What do you find worth documenting?

[abufletcher]

As it says in the forum guidelines any photograph is in some sense

documenting something. But I think when people hear "documentary

photography" they think of using photos (usually a series of photos) to capture

some aspect of the world as it actually exists out there beyond the lens.

 

Many of the truly outstanding photos posted here over the last couple of days,

seem to me to fall primarily into the "found art" category. In this approach to

photography the world "out there" is all really just fodder for some world

"inside the photographer's head" -- they are less a reflection of some

objective reality than of some vision or emotional state of the photographer.

And that's absolutely great. I have nothing whatsoever against this approach

and have enjoy doing it myself (although for years I steadfastly refused to

allow myself to take photos of "things" I found). Also I wouldn't want to insist

that these two worlds ("inside" and "outside") are mutually exclusive.

 

I suppose the question that I'm leading up to is what are the subjects "out

there" that you find yourself wanting (needing?) to document? For those of

you with substantial bodies of work, what would you say are the primary

themes you have worked with?

[edmo]

Shoot everything, eventually it all sorts itself out and I do think that both can coexist.

[Spearhead]

I tend to document the inside of my brain, and I also shoot the way Edmo describes above. However, I still have a few themes I spend deliberate time on, including food, food workers, the nature of hallucination, and California.

[abufletcher]

Edmo, "shoot everything" reflects a particular way of working. It's a hunter-

gatherer approach where you basically just need to be out "walking the beat"

as much as possible. A very different approach is typically taken by

photojournalists. They typically do a fair amount of research and background

work to find what they will shoot and gain access. They then go into a

situation and shoot within the confines of that event or situation.

 

Part of why I'm asking this is that I'm finding the hunter-gatherer approach to

photography to be less than fully satistying here in Zentsjui, Japan. Much of

life here in Japan -- particularly small town Japan -- doesn't take place in

public. I could wander up and down the streets of Zentsuji forever and never

get more than a small, perhaps somewhat marginal view of life here in Japan.

 

I've always felt that just going out and wandering the streets was taking the

"easy way out." It avoided all the hard work of gaining access and the focus of

shooting a "story." I guess what I'm saying is that I personally find it

emotionally easy to wander around and take photos of strangers on the street

-- so that's what I usually do. I find it much harder to commit to a project and

possibly to a particular group of people.

 

I can't help feeling I'd be a better documetary photographer if i COULD force

myself shoot stories.

[mattalofs]

"I've always felt that just going out and wandering the streets was taking the "easy way out.""

 

I think this depends on your own disposition. Wandering the streets can be highly disciplined on an abstract level. In my case though, it's just a technical exercise. Kind of like playing scales on a musical instrument. It get's you warmed up and it hones the fundamentals.

 

I live in a smallish city in mid missouri; like your town in Japan much of life happens behind closed doors. To get around this I've set myself a number of projects. One is in cooperation with a documentary filmmaker who's doing a project on what life was like along the Missouri River before the Corps of Engineers started doing flood control. She interviews the old folks and I do portraits of them. Another project I'm starting centers around the impact of downtown businesses. I'm trying to take a picture of each person that works along one street of our down town in order to show how much economic impact small businesses have on the commnunity. When these two projects start to wrap up, I've got a few more bouncing around the corner of my brain.

 

To answer your original question, I want to document those things that I find interesting. Both of my current projects are at least tangenital to topics that I find interesting. So pick an interest, and then find a way to shoot it.

[terry_rory]

An example of 'documentary' photography that I have done is at a small, family bakery about 60 yds from where I live.

 

I was allowed to photography them at their busiest time around 05:00 when all the batches were coming out of the ovens and they were loading vans etc (lots of movement).

 

However, I would not dream of posting such a literal and parochial photo document here in this forum because it would seem lame in comparison to the edgy/NY/urban/decay/ennui/isolation stuff posted frequently by the dominant talents already here.

 

All I have is bunch of blokes cooking bread at 5 in the morning in a local (English) bakery that is 95 years old (and looks it). It is a million miles from the grant/Edmo/Balaji etc style that I am looking at a lot of right now.

 

I like it for what it is in a local context though.

[terry_rory]

I have similar documentary stuff of local trawler men and monks at a nearby monastery and work going on at the only blacksmith we have left in our city (welding components of a large canopy for a nearby shopping centre) it is not 'street' or 'dark' stuff though.

