Journal in Light

So it’s been a while since I picked up my camera and took some photos. As always, life somehow got in the way. Fortunately, I had a planned vacation, which I used to dive back into photography. I checked my 52-week challenge program, but I’d be lying if I were to say “I’m excited”. Instead, I felt a creative block through this very challenge.

So I chose different approach. Maybe, just maybe, I do have an artistic voice. Maybe, just maybe, subconsciously I know, what I want to say visually. And maybe, just maybe, that is buried under all the other experiments I was doing with my photography.

I scoured my archives not for the best pictures from a technical perspective, but the ones, that resonated the most with me. I culled my entire library down to 74, then 20, then ten, then five pictures, that felt the most like me:

Then I spent some time thinking about these pictures. What do they make me feel? Why do I like specifically these pictures? I worked based on this question:

If your photography could only ever make a viewer feel three things — three emotional states or moods — what would you want those to be?

The words that I come back to are:

Verge. Ephemerality. Being.

That felt like a really big moment. And in hindsight, it feels like it explains a lot of things. For example, the black&white picture with the foggy mountains was taken in the Amalfi region of Italy. I travelled there, because I wanted to take all these fancy pictures, that come to mind, when you think about the amalfi coast. Once I was back and looked at my camera roll, I found a lot of cool pictures, none of which I set out to take. Back then it felt a little bit like a defeat; today I know, I couldn’t even win. Instead, to stick with the analogy, I simply did not play my game.

However, if I were to present just these three words to viewers of my photos, they would not necessarily understand, what I want to say. So I spend some more time to come up with my first artist statement. It should give the viewer a little direction on what to expect when looking at my pictures:

I want to capture something intangible — a fleeting moment of being. I want the viewer to linger. I want them to feel the verge of the situation: what was, what will be, and what is right now. I want them to stop, be present, and hold the ephemerality.

Now for the next month I want to focus specifically on this statement, whenever I want to go out and take pictures. I want to focus my creative energy in capturing exactly my three words. That does not mean, whenever I’m stumbling upon a really great shot, I’m not taking it. No, I still take the great shot. But whenever I’m not exactly sure about whether or not the frame works for me, I’ll check with the statement and my three words.