To what extent is photography a solitary pursuit?

<p>A lot of spin-off questions come to mind:</p>

<p>Are the best photographers loners?</p>

<p>Does the creative spirit thrive on (or in) solitude?</p>

<p>Is the creative process an individual process or a social process?</p>

<p>Do the best photographers/artists play to popular demand, or to an internal voice or vision?</p>

<p>There are many others, but I would prefer that persons make up their own questions, or else modify the question(s) to allow for the fullest expression of their own ideas.</p>

<p>--Lannie</p>

<p>Yes. For the most of it, anyway. Socialism is a killer of creativity.</p>

<p>"Solitary" v. "socialism." Hmm. . . .</p>

<p>--Lannie</p>

<p>>Are the best photographers loners?</p>

<p> Some are, some aren't. It is also dependent on what they do. Guys like Frans Lanting are in a type of work that almost requires a solo effort. Street photographers (famous ones) tend to be more social. It is easy to give examples of both.</p>

<p>>Does the creative spirit thrive on (or in) solitude?</p>

<p> Both. Again, history has examples of both.</p>

<p>>Is the creative process an individual process or a social process?</p>

<p>It can be either or both.</p>

<p>>Do the best photographers/artists play to popular demand, or to an internal voice or vision?</p>

<p> The best? Most do not. But many, if not most, are aware of, and play/riff off of/flirt what is floating around out there, and/or make it their own. Successful commercial photographers and many artists do play to demand.</p>

<p>There are many others, but I would prefer that persons make up their own questions, or else modify the question(s) to allow for the fullest expression of their own ideas.</p>

<p>The OT consists of popular, odd presuppositions: Somehow "we" know who's a "loner"and who isn't, and we assume best-known (to "us") relates to "best." Somehow popular demand (eg Kobe Bryant? Bach? Ansel Adams?) precludes "inner voice." Somehow individuals are one way or another, unchanging, consistent. Don't we know a little about the wildly different creative processes of the photographers we recognize, and don't we all have our own individual processes?</p>

<p>fwiw, I have personal photographic urges that are evolving and becoming more clear to me, but I am very happy when someone unknown to me responds to my work in their own way. I might (or might not) do more to appeal to people other than myself if I had more time at my disposal.</p>

 

<blockquote>

<p>Are the best photographers loners?</p>

</blockquote>

<p>The "best" portrait photographers tend to interact well and often with others. :)</p>

Ever since I closed my photo business 7 years ago I have been very solitary in my photography. Even when I had the business, although I enjoyed my customers, I never hired anyone and did weddings by myself. This gets difficult when you are trying to load MF backs, carrying three cameras around your neck and trying to stay up with a large wedding. So this past Winter in order to break my solitude I was successful in teaching a series of beginning photography classes and the Artists Association I belong to started a photography group. I enjoyed teaching the classes but have no desire to do it anytime soon, again. I lasted three meetings with the photography group. They went out in groups to take photographs accompanied by each other. Gag me with a spoon. I couldn't stand it. I couldn't stand the unmitigated BS in the meetings. I have decided it is better to be alone. I do other things in groups but not photography. Solitude and absolute independence about what I do, I find, is extremely important to me. Yes, photography is a social process but only with me and my subjects, not with me and other photographers except on photonet where I enjoy the dialogue and I wind up learning a lot. Now that I don't have many(I still have some) customers my inner voice determines my satisfaction with my images.

<p>Speaking philosophically and in broader context of this forum we have to realize there is no such a thing as ""best" photographers". The attempt to term it this way is misleading, dangerously primitivistic and meaningless. There are popular or successful ones in one way or another, usually in narrow frames of specific local culture and time period.</p>

<p>Matter of destiny, talent and determination? Sure. But you don't have to be less/more creative to make a successful commercial photographer then a prolific artist one.</p>

<p>To be popular one has to have a talent for keeping half a step ahead of crowd but no more. Maybe even fall back every once in a while. Measure of success in this case is instant recognition and nice pay if it works. Which is not necessary granted btw. And you compromise your ID which is bad for the soul.</p>

<p>To meat you own personal creative requirements, keep up with it and develop the case towards usually unknown goal, use time and resources is essentially antisocial and seldom meat aproval of general population or whatever you got. Need lots of determination, luck and stamina, actually. And you have to pay the way too, somehow ...</p>

<p>Want to get it done - stay off.</p>

<blockquote>

<h1>To what extent is photography a solitary pursuit?</h1>

 