 

However I will enjoy this forum for what it is. Some threads just explode with the mood of place. An interesting aesthetic contrast to my own stuff and the places/people I photograph.

 

Good discussions to read.

[michael s.]

<<< ... I would not dream of posting such a literal and parochial photo document here in this forum because it would seem lame in comparison to the edgy/NY/urban/decay/ennui/isolation stuff ....>>>

 

Trevor - I enjoy the city-scented pictures, too. But I would not say other documentary photos pale in comparison. Not long ago, you took a couple shots of a man working on some heavy machinery. I liked them -- one especially -- and thought that could be the beginning of a little docu sequence.

 

If you think there are some good ones in the bakery set (for you to decide, of course) I wish you'd put 'em up.

 

I guess I'm saying that the subject matter is only one part -- and to my mind maybe an increasingly small part -- of whether I like a picture.

[takaaki]

Trevor. Why don't you post them if you like them. I for one, would love to see work like that.

 

Again, I don't think any subject can be 'lame' per se, and yes, I will shoot anything, anywhere, anytime, for I want to see things photographed.

[Spearhead]

<i> They typically do a fair amount of research and background work to find what they will shoot and gain access. </i><p>

 

OK, so taking food as an example, I travel and study food and food prep wherever I go. It helps that I went to restaurant school in another life and some of my family is in the bubsiness. I usually read as much as I can about local food, try making it myself. When I arrive somewhere, I ask where the markets are and the places the locals eat. If they eat on the street, I eat on the street. If they eat in bars, I eat in bars. Then I go to the markets and photograph the foods in the market. And then I see if I can photograph in the restaurants, homes, or wherever food is prepared. I have tons of photographs of food, and I'm working on a redo of my web site that makes this a separate category. I wish I'd taken more photos of the grasshoppers I ate in Mexico.

[michael s.]

Hmmmm -- Does the fact that I'm on Takaaki's wavelength mean there's a chance some of his skills are gonna rub off on me ? -:)

[john_sidlo]

I'm documenting the (successful) results of my brain's signals to my shutter finger. Some patterns have emerged, but others remain latent.

[edmo]

Donald,

<p>

<I>I can't help feeling I'd be a better documentary photographer if i COULD force myself shoot stories.</I>

<p>

Absolutely, nothing could be truer. Though personally I'd rather be flipping over stones than building walls. Maybe more along the lines of a casual observer that is more interested in seeing things as they could be. Hate the terms captured and created, maybe 'realizations' something I should probably give some thought too. Something along the same lines as what Tataaki said "what it looks like". Could also be that I am more interested in pics that ask questions rather then telling stories (at least that's a direction that I would like to be heading in).

<p>

As far as the hunting analogy goes there's nothing wrong with planning and stalking your kill. I on the other hand would probably rather nuke the forest and rummage through the carnage (like a rat), drag it home and see what I can come up with in the kitchen. Put the subway pics in this pile the shots of sidewalks in this pile.

<p>

I do very rarely head out and just shoot some subway by the way and occasionally hit some abandoned spaces.

[mattalofs]

Post that parochial stuff Trevor. Not all of of us live in the city.

[edmo]

And those that do like to see beyond the walls...

[paul a. roid]

I wander the streets often with a camera, photographing<br>

things that catch my eye. On a good day I will see 'nice' frames<br>

all the time and burn film like crazy. On a bad day nothing<br>

happens. It can happen in the same location.<p>

I get the most joy out of photography when I put myself on<br>

self-assignments - shooting a theme that is...<p>

Either it is an interesting location, event or just a loose theme<br>

like abstract, bold colors.<p>

One idea from another forum that helped me a lot was to put my<br>

images together in story sets of 6 to 9 (sometimes more) images.

[websterforrest]

This is a very interesting question.

 

To start on the surface level, I think it's true of myself - and seems to be true of many

others - that I go through phases where different subjects interest me. A lot of it probably

depends on what one is exposed to. If you walk down the street and see an overturned

truck of chickens, well it sort of begs to be photographed. Other times one might come

across things which could be described as visual irony: an old fat priest on a moped for

example. Unfortunately there's no guarantee that when you feel like going out and taking

photographs there will be a lot of things that are patently unusual, worthy of

documentation, or even cute and funny. If you're lucky, you live in an interesting place and

can more or less rely on encountering the kinds of things that were so beautifully

photographed by Vilem Reichmann (he's not a household name, so I offer the following

link: http://www.artnet.com/artist/629585/Vilem_Reichmann.html). Most of us are not as

talented at condensing and preserving that visual irony anyway, and end up with a picture

that merely refers to something, and does not create anything new or even recreate the

impact of the original.

