Whose Work Is In Dialogue With Yours?

<p> Photographs do not exist in a vacuum. We make pictures, and we also look at the work of others. This connection can be unidirectional, as in work that influences ours. Others' work can inform our own through us, and in turn, the relation to that work through our own affects the way we understand it. This dialogue takes place within us. Whose work, and specifically, which of their works are in dialogue with yours? If possible, comment on the nature of the exchange.</p>

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<p>James Nachtwey. He tells me entire stories with one picture.</p>

I am old. I grew up with a host of Life Magazine Photographers who mostly did black and white. I am in tune with John Steinbeck the author and the depression photographers that documented that time. Eisenstadt, Capa, Bourke-White are a few of many. I think that the oft bandied about and distorted term used on this site "photojournalism" was defined in Life in a true way in a day when there was no television and newsreels were only seen every Saturday in the home town theatre weeks after the fact. These photographers were a prime visual link to WWII, Betty Grable (very famous picture in Life) and the world. We read and viewed this magazine from cover to cover in the late thirties into the post WWII era. It gave us much of our picture of WWII and as they said "Life in these United States".. I do not try to mimic the photography of that time but I think it has greatly influenced the way I approach my work in capturing moving facial expressions and my overall vision of what my pictures should look like. It certainly influenced whatever artistic view I have of my subjects. I think the magazine helped create my love of photography. Those were very creative practicioners of the art and capturing stark realism contained in their images. Most exemplary of the great photography of that day was Joe Rosenthals flag raising at Iwo Jima reprenting the God awful slaughter that took place on that island. They managed to do with film and the limitations of equipment of that day what I cannot do with thousands of dollars worth of digital equipment today. There are so many that I truly respect and admire that I could write a book and still leave out many of the best.

 

Another great influence on my weddings was the late Monte Zucker who did better wedding pictures with 6 megapixel cameras than I see here today with 20MP. I took a fairly short course from him and he taught me things about studio lighting and flash fill that I still use today. More than that his pictures gave me a goal to strive to in doing my weddings which I never really achieved but certainly improved the quality of my product.

 

There are more. Like I said I could write a book.

<p>I've just started listening to <strong>Gustav Mahler, </strong>whose work feels related to photographic interests I've treated too casually. He addresses big issues, but <strong>Thelonius Monk</strong> struggles more with them. Dialogue with Monk is more challenging, so probably has more potential.<br /><a href="http://weblogs.baltimoresun.com/entertainment/classicalmusic/2010/07/how_gustav_mahler_saved_my_lif.html">http://weblogs.baltimoresun.com/entertainment/classicalmusic/2010/07/how_gustav_mahler_saved_my_lif.html</a><br /><a href="

<p><strong>Bill Brandt. </strong>His photo essays and a few of his portraits come to mind more frequently than the work of other photographers. I'm also a fan of the spy novels of Alan Furst and of noir films... born in the wrong era.<br /><a href="http://www.luminous-lint.com/app/photographer/Bill__Brandt/C/">http://www.luminous-lint.com/app/photographer/Bill__Brandt/C/</a><br /><a href="http://www.moviediva.com/MD_root/reviewpages/MDPepeleMoko.htm">http://www.moviediva.com/MD_root/reviewpages/MDPepeleMoko.htm</a></p>

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<p>Brandt's original prints aren't Weston-exquisite, didn't aspire to be (he shot for publication), but they are vastly better than the Luminus-lint examples (my apologies).</p>

<p>Paul Strand and "Time in New England". I have the folio prints of "Mr. Bennett" and "Susan Thompson" and look at them regularly. The grace, beautiful detail, and close seeing of his prints always inspires me.</p>

I'm following my own direction these days. I choose the location, do the scouting without regard to any famous images or preconceived notions, and shoot what I find appealing or interesting or fun.

 

I went to see the HCB exhibit at MoMA. I appreciated the work but his style is so different that I didn't feel any sense of

"Gee, I should make photos that look like these." I like some of the lighting work that I've seen lately from Dave Black and

others but I haven't endeavored to emulate it. Maybe someday, just not now. I barely look anymore at the magazines that I

used to pore over obsessively every month.

 

So, I'm having my own unique adventures and reacting to the world with a sense of wonder and appreciation. It's like a

series of brief love affairs with places. I court them, they reveal what makes them special and I capture as much as I can

before it's time to move on.