</blockquote>

<p>To the extent of actual shooting...meaning looking into the VF, compose, adjust and click of the shutter. Even then...if using liveview these days, actual shooting process can be done by two people. Everyhting else mentioned is a combination of both, social and solitary.</p>

<p>When you think of the famous photographers pre-WWII, they all had a creative relationship with their peers. Today even Magnum is apparently an impersonal organization. Perhaps the desire to have a creative "product" to differentiate yourself is more important today given the rise of a market for photography. </p>

<p>I personally find it discouraging that, at the highest levels, creative collaboration has been replaced by gallery demands and PR campaigns.</p>

<p>

<p>Most of what I photograph ends up with a lot of beer drinking and socializing so at least in my case it is anything but a solitary pursuit. To put it another way I like to photograph people, to do so I have to be around people and I sure enjoy interacting with them a whole lot more then standing on the sidelines just photographing others enjoying life.</p>

</p>

<p>IMO many photographers produce decorative products labeled "art." Scenic pretties, travel, colorful characters, kittens etc. Since these are conceptually not individualistic (ie not actually art in the traditional sense) they entail "gallery demands" (gallery=retail store) and PR campaigns.</p>

 

<p>Long ago, I started photographing when I bought my first Nikon. A friend and I went the hour after I bought my first camera, on board the Staten Island Ferry, and out of the first roll of film was a keeper, still show and in my B&W gallery today.<br>

However, when prowling streets of NYC then as a Columbia Student, then as a guy with a camera following my nose around Manhattan and boroughs, I found that no one really was interested in following me, nor should they have been; I had no real well thought out creative process or ideas, just some ideas, many of which are still shown in my B&W gallery, as early B&W.<br>

Then came the twin assassinations: First Bobby Kennedy and a street photo I took ended up the day after his assassination in the front (not the cover) of the NY Times; I happened on a street (barrio) celebration/memorial of Bobby's with a cross and his photo together with that of his slain brother. I just walked into the NY Times and said 'I have some film' and in I went and a month or so later got a check that was big even by today's standards (or especially by today's standards).<br>

Martin Luther King got assassinated, Harlem got torn down, I did not go in (it was torn down at night and I as not equipped personally for safety there, as I knew the territory well and knew I'd be torn limb from limb, but ventured to the outskirts the next day and got a great photo of a black, a Hispanic and a white copy putting together the riot barrio in front of a drug store with great lines (no one was with me of course -- who had the gumption to go such places.<br>

That evening (or a following one) I decided to go to Washington, D.C. which was then in full riot lockdown (curfew) and took a night train (rescheduled to get there when curfew lifted.<br>

The coach was cold and when a merchant seaman got up (leaving his concealed gun in a paper bag on the seat to complain about the cold just as we were about to enter Trenton, another merchant seaman lay down across the seat (and across the gun as well)<br>

A fight ensued, I broke it up (after all they woke me up with their fisticuffs and I put and end to THAT I thought)<br>

BOOM! the bullet went through the first merchant seaman (the white one, and into me, and down went the first merchant seaman, and I was facing the second (no one was with me, and strangely enough, though the train coach was packed with people there was NOT ONE WITNESS).<br>

The assailant escaped past me at the vestibule where I ran with my leg in shock so I didn't feel the immense pain that would follow, then jumped off the train, but in the wrong direction, I fetched my FILMLESS CAMERA, from its seat, went to the platform, hung between two conductors and the assailant (perhaps not knowing he had hit me?) came right up to me and asked how was the 'guy who was shot on the train?)<br>

'All right' I said, 'he'll be all right' and the assailant wandered down the platform, and soon a woman ran out of the stopped train coach shouting<br>

He shot him again<br>

In the head.<br>

He pistol whipped the second merchant mariner, then fired, point blank (and the other guy jerked his head)and the bullet grazed his cheek a little and his ear, drawing an enormous amount of blood, concussing him and rendering him deaf, causing him to fall to the train floor.<br>

The assailant walked away and soon enough was arrested.<br>

The other victim and I shared an ambulance, then an emergency ward.<br>

I HAD NO FILM and NO FRIENDS WITH ME. LUCKY FOR THEM.<br>

A couple of days later, when released from the hospital, unable to walk without a cane, the cops drove me through THE MIDDLE OF AN INCIPIENT RACE RIOT.<br>

I gave my statement to a northern look alike of Bull Connor as the police station emptied and reinforcements took to the streets, leaving me, the dispatcher and this guy. <br>

