Monthly Archives November 2008

Blast from the Past: Phoenix’s First Photowalk

You know what’s really cool? Photowalking has, apparently, taken off. Yes, there is even a site called Pdog
Photowalk.org. The picture above is “Phoenix’s Dog,” taken back in 2005 during a photowalk. I like photo walking and have been doing it for some time — perhaps not as often anymore, classes, etc. keep me busy. But, I try from time to time to just go for a stroll, go sauntering, and bring a camera along. 

In any case, reading about photowalking reminded me of Phoenix’s first photowalk with me (2005). Here’s a link to his images. I think he had fun, and even though at this point (he’s 9) he does not seem that interested in going out with me to do photo stuff, I might get him a small camera for Xmas and make photowalking once again one of our little father/son pleasures.

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posted by Nacho, 30th November 2008

Who is your Audience?

Have you tried photographing common subjects with a different audience in mind?

Think about this: Wherein lies the fun of subjecting all those folks who come to visit you with those old movies about the family, or your last travel to Timbuktu, etc? You and your family may have seen these countless times, but… there is always fun and excitement in showing it to a new audience! Why? Because you get a chance to relive those moments, but also because there is a joy and fun in watching the images and/or movies through somebody else’s eyes. Well, we can at least try to do so.

The important thing however is that such a move, trying to see something through another’s eyes, can be quite productive for our photography. Starting with that notion in mind, we can take shots of things that are quite familiar to us, but change our perspective on them when we imagine showing them to a different audience.

So, take a moment to consider who your viewers might be, and how that might influence the way you look deeply at your subject. Does that open up different ways of thinking about the moment? About your subject? About the experience? About your viewers? About your processing?

This might seem like adding yet another thing to remember to your already overcrowded photographer mind, but in truth it is merely reorganizing something that as good photographers we already do: considering our viewers. The change here lies with putting viewers and that experience earlier in our photographic imagination. Much too often, the dimension of viewing, as well as viewers, end up at the end of the process (as in the end of an assembly line process of photographic production). Reorganizing our process so that such insights about viewers, can be earlier in our creative process activates a mindful attitude, and might yield surprising results.

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posted by Nacho, 29th November 2008 , Categories: Practice

Where Does the Mindfulness Reside?

A question I’ve encountered recently: what is mindful photography… about? The short answer is that mindful photography can be about anything. The better answer however is that the subject of photography is not what is mindful or not. Hence, just because I take a photograph of a Buddhist monk does not mean that I am a mindful person, that the shot was taken mindfully, nor that mindfulness resides somewhere in the image. We should probably move to defining mindfulness, but I will skip that for now.
Well then, where does mindfulness reside? For me, and given my own background practicing mindfulness, it resides not in me as container (nor in other objects as repositories of mindfulness, all bottled up for use here and there),  but in my disposition to enact an ethos of mindfulness. That means that mindfulness is not a thing. It is instead, a practice, an attitude, a disposition and inclination, a sensibility, it is a way in which we relate to all that is. Whether taken in a spiritual way, from a Buddhist perspective, from a scientific and medical perspective of stress-relief, or even from an artistic understanding of presencing, mindfulness is not about the subject, it is revealing of the relationship of being fully present.
But, can a picture be mindful? My concern here is that folks will think that we can create another genre or category of images, those under the rubric “mindful” and somehow expect them to not just look a particular way, but evoke a particular response or set of responses. The key is that as photographers we can practice being mindful observers of the world, as well as engage in our techne with as much mindfulness as possible. Such a disposition can enhance our witnessing of the moment, our photographic imagination, our seeing deeply, and infuse our work with such a character (ethos). The outcome might be that our images are more than mere representation, and become revealing of the world we inhabited at that moment. Notice that I did not say “the world as it was at that moment,” nor “the world as it is.” What might be revealed in such photography is the way we mindfully experienced that moment. That mindfulness opened our eyes to elements of the situation that we perhaps treated, composed, and/or addressed differently as a result of our being fully present. That makes a difference in our images, and in how a viewer in turn sees what we present. Of course, our own mindful persona might influence the subjects we select, our imagination, our artistic vision. And let us not forget that the viewer brings much to that experience.
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posted by Nacho, 26th November 2008 , Categories: Mindfulness