 

If I am in a dialog with anyone it might be mother nature. Or maybe some younger version of myself.

<p>You.</p>

<p>The third-person plural You. This You is always there when I look through a camera and also when I look at my own pictures. Close; practically breathing in my ear. No, this is not just normal cognition because the You is not there -- at least not most of the time, and never in the same close way -- when I am not looking through a camera or looking at my own pictures.</p>

<p>This You is in close binary (as opposed to lunar) with me; there is a back and forth of discovery going on. We create a middle path.</p>

<p><strong>Luis</strong> wants a specific "who" -- which I guess You doesn't satisfy. For me, the scene being looked at calls up its audience; its own particular You. If I'm looking at mundane stuff (bugs, I love bugs) I get an audience of children. If I'm looking at Ansel Adams-ish stuff, I get Adams and the many like him whose work I have seen. I would guess that the You of urban shooters is richly populated with name photographers. I don't have that; there are very few name photographers who do the Eastern wilderness, so I have an anonymous (but very sufficient) crowd of imaginary presences.</p>

<p>An imaginary anonymous You is not as nutty as it may sound. One's conception of known photographers is fragmentary, constructed out of bits and pieces of seen/heard/read material and filtered through one's own preferences.</p>

<p>I don't have a You when I look at other people's pictures. There's just me, receiving the experience of what's there. I do, however, later, if I admire the work, go back and metaphorically rifle through their drawers and read their diaries while they aren't looking ...</p>

<p>What I was referring to when I used the word 'dialogue' was not "Gee, I should make photos that look like these." Not at all. Or to mean the same thing as being influenced by someone else. We, and our imagery, live in an Ocean of images. No one grew up in a bubble or is self-made. We all have antecedents, predecessors, culture, food, genetics, geography, etc.</p>

<p>We are also a nexus that connects several images through our life experience. Many we are exposed to, some we make. They meet and dialogue inside us. Some could be said to be the things that come in close contact with us, others what's on our minds at any given moment.</p>

<p> ___________________________________</p>

<p><strong>Julie - "</strong><strong>Luis</strong> wants a specific "who" -- which I guess You doesn't satisfy."</p>

<p> Satisfy? I was hoping for more to have my expectations exceeded, not just met. I think I grasp Julie's "You", and I'll take it. Among creatives, I don't expect slavish answers to anything. Besides, I hav...um...had imaginary playmates as a er....child. Julie's incisively oblique vectors are like a welcome Zen slap. Abnormal cognition? Check. Nutty? Normal to me.</p>

<p>______________________________________</p>

<p><strong>JH-</strong>"One's conception of known photographers is fragmentary, constructed out of bits and pieces of seen/heard/read material and filtered through one's own preferences."</p>

<p>True, and the same could be said about a <em>lot </em>of things, specially if we change "preferences" to awareness. What do I really know in its entirety (leaving aside the collective unconscious, Akashic record, and Whitmanesque notions)? Not even myself. I wasn't talking about knowing the totality of another, their work, or even our own, but some of their photographs, and our own, interacting through us.</p>

<p>______________________________</p>

<p>Cartier-Bresson, for his influence on seeing beyond the obvious and his humour; Michael Kenna, for the same dialogue concerning the art of seeing, and for works that are akin to some of my own perceptions and my complicity with the world around me. Freeman Patterson (through his writings as much as his photography), for his open spirit that inspires me in the context of ordinary surroundings. John Max, of Montreal, whom I knew briefly as a teenager, never understood, but who speaks to my visual senses and love of chiaroscuro and fantasy in human portraits.</p>

<p>The work of these artists is various; here is one of Max's: http://www.bulgergallery.com/dynamic/fr_artwork_display.asp?ArtworkID=3532</p>

<p>I can't pretend to be anything like my heroes, I am my own man so far as the work I produce and have my own way of seeing ... I wouldn't change it for the world either. I can easily cite the photographers whose work inspires my own however. Brassai is top of my list always ... Cartier Bresson and Weegee would be amongst my top 3 also. As for the others ... any of the unsung war photographers of WW1 and WW2.</p>

<p>Best, Simon.</p>

 

<p>I am drawn to people who's photos are similar to mine, and I have been influenced by many of them, but I am also influenced by people who's photos are unlike anything I could do or would do. It all goes into the mix, consciously and unconsciously. Still, I have a strong internal set of image ideals that quite effortlessly guide my own work. Another person could probably look at my work and see some of my influences. </p>