Rioters broke into the first floor and my cop (Bull Connors look alike) held them from coming to get me and him with a shotgun at the top of the steps.<br>

I had a camera and lens.<br>

NO FILM<br>

STILL.<br>

I went back to Columbia.<br>

Later infection almost cost me my leg.<br>

When, during an interregnum during long hospital stays, I was out, students took over Columbia in the first major student riot (film sold to Time Life, NY Daily News, etc).<br>

There I had friends.<br>

Friends or no friends, it was really no different, except that if photography comes first, one must make the decision:<br>

'Does this photo count more importantly than my need to satisfy my friend's need to get going to talk to this person or go to that place?'<br>

I went to Viet Nam with a camera and mostly filmed alone but often in the company of other people.<br>

But always I was the only one who could see through the viewfinder, and there was no instant sharing, so a friend either had to be pretty easy going and happy just to go wandering or tag along, or the friendship became strained quickly.<br>

I joined Associated Press after stringing in San Francisco for AP and UPI (they both gave me offers).<br>

There I photographed side by side with their staff photographers: it was very collegial: Sooner or later if you go to events, and such, you get to know everybody.<br>

Recently, during a disaster I was driving by, I got out with big lenses and intermixed with the huge TV camera guys and the local and regional dailies, and soon I was one of them. They saw that I got good captures and knew how to act, and just accepted.<br>

Photographing documentary, PJ, and 'street' is something that can be done and sometimes must be done solo and sometimes must be done in a group, depending on circumstances.<br>

Sometimes long teles are necessary and the subject never knows he/she has been photographed; other times, it is necessary to gain trust and intermix and with digital show results to a subject, then get in close, real close.<br>

Now I often get in within six to ten inches of a subject's eyeballs (the object of my focus) with a 12-24 Nikkor f 4 DX on a D300 often after first (1) taking a photo to show them the wide angle and/or (2) letting them or encouraging (often forcing) them to peer through the viewfinder to view the wide angle so they understand what a wide angle does and how it frames, to allow them to feel comfortable with my getting so close.<br>

I can easily go out with a friend, and sometimes do.<br>

I recently tutored a MFA graduate who wanted to hone his street skills.<br>

His feedback was positive.<br>

He seemed to make enormous progress during two days of shooting in the LA area.<br>

(I won't name him; it's his personal privacy, but he wrote me kind thanks and said encouraging things about the time and effort).<br>

And I think the effort has shown in work he sent me shortly afterward.<br>

Also, I enjoyed shooting with a fellow photographer.<br>

I always remember that it is amazing how one can take a small group of photographers, have them all photograph the same scene and be amazed at the sheer variety of photos that each produces.<br>

I think he made substantial inroads to his fear of actually encountering people that he was going to photograph, as it is my habit sometimes to walk right up to them (now); something I seldom did before the amazing treat that has been PN entered my life and gave me such a great worldwide audience of photographers, and so many subjects whom I know (because they tell me later) who click in to see my work later and then maybe look at yours too.<br>

I have a special friend, who can walk with me, knows my work and just points (or makes a noise) at a circumstance my friend often knows I will be interested in photographing.<br>

That's a special treat.<br>

No long sentences or explanations from my special friend, just a finger pointed and away I go, camera at the ready.<br>

It takes a special friend and friendship who can go and shoot street like that and make a positive contribution and such friends are rare indeed.<br>

One reason I mostly gave up photography (besides having met Cartier-Bresson and knowing I could never reach the caliber of the work he was exhibiting when I saw him at age 22) was I had a wife who did not enjoy my photography much. <br>

Now I have a test: If someone in my life who might be prominent does not like my photos or being around photography, then they are not going to be prominent.<br>

End of subject.<br>

I tried it the other way, not taking photos, stifled myself for too long and it didn't work.<br>

When I recommenced taking photos and was much more unsure of myself, I often shot alone and for substantial periods, often with a telephoto.<br>

Now it's different. <br>

I can interact with almost anybody.<br>

I remember a member here commenting on the street style and manner of Magnum Photographer Bruce Gilden who then invited that member to Gilden's home to dinner (I think I recall) and to meet Gilden's wife.<br>

It all seems truthful to me, that Gilden who can take such outrageously intrusive photos should have such an engaging and outgoing personality.<br>

