Deviation Actions
I felt I could do more good in the USA, so I took my camera to the streets locally. In my gallery you will find many inner city images, as I roamed about.
Turns out I was completely wrong about "what good is it?"
What the photographer offers is the time machine of now, kept for later. These images you take today carry on for others to view again, and sometimes again.
I review everyday, images taken for the media posted on internet, television, magazines, and newspapers, to walls of all sizes from the space in your home, to billboards of unlimited dimensions.
PHOTOGRAPHY is EVERYWHERE in ANYTHING
I can not imagine, anything more important today, as it influences all, again and again.
I was given the gift of seeing. I'm encouraged daily, as images are constantly appearing in the form of nature, people, geography, including the world I travel in. Lots of us enjoy this, but like music, if it isn't in you, it's hard to make it. You can buy cameras, so smart, sharp and steady, but still it has to be directed where and what to record.
I'll give you an example. Yesterday walking from my parked car, carrying my usual bundles to the gallery, I first passed a daisy like flower swaying in the breeze. Took it. Posted it yesterday. I then took a shortcut through a parking lot, passing the old courthouse. Saw a well dressed couple having just left the building. As I'm curious and friendly, it turns out they had just had a wedding and were going on in their joined world. Another quick photo. I sent it to them and now they have a documentary image of their lives, a historical image meaning more each day.
Even if you are not aware of it, your street images, or life recordings carry more than just face value. They carry a coinage of lasting time, long beyond today's interest.
Like I said, I was wrong.
eugene spiegel
April 2o
Another side of the Eclipse
Hasselblad Master's
Does money ruin everything
But James Estrins tweet today pushed it over the edge;
JamesEstrin
There’s no point in taking a picture if it isn’t going to do some good in this world. I'm a messenger-not an artist.
Something there resonates. We record fragments of space and time to keep us connected. We are so connected in space now - you will be able to read this on the other side of the planet milliseconds after I push submit - that we forget how art, and photojourn in particular, connect us across time, from now to the future.
Pictures do matter, but it's not just taking them. It's getting them seen by the right people. I read of the NYT (I think!) photo editor in the 60's who made the calls to run some of those iconic, but really tough images we associate with tipping the sentiment about Vietnam. He didn't take them, but he could have effectively 'untaken' them by not running them. By not running this image (warning - it is gruesome!) (www.sott.net/article/283563-Sa…) from Iraq, did media outlets make a call that has prolonged those wars?
You and I don't play in such intense spaces, certainly not as a high school teacher! But we play in OUR spaces, and have the chance to tell the stories around us, and dilute the ignorance the feeds xenophobia and hatred, that breeds respect and understanding.
Communicating matters, and good pictures communicate.
So, I think it is worth it, yes. We each do our little bit, and build a a little more of the puzzle. Which is why photoswithstory is actually quite important.