About

Hopefully standing in front of a subject for six days would descry an image that I felt was worthy of working with.

Sometimes that’s what it takes to make a decent photograph. One that I enjoy working with, one that fills me with feeling. Not just a positive feeling but any feeling. At times amazement, awe, respect and passion. At other times I can point my camera at something that just doesn’t want to work with me and all I feel is a sort of ennui that speaks to time and effort wasted.

It’s all part of it. A potentially limitless endeavour to find and create a photograph that has all the elements I’m looking for and possibly a few surprises I wasn’t expecting.

For me the curiosity of my specific photographic endeavour is multi faceted but those facets should in the final work be irrelevant to the viewer. The viewer is concerned with how a particular image elicits a feeling. If the viewer considers the piece irrelevant then I’ve achieved nothing. The only thing that in my mind should be irrelevant to the viewer is the research involved in getting there and digging to find the angle, the right time, the right light, the right technique. If the viewer naturally disregards all of this and feels drawn to the final image with a certain longing then I’ve done something worthy of my time and the viewer's time.

Black and white photography involves itself with the poetry of space, form, tone and depth. Seeing in Black and White is an art in and of itself. Upon viewing a scene the conveyance of that scene to Black and White becomes a meditation of altering the reality in front of you. Deciding which colours become which tones and not denigrate the scene but adorn it with interest and wonder which hopefully will convey a third dimension.

Spending a number of days in front of a scene, watching the light, the weather, your inner self, becomes the meditation. One in which I lose the sense of self and become completely immersed in my surroundings. A meditation that excludes anthropomorphic tendencies. When I all but touch that state is when the act of photography becomes all encompassing. A very rare thing.