In fact, it's probably a necessity, I now realize.<br>

Now, I can shoot solo, or with another, it makes no difference, so long as the other person doesn't try to drag me away from my shooting.<br>

I even took one great shot (man in recliner seated in front of line of extremely buxom mannequins) while engaging in chat with a person behind me and while apologizing for sticking my buttocks in his face while I was trying to get the perfect angle for that shot, and in that conversation, didn't miss a beat. (Adult Expo, Las Vegas about three years ago).<br>

The same test for me still counts: A friend makes little difference if he/she comes along, just so long as the friend does not interfere with my photography, try to drag me away or interfrere with the creative process or my subjects.<br>

A friend or companion can be a great help with digital in helping edit the good from the bad if that friend has decent taste, also.<br>

But one has to choose one's friends well if one is to take a friend along when photographing 'street', documentary, or PJ, as I do, as it's not like going on long camping trips or hikes and then stopping to take a great landscape photo (but that can make stress, too, I am sure, as a great landscaper must wait for that great light and others may want to go hiking, or do other things and NOT hang around).<br>

It helps to have friends who 'get along well' and are not 'demanding' if one is to take one along photographing.<br>

john<br>

John (Crosley)</p>

 

<p>Erratum:<br>

I shot the Martin Luther King, Jr. photo then went to Washington, D.C. first. (it was cold, April, 1968)<br>

Later in June 1968, after the Columbia riots and campus shutdown, came the Robert Kennedy assassination. I apologize for the error. (it's been a long time). (it was warmer, June, 1968)<br>

john<br>

John (Crosley)</p>

<p>Wouldn't the counterpoint for the solitary pursuit of a project be a collaborative one? Aren't photographers ever part of teams of people carrying out their assignments for (what one hopes would be) the eventual success of the whole effort? How would a solitary photographer ever make a whole commercial movie all by himself?</p>

<p>The need to pursuit creative photography as an individual AND BY NO MEANS a social process is perhaps one of the strongest indications that photography may after all be an act of art.</p>

<blockquote>

<p>I have personal photographic urges that are evolving and becoming more clear to me, but I am very happy when someone unknown to me responds to my work in their own way. I might (or might not) do more to appeal to people other than myself if I had more time at my disposal.</p>

 

</blockquote>

<p>John (Kelly), wouldn't it be nice to have all that time! I am still grateful that you had the time and generosity to send me a print of a photo that many of us have seen and appreciated ( http://www.photo.net/photo/10498465 ). The print still stands magisterially above my fire place, inspiring me from time to time to want to go forth to capture or create something of my own.</p>

<p>--Lannie</p>

<blockquote>

<p>Now I often get in within six to ten inches of a subject's eyeballs (the object of my focus) with a 12-24 Nikkor f 4 DX on a D300 often after first (1) taking a photo to show them the wide angle and/or (2) letting them or encouraging (often forcing) them to peer through the viewfinder to view the wide angle so they understand what a wide angle does and how it frames, to allow them to feel comfortable with my getting so close.<br /> I can easily go out with a friend, and sometimes do.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>John (Crosley), you give a whole new meaning to "in your face." You also give a whole new dimension to the "social" aspect of photography, as well as the extent to which pure physical courage and social courage are often mixed up together. As I recall, you had to be shipped back in pieces from Vietnam in one point in your life of PJ sorties. I've only been seriously shot at once, but you have been shot at--and hit--at least twice, as I recall.</p>

<p>Thanks for the stories, as well as the other commentary that has such broad applicability to all kinds of creative pursuits:</p>

<blockquote>

<p>One reason I mostly gave up photography (besides having met Cartier-Bresson and knowing I could never reach the caliber of the work he was exhibiting when I saw him at age 22) was I had a wife who did not enjoy my photography much.<br /> Now I have a test: If someone in my life who might be prominent does not like my photos or being around photography, then they are not going to be prominent.<br /> End of subject.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Amen, brother (although in my case it has been more about my writings than about my photos, which are little more than amateurish snaps, when they are even that). There are also the "control freaks" who would also make us all over into their suburban, Sunday-morning-church-going selves. (I was married to one: they and their churches destroy more relationships than all other institutions combined. If marriages are made in heaven, they are surely destroyed in churches--but I digress.)</p>

