wake up) and after the caffeine kicked in, I thought I had enough material to make a small folio. The statement accompanying the photographs was written between photographs. The entire project, starting with the making of photographs and ending with posting the folio on consumed a total of two hours.

Projects don’t have to be big, multi-year affairs. They can take as little as a couple of hours to complete and give you a sense of satisfaction at the accomplishment. That’s what I did with Gift of Light.

Stop by my web site and check out The Gift of Light.

447 - Is The Experience The Art?

Casual Wall Art

The Star Works, Star, NC

I started a thought experiment and I have yet to emerge with a conclusive result. The question is about creating photographic art. Is the act of creating the photograph performance art? Or is the result of the act of creation the real art? Can the two be equal?

Can the creation of some great photographs be considered a performance of the photographer? Or, as Ansel Adams is often quoted, “the negative is the score, the performance is the print.” Do we get credit for creating the digital capture as art as well as the “performance” of the digitally edited file? Are these two separate creative activities, on two steps in the same process?

Is it performance art if someone else creates a video of your creating the photograph? Or would that be the videographer making a documentary of you creating art?

The more I think about this, the more I think that I should get back to making art and not thinking about it so much.

446 - Sitting and Watching

Beach Scene,

Litchfield Beach, SC

I commend to you the practice of observing. Sitting (the most desirable position for observation, although there are those that favor the prone position with head supported by hands) while contemplating a scene will provide you a better photograph. Patience, of course, is a required prerequisite for this approach to photography. Minor White suggested you wait until the subject tells you it’s ready to be photographed. Seems like a reasonable approach to a contemplative manner of photography.

The initial impression (or maybe infatuation) with a scene is an indicator of photo-worthiness of the scene. Let the love blossom by developing a relationship with the scene. As we become acquainted with the scene our vision matures, deepens and becomes more nuanced. When our relationship with the scene reaches this level something of lasting value might be created.