#fineartphotography

For What It’s Worth

“There’s something happening here / But what it is ain’t exactly clear…”

Apologies to Steven Stills and Buffalo Springfield for co-opting their anti-war song, but this opening phrase often plays in my head in relation to any number of associations. I developed this roll of Kodak Double X a few weeks ago, then scanned it. This image was one that I singled out.

I was using my recently restored Nikon F2 Photomic, which I constantly point out has been in my camera bag since I purchased it used in 1978, and a new-to-me Nikkor 43-86mm f3.5 lens, gifted to me earlier this year. I do not typically shoot with a zoom and have, in fact, sold off two or three in recent years. It’s totally unreasonable, but I eschew zooms because prime lenses are supposedly “sharper,” which is an almost meaningless term in the age of pixel-pumping, and somehow “cheating” because you can…well, zoom. Rather than position yourself, Bresson-like, in the ideal position.

This type of snobbish constraint was something I picked up as a young autodidact from magazines and photojournalism student friends. It’s rubbish, but it clutters my head, nonetheless.

I was drawn to this scene because it was rich in content. There is, indeed, lots of “something happening here.” I set up the shot, guiltily using the zoom to frame the scene. I pressed the shutter once and felt satisfied, but before I pulled the camera from my face, I watched the person walk quickly into the lower right of the frame. Now there was something more happening here. I instinctively pressed the shutter again.

“BAM!” It was an Emeril moment.  

I am describing this image because, like the best dishes, it has layers of intentional content, from the tiger-stripe curtain to conquering ivy, to the damaged wheelbarrow (so much depends upon a wheelbarrow). This is not a swipe-type image. It is meant to be savored – compliments of the photographer.

Why I 'Toy' Around With My Photography

“My Bird Girl”This is not the image in the Art Through the Lens show. It’s an “oldie but a goodie” from my catalog, taken with a Holga on cross-processed

“My Bird Girl”

This is not the image in the Art Through the Lens show. It’s an “oldie but a goodie” from my catalog, taken with a Holga on cross-processed

I have a photograph included in the upcoming Art Through the Lens 2019 group exhibition at the Yeiser Art Center in Paducah, Kentucky. I was asked to provide an artist’s statement. This required me to consider — once again — why a good portion of my photographic endeavors involve shooting with plastic toy cameras and then developing and printing my negatives myself. As my relationship with these low-fi rascals continues to mature, so too does my ability to express (sometimes defend) my attraction to them.

Without further ado, here is my latest take on why I toy around with this sub-sub-sub-genre of photography (they asked for no more than 150 words, and that’s exactly what I provided, wordsmith that I am):

I shoot a range of film (and digital) formats from 4x5 to 35mm, yet images captured with plastic toy cameras – 120 format Holgas and Dianas in particular – comprise a significant portion of my portfolio. I am drawn to this low-fidelity, low-tech approach because of its reductionist nature – reduced sharpness, reduced aperture and shutter control, reduced predictability, to name a few. These constraints create boundaries within which I find a rich and rewarding opportunity to render the world. Like poets who work within a rigidly defined form, like haiku, shooting with toy cameras requires discipline while offering a liberating creative freedom. By doing less, these cameras and films challenge me to do more, from taking the image, to developing the film, archivally printing the negative on fiber-based paper in my darkroom, and even to matting and framing. The limits of toy cameras make me a better – and freer – artist and artisan.