<p>Something else in a related vein spoke to me as well:</p>

<blockquote>

<p>I tried it the other way, not taking photos, stifled myself for too long and it didn't work.<br /> When I recommenced taking photos and was much more unsure of myself, I often shot alone and for substantial periods, often with a telephoto.<br /> Now it's different. <br /> I can interact with almost anybody.<br /> I remember a member here commenting on the street style and manner of Magnum Photographer Bruce Gilden who then invited that member to Gilden's home to dinner (I think I recall) and to meet Gilden's wife.<br /> It all seems truthful to me, that Gilden who can take such outrageously intrusive photos should have such an engaging and outgoing personality.<br /> In fact, it's probably a necessity, I now realize.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>I had no idea when I opened this thread what a range of perspectives I was going to get. (The thread started out of frustrations at having no real photographic record of my wilderness ramblings,whether on foot in the mountains of North and South America, or waterborne in my paddlings off coastal Georgia and even--once--off the coast north of Camagüey, Cuba.)</p>

<p>I do know that the kind of private and introspective activity that much of my work has required has also involved a paradoxically very different kind of <em>going out</em>: the <em>going into</em> my own self, and the retreat (or is it foray?) into the self in order to write about darned near anything. Writing can be such a lonely activity--whether it is fiction or philosophy. I think that I was nowhere so bold as when I was venturing into the world of human beings, even though I told myself as a young man that there was something really bold about going into the mountains alone. That was psychological child's play compared to putting myself on the line as a writer. The mountains were simply an escape, something that I needed at the time(s)--but they can be much, much more than that, too, as many nature and wilderness photographers know.</p>

<p>Those who know your work, John, know also your commentary, which comes like a flood tide upon each picture that you have posted here. ( http://www.photo.net/photodb/user?user_id=888636 ) Thank you for showing up here, at this time--but you always had that PJ talent of being exactly where you were needed, exactly when you needed to be there.</p>

<p>--Lannie</p>

<p>...give a 12-year-old a set of Craftsman tools, he or she won't be a talented auto mechanic on the first day.</p>

<p>...give a 16-year-old a trumpet, he or she won't be a soloist on the first day.</p>

<p>...give anyone a film camera or a digital camera, and they won't be a fine photographer on day one. Nor will they see <strong>each interesting thing</strong> in the sky or in the yard or in the flowers or along the shore, that they might consider a photographic subject.</p>

<p> There is not an exact answer to the questions.</p>

<p> </p>

<p>Photography can be seen in it's historical and social context. It's misleading to regard for example the work of Ansel Adams (I'm not particular fond of his work, but he is regarded as one of the masters) as singular, rather then seeing it in context with Weston, Strand and the like. Or name some germans like Renger-Patzsch, Sander and his precedor Hugo Erfurth. Newer examples may be the Dusseldorf School of Documentary Photography (Becher and their pupils Struth, Gursky...) or the new american color photography. The artists are individuals, but they certainly influence each other.</p>

<p>I can only speak of my experiences, not those of famous photographers. When I go out to take photographs, it is to experience landscapes; the photos are secondary (but still of tremendous importance). It's an experience of landscapes, not a social engagement with other photographers in a landscape. Occasionally I will engage in photography with a friend, but even then it's two solitary individuals who get together at the end of a walk to talk about the experiences each just had. For me, photography is simply a wonderful way to experience landscapes and the natural world more intensely than I would if I didn't have a camera. And that experience is a solitary one, and it is understood and shared only by others who pursue solitary experiences in and with landscapes and the natural world. Mine is just one of many ways of living; human beings are incredibly diverse.</p>

Stephen. You said it better than I did.

<p><em>Don't know about the best photographers, this does not apply to me</em>, but</p>

<p>I believe it is an <em><strong>absolutely solitary pursuit</strong></em>, even if there is somebody helping you.<br /> In the end most if not all decisions are individualistic and individual. The photographic dynamic - be it fast or slow, walking ahead or staying behind - is strictly individualistic. Unless tethered to the photographer - physically, but most of all mentally - those staying with him/her have hardly any chance.<br>

As a counter-factual proof</p>

<ul>

<li>when I am around with friends, <em><strong>they say that I tend to be asocial when I photograph</strong></em>, and</li>

<li>when I try not to be asocial, <em><strong>I miss a lot of photos</strong></em>.</li>

</ul>

<p>Saturday morning I was going around in the centre of Roma with my wife. I got one shot which is probably good, but missed at least a couple of other photos because I failed to stay "photographically focused" all the time [<em>I was also handed some stuff to carry at a certain stage, and also this does not help</em> ... :-)].</p>

<p>But I looked around a lot and now I have an idea for a photographic project.</p>