 

You mention found art. I think I know what you mean by this in photograhical terms,

indeed I would urge anybody interested in this to look up other Reichmann photographs.

The famous sculpture by Picasso of a bull's head created with a bicycle seat and

handlebars for horns is I think the touchstone work of that movement in the sculptural

field, if not Duchamp's urinal. For 'the rest of us', it's kind of sad because we feel the urge

to capture something of the world around us even if we don't come across very unusual

subjects, or have the spark of genius to put ordinary objects together in a striking way.

The outcome of this urge for most photographers varies I think. I've seen a lot of

photographs of 'found objects' - many in my own portfolio - that are just boring.

 

One of my favourite forms of photography is the kind of informal and seemingly

impromptu portraiture /scenic portraiture that you can see on Stefan Rohner's website. I'm

referring in particular to his photos of Morocco and Lourdes. I don't know how he does it,

but his photographs are fantastically textural and beautiful and ugly at the same time. I

won't even try to emulate his photography, because it's just not the way I would approach

the same subject: and I think his photos would be better anyway. Unfortunately, many of

us try to emulate the likes of Cartier-Bresson, and end up with photos of the backs of

people in markets and crowded streets, with a sprinkling of surprised people with

expressions that suggest "What the hell are you doing taking my photograph?". The strong

telephoto lens seems to be used a great deal for this kind of photography; personally I

view it as the result of the photographer being too afraid to walk up to someone and ask

to take their photograph. It's a kind of lazy hunting for pictures. I hope you know what I'm

talking about, it's hard to describe without giving a link to some poor person's photos and

saying 'these are lousy'.

 

The main point I am trying to make is that when we go out hunting for images, often our

primary decision is to take interesting pictures, and not to see things interestingly. In most

modern living environments, there isn't very much of patently obvious interest to

photograph. Does anyone really find Stephen Shore's images of America that interesting?

They're more impressive than interesting surely. It always seems to me it's the sheer scale

that makes it impressive - do people agree with me? There's a whole school of that kind of

photography: Robert Polidori is probably the most evocative, but another very well known

photographer in that school is of course Joel Sternfeld. I still don't get it - I mean I get it?

But I don't get it.

 

What I do get is this:

 

What are they all documenting? What do Cartier-Bresson, Reichmann, and Polodori and

Sternfeld (and especially Lee Friedlander who I haven't mentioned individually because he

combines all of the above) all have in common? They have a 'take' on what they see, and

they have the ability to represent that in a photograph. Anyone can press a button on a

camera, and anyone can find an inherently interesting subject at least somewhere, but how

many can see something in the world in front of them and then preserve and communicate

a comment on that - rather than simply record it without any comment being preserved? I

think that is what is worth documenting: the 'take' on things, the comment, rather than

the things themselves. It's the interpretation itself that's worth 'documenting' - that's what

we experience, so that's what's interesting if we can communicate it. Do you agree?

 

Webster

[edmo]

As a kid in Germany during World War Two my dad and a friend of his went fishing on a pond with a case of German handgrenades. Needless to say they caught a lot of fish that day. All kinds of fish.

[Spearhead]

<i>They have a 'take' on what they see, and they have the ability to represent that in a photograph. </i><p>

 

The problem with this statement is that it is true of almost anyone who can articulate through photography and has nothing to do with "documenting" unless we use a definition of "documentary" that it is synonomous with "photography." I don't think that street photography is automatically documentary, but I do think many of the good street photographers do gravitate to specific topics and end up documenting something.<p>

 

However...that is very different from some of the traditional uses of the term "documentary photography," which historically dates back, at least in the US, to Walker Evans and some of the other FSA photographers, although Curtis' immense project might be along similar lines. It's a case of making a decision to document something specific, or go somewhere specific, and make a collection of photographs around that specific topic, and often a point of view. It requires a lot more preparation, a lot of funding, and a lot of time. If you look at some of the people who do this today, they either have full-time agency deals, or get grants, or have a secondary way of using their photography for income. One photographer I know who does war and disaster work supplements his income with postcard images that don't even have his name on them.<p>

 

So even though many of us here see ourselves as documenting the world around us or inside us, there are different paths, maybe more concentrated, but also more narrowly focused, maybe even missing some of what's out there. And maybe not.

