Edward Weston on “Portraits in Photography”

“…to reveal the individual before his camera, to transfer the living quality of that individual to his finished print…Not to make road maps but to record the essential truth of the subject; not to show how this person looks, but to show what he is.” - Edward Weston

I searched through my albums looking for an image that would work well with this quote. The image of the Black Horse worked the best. It was a moment, I think, when I saw in to this horse, beyond the façade of being a Sable Island horse; the true wild spirit of this horse came out and showed itself on print.

One can find this hidden depth in people through looking. Sit across a small table from the person to be photographed. You have the camera in hand. Waiting. Through looking at this person, with a little chatting, you will make a connection. At some point the person stops looking at the camera, to them the camera has gone, and they will look right at you. At that point, and it may take time, the true character of that person comes through. One click of the shutter is all it takes. I tried this approach when photographing a teenager in a group home. She never really came through. And then, just as I was to leave, my friend started to comb her hair and she came out. For privacy reasons I can’t show the photograph but the story makes the point that through looking, and with patience, you will see.

 

Black horse Sable Island

 

Photography is an art of observation, Elliott Erwitt

Every second of our day we are seeing things. There is a lot of visual information entering our heads all the time and our minds keep very busy processing that information. Indeed our minds never stop processing; it is active all day and all night.

With photography however, you are only seeing when you slow or stop the mind from processing and allow the image before you speak. Its like going out for a beer with friends and one of those friends cannot stop talking. You might say something, and then a second later this friend has taken your thought and is running with it and talking all sorts of gibberish. Thankfully, perhaps unlike the friend, we can stop our minds and allow the image to speak. I think that is when we develop a connection with what we see and the photograph that we take of that image fully expresses that connection.

“To me, photography is an art of observation. It’s about finding something interesting in an ordinary place… I’ve found it has little to do with the things you see and everything to do with the way you see them.” – Elliott Erwitt

Love!

Who am I anyway? by Helen Levitt

When you take a photograph, you are expressing yourself, often unknowingly, and it shows in the final image. I am a zoologist and am certain that interest itself in the images I shoot, whether they are of wildlife or of people on the street. But people are complex beings and all of what makes you who you are, shows in the final image. Images, then, are mirrors of who we are.

“Since I’m inarticulate, I express myself with images.”- Helen Levitt

Japan-53

Seeing by Henri Cartier-Bresson

Photography can be about the camera and what the camera can do. But for me, the camera is there to catch what I see. The photography of Henri Cartier-Bresson is also all about seeing and he is a great inspiration to me.

“Pictures, regardless of how they are created and recreated, are intended to be looked at. This brings to the forefront not the technology of imaging, which of course is important, but rather what we might call the eyenology (seeing)”. - Henri Cartier-Bresson

Untitled

THE KARMA OF A SOUR LIME

“When someone says “sour,” it may remind you of biting into something sour like a lime. Since you already have had the experience of eating a lime and tasting how sour it is, just hearing the word sour and thinking about it, your face makes an expression as if you were eating a lime or lemon right now. Habit is formed out of memory, from that point of view. We begin to reshape our present situation according to that habitual memory and ape instinct, as we might call it.”

Chogyam Trungpa, “The Tibetan Buddhist Path” a seminar at Naropa University, Summer 1974.

So what relevance does this have for photography. Well, a lot. When we see something on our way to work, while shopping or simply brushing our teeth, during that split-second we see the raw qualities of whatever that thing is, its colour, texture, light and form, and thus its raw beauty. But after that short period, our minds arrive at the scene and label, and judge, associate and recall memories of whatever we see, ‘oh, its a can of coke’, ‘its a bus! ugly!’, ‘oh that reminds me of my..”. The beauty in our world sits peacefully in the split-second, and with practice that short period can become minutes.

 

Elliott Erwitt on seeing the photograph

When we look at a photograph we sometimes want it to be something else. We might say that we like this, but don’t like that; or I wish I could see more of this. In doing so, we miss what the photographer is trying to show us. At a recent craft show, I listened to a couple discussing which photograph of mine they should purchase. In one image, the chap didn’t like the two horses on either side of the image that were almost cropped out. Clearly, they were looking for their own image and totally missed what I was trying to show.

“A picture should be looked at – not talked about” Elliott Erwitt

Mother, Sable Island horses, NS

Street photography and quotes – Edward Weston on Time

 

“Very often people looking at my pictures say, ‘You must have had to wait a long time to get that cloud just right (or that shadow, or the light).’ As a matter of fact, I almost never wait, that is, unless I can see that the thing will be right in a few minutes. But if I must wait an hour for the shadow to move, or the light to change, or the cow to graze in the other direction, then I put up my camera and go on, knowing that I am likely to find three subjects just as good in the same hour.” -Edward Weston

Halifax Pride Parade 2012

 

Sable Island horses at the NSDCC

On the 16th November, 2012 the Nova Scotia Designer Christmas Craft Show comes to the Cunard Centre in Halifax. This is a great craft show showing off the best of craft work from the Maritimes and beyond.

As in the past few years, I will be there exhibiting my limited edition work of nature images from the Atlantic provinces. Much of my work will be from Sable Island. The limited edition collection is considered, by myself, to be my best work. Images must have something extra special about them to be included in the collection, and all have been captured using a contemplative approach.

Here are a few images that will be on exhibit at the show.

 

 

Seeing wild horses

I visit Sable Island often, perhaps twice a year for 8 weeks or so. It is a great place for photography but after coming here since 1997 one may think what you see gets old. There are horses, sand, sand dunes, seals, birds, sea, and so on. But when one is really looking, there are endless perceptions. When I see a horse I don’t just see a horse…

 

Art in everyday life

ART IN EVERYDAY LIFE

Every moment we might be doing the same things—brushing our teeth every day, combing our hair every day, cooking our dinner every day. But that seeming repetitiveness becomes unique every day. A kind of intimacy takes place with the daily habits that you go through and the art involved in it. That is what is called art in everyday life.

in Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche True Perception: The Path of Dharma Art, page 27.

This quote describes well the wonderful sights that are around us everyday, and that paying some attention to that reality allows one to see the beauty in our world.