<p>Photographing, at least my approach to photography, requires concentration on what goes on around and on the act of photographing itself.</p>

<p> </p>

<p>I just shoot pictures, don't confuse me, I'm confused enough already.</p>

<p>Stephen, I have come full circle in just over the five years since you got your Photo of the Week:</p>

<p>http://www.photo.net/photo-of-the-week-discussion-forum/00BKZ2</p>

<p>I first went out into the wilderness to explore wilderness and to commune with nature. Taking pictures was entirely secondary, if it occurred at all. I would go out by myself because there is something about solitude in the wilderness that heightens the senses and reveals one's vulnerabilities in a way that being a member of a party could not do. I found fairly quickly that I was quite at home in the wilderness, and I did not feel lonely simply because I was alone. Nor was I often afraid, as I had expected to be. I took solace in the wilderness and felt that I communed with God and nature there. There was more than anything else a spiritual awareness in nature that I had not and have not found anywhere else. The few photos that I took were primarily for my own sake, to help me remember where I had been and what I had seen.</p>

<p>Of course, the few photos that I took in those early years cannot and could not show the wilderness experience itself, which is very subjective and is a psychological state which cannot be shown or shared in anything approaching its fullness. One can only recommend the wilderness experience to others, not show it to them. The pictures may inspire them to go out, but the description of the wilderness experience is very difficult to convey in either words or pictures--a fact which was and is very frustrating to me.</p>

<p>In any case, what started out as a purely private quest became very nearly a social cause. I found the wilderness experience to be so over-powering and wonderful that I wanted to share it with others and to encourage them to want to go out and have it themselves. Toward this end I invited a person or two with me on a number of short day trips in the late 1960s, which typically did not quite work, since the spell of solitude was now broken, and because I was now someone's guide--a fact that I did not mind, but which kept them from realizing and experiencing the fullness of going out <em>on their own. </em>By my very presence, I tended to prevent them from experiencing, say, hiking up a mountain as if it were a virginal experience for themselves--the real essence of a wilderness experience, in my opinion. That is, in going out alone one gets the sense (or illusion) of being the first human being to be in a particular place. That is lost when someone else shows the way. The day trip also tends to give one only a sense of wilderness. The fullness of it typically takes a while longer, although I have found no set rule as to duration. A fleeting sense of it is better than no sense of it at all, and I do not disparage those who can manage nothing more extensive than an afternoon's trip into the mountains or a brief foray into the ocean on a kayak. There is something about both mountains and oceans that can make one feel alone pretty fast, and the awe and majesty of nature often come at one when one least expect them--sometimes not always pleasantly at the time, although always meaningful and thus memorable.</p>

<p>The wilderness experience is thus for me in and of itself a very <em>solitary</em> experience, at least in all of its fullness. The taking of a photograph is not in itself a necessarily social act<em> in the fullest sense</em>, since the first few photos that I have of some of my wilderness experiences were made solely to help me remember them. We do not always take photos <em>in order to</em> share them, but we typically do later share them. Later, when we go out into the wilderness, we typically know from the beginning that we will share the photos. If I were to go back into the Andes with my present cameras, for example, it would be in part expressly for the sake of bringing back photos which I could share with others.</p>

<p>I am saying this not to start a whole new foray into one type of photography as much as to convey what motivated the present thread. It came out of a sense of frustration that I simply do not get "out there" like I used to, a function in part of where I now live, as well as age, but hardly only these. I am no longer in tune with nature as I once was, amidst all the press of other obligations which make me feel pretty good about myself if I get a mile or two of walking in on a given day. I am reminded anew of John Muir's maxim: "Walk a mile in any direction and taste the freedom of the mountaineer."</p>

<p>I googled the saying just above to be absolutely certain that it was Muir's before I posted this, and, lo, here is what I found:</p>

<p>http://www.photo.net/photo-of-the-week-discussion-forum/00BKZ2</p>

<p>It was at that point that I realized that I was repeating myself, and so I will shut up now, except to say that, although sharing photographs is an inherently social act, and even though we carry an enormous social tradition when we both go into the wilderness alone as well as when we take a photograph, there is yet something solitary about taking a photo for me (or in any creative work, for that matter), just as there is something solitary about going into nature--even if one does try to do it in couples or even with a larger group.</p>

<p>I suppose that as long as i do not repeat myself more than once every five years or so, then my mental powers are not gone quite yet.</p>

<p>--Lannie</p>