[thomas_sullivan]

I was trying to assign myself a photographic assignment, a documenting of one particular subject matter or thought awhile back. Couldn't do it. No amount of thinking about what I wanted to do in that documentary concept mode could get me there. I sorta felt Donald does for a little bit. Like I should be wanting to document something that interests me, but was failing miserably at coming up with something.

 

Then I went, strictly by happenstance...meaning I didn't know of what I'm going to mention before hand...., and saw Shomei Tomatsu's exhibition in the Japan Society in NYC. Not only was his work blowing me away, but the titles of the series were knocking me over...........bubble gum and chocalate..........where the heck did that come from. I eventually "got it", but was still amazed at a series being derived from such an obscure title.

 

Then I bought the book that goes along with the exhibition........and in it I read that the Japanese don't really put together a series of pictures in the same way that western society, especially the U.S., does. They have a word for it.......unfortunately I'm at work and dont have the book to look it up......but it basically means a grouping of pictures. Not a series mind you, just a grouping. And it's not really referred to as documentary........but when you see the show (or book) you would think it was.

 

Now, whether this is the real meaning of all that or not I have no idea, but what I came away from with all that was that I should just shoot, the so called "found art" stuff, and like Edmo says, it will all eventually come together. I think that is what they were saying the Japanese do, or at least Tomatsu does. Then I remembered that Scianni's "...to sleep, perchance to dream" book of people sleeping was emerged just from his realization that while he was off doing assignments, one of the things he took pictures of amongst and during those sessions, was pics of people, things, sleeping. Put together the book and I love it.

 

If you look at Tomatsu's "series" you can easily say, yeah, he designed it to be that way. but I have a stronger sense that he simply recorded post war Japan as "found art", just because he was living thru it, and the "themes" emerged and then were entitled (thats a guess on my part..........it may not be true.......but, it could very easily be true........those series are not that solidly glued together that they naturally form a series.....his putting them together has more to making them a series..........Does that make sense?)

 

Anyhow, thats what I have since decided to do............just shoot whatever strikes my fancy at the moment. I've put some together seemingly as series, but I really don't see them staying that way. Only last night, while thinking of re-doing my website again, I was playing with taking some of the blizzard stuff, some of the "Gates" stuff, some of the mummers 2 street stuff, and abunch of misc stuff together in some sort of series that explains or documents the last 5 months of my life. Was a passing consideration, but it might happen.

 

I see nothing wrong or incorrect with post documenting a series. Sometimes the connections that they are a series don't happen untill after you live with them for awhile...........I would think.

 

I think.........heh, just thoughts flowing out of my fingers as I sit here at work totally bored to death.

[m.c.fitz]

Just saw this thread. Trevor, please post your series of bakery workers, monks, etc,

somewhere, please. From the sounds of it you are following in the footsteps of August

Sander and Atget. Don't underestimate the value of what you are seeing and recording in

your local context.

[ichavel]

"Does anyone really find Stephen Shore's images of America that interesting?"

 

I am extremely relieved to read this statement. I thought something was wrong with my "vision."

 

As to the general thread, there seems to be only two options: To work on an assignment (hired by others, or self-generated) or to look aimlessly, uncommitted as to what will present itself. I would guess that some combination of the two is helpful, and, whether realizing it or not, people actually use it. The benefit of a concrete project related to street photography (in this discussion) helps focus the mind, to see --- not just look. But unless one has specific professional goals for the project, why must it be highly defined? One keeps it just loose enough to combine purpose and serendipity. As they say, good fortune favors the prepared mind.

[ichavel]

"Trevor, please post your series of bakery workers, monks, etc, somewhere, please." I second the motion.

 

From the sounds of it you are following in the footsteps of August Sander and Atget." And Lewis Hines, for another example.

[edmo]

<i>...or to look aimlessly, uncommitted as to what will present itself....</i>

<p>

<i>...helps focus the mind, to see --- not just look. </i>

<p>

Isaac, ya lost me. Mind elaborating a little?

[subpopstar]

Isaac - I don't know I agree that there are only two options (have a specific assignment or be a rambler), but I do agree that many use a combination of both to some degree. I haven't been as successful in sticking to specific assignments I've given myself as I'd hoped, yet when looking for things to fit into a context I've found other interesting items present themselves. I am probably not as disciplined as I'd like to just shoot anything, anytime as edmo does, but I do find it helpful to keep loose themes in mind when shooting. And as you point out, being prepared is as much mental as anything...