(no subject)
I was thinking, or maybe I was just staring; no, I remember, it was neither. I was looking at some old photographs I had taken. Then I began to think: how strange, I am not cringing as I do when I see the clothes I chose to wear in the past; nor as I do when reading an essay I, at the time of writing, considered an accomplishment, nor even the squirming that ensues when I flip through an old sketchbook and realize that the doodles I thought may be remarkable really are forgettable (and I had indeed forgotten them).
But!
Never do I get this way when looking at old photographs I’ve taken-and then I began to wonder why. What element of photography allows it to be more truthful than other means of communicating (though we know the subject of any photograph can be as easily manipulated as that of a painting. By truthful, I mean honest…not much more helpful, but allow me this explanation)?
I suppose when I am taking a photograph, when I squeeze the shutter open, it is at that moment that I can best remove myself from what I am doing, and any desire to impress something upon it (as I do when, say, drawing). There is no time! A photo is waiting and watching, even when directing, and when I find for what I watch and wait I must simply act, or lose it. A space in this “decisive moment,” as henri cartier bresson named it, for putting your mark intentionally here or there, or anyone else’s mark either, there is not!
Interesting, no?
And this is why photography is honest-not because it frames real people, places, or things (because it doesn’t do even that)...
But!
Never do I get this way when looking at old photographs I’ve taken-and then I began to wonder why. What element of photography allows it to be more truthful than other means of communicating (though we know the subject of any photograph can be as easily manipulated as that of a painting. By truthful, I mean honest…not much more helpful, but allow me this explanation)?
I suppose when I am taking a photograph, when I squeeze the shutter open, it is at that moment that I can best remove myself from what I am doing, and any desire to impress something upon it (as I do when, say, drawing). There is no time! A photo is waiting and watching, even when directing, and when I find for what I watch and wait I must simply act, or lose it. A space in this “decisive moment,” as henri cartier bresson named it, for putting your mark intentionally here or there, or anyone else’s mark either, there is not!
Interesting, no?
And this is why photography is honest-not because it frames real people, places, or things (because it doesn’t do even that)...