Ed Schlotzhauer

An artists journey

Category: Artistic Process

Take a Cheap Trip
Most of us like to vacation. Travel is booming at levels not seen for years. Popular vacation spots are often overcrowded. And costs continue to increase. What if I suggested a way to take a cheap trip? One that may benefit your photography. And it’s not a timeshare sales pitch.
High costs
Travel inflation seems to be higher than other inflation in general. It restricts some of what we can do.
A trip overseas for a few weeks can be out of reach, both in money and the time required. It can suck up our entire savings for a year or more. Even taking a local road trip is getting to be a burden and out of reach for some of us.
But some of us rely on travel to refresh and relax us. What are we to do?
©Ed Schlotzhauer
Why do photographers travel?
Photographers seem to have a special fondness for travel. We expect the travel experience to renew us, shake out the cobwebs, invigorate our vision and interest. And we want to come back with exciting new images to show and talk about.
This has long been the case. From the beginning photographers tended to travel.
As soon as the technology allowed fairly portable equipment, it seems like photographers were traveling. Matthew Brady traveled and photographed extensively during the American Civil War. Other famous artists like William Henry Jackson and Ansel Adams shot exclusively outdoors. And I’m just highlighting American photographers.
These artists traveled to places most people couldn’t go in those times. They opened up our understanding of the world and what was going on. In this, they did a great service.
Our travel expectations are probably more modest. We will seldom go to uncharted lands no one has ever seen. But we go to places new to us. Or at least places outside of our normal routine. It is enlightening and changes our perspective and understanding. That is usually a good thing. And refreshing.
I think a yearning to travel is an inherent part of society these days. Especially for photographers.
Shake it up
But I promised you a cheap trip. Here goes: shake up something you usually do.
Yes, that’s it. That’s all.
We all fall into ruts. Shooting the same subjects in the same way with the same lens in the same lighting. It becomes a habit. A habit is where we avoid thought and go through life on automatic. Shake that up by changing something. Force yourself to confront a different situation where we have to think.
One simple thing is to pick one lens we seldom use and photograph exclusively with it for a while, say a month. Some of us are naturally wide angle shooters. Switch to a telephoto. Some of us see only telephoto shots. Switch and only carry a wide angle for a while. Or a macro lens and only shoot closeups. Or a fish eye, or a tilt/shift. If you are a landscape photographer, try street photography. If you do portraits, try night skies.
And yes, just carry that one lens. Not your whole kit. It will force you to play the game.
Maybe try putting aside your “serious” camera for awhile and only use your phone. Or shoot with the expectation that you will process everything to black & white. Maybe it could be as simple a thing as deciding everything you are doing now will be cropped square.
©Ed Schlotzhauer
Just do something different
It really does not matter what you choose, as long as it is different enough from what you usually do. During this time you are not concentrating on adding to your portfolio. The goal is to break free from your normal habits and learn to see better. Think again.
How is this a cheap trip? Travel encourages us to see different. We are out of our comfort zone. We become more mindful. Basic assumptions have to be re-examined. Things look new and different so we pay more attention to them. Making a change in our routine triggers similar things.
One way to simulate that same effect as travel to force our self out of our normal rut. A cheap and easy way to do that is to force a change in how we see through our camera.
Sound too easy? Try it. You may be surprised.
Practice mindfulness exercises
Making a change like this is one example of a mindfulness exercise. I’m not talking about chanting and navel gazing. The purpose of mindfulness is to set aside our preconceived notions and expectations. Wall out the distractions that are enticing us to other things. Learn to be in the moment, and to look around and actually see what is there.
Some people can get there through meditation. Some others through travel or workshops. Maybe for you going to a museum and looking at the work of great masters does it. But regardless of the mechanism that works for you, mindfulness comes down to creating a still place for yourself. A place where you can set aside distractions and competing thoughts for a while. Where you can free yourself to really see and consider what is around you for what it is. Where you can immerse yourself in the experience of creating.
©Ed Schlotzhauer
A cheap trip
I am not really joking when I say changing up your normal routine or environment occasionally is a cheap trip. It can produce some of the same benefits we often get from travel. Granted, it may not be as much fun, but it is a lot cheaper. And you can do it anytime or anywhere.
No, I’m not suggesting that this is an excuse to go buy that great new lens you have been wanting. Of course, whatever excuse works for you is up to you. But that shoots down the idea of a cheap trip.
Getting out of our normal territory and traveling to a new location often puts us in a more mindful attitude as we shoot. It amazes me that everything we see becomes an interesting subject. Part of that is because we set aside the uninterrupted time to be there and shoot. But I believe a large part of it is that we are seeing things new. That refreshes and energizes us.
I am suggesting another way to stimulate a similar effect of travel is to change something about our routine. Something to make us think, reconsider, focus more on what we are doing. Something to make us see past mechanics and rules of composition and social media likes.
Make it a habit to challenge yourself like this periodically. It does not require an uncomfortable 10 hour plane ride.
Today’s image
The image at the top of this article is an example of shaking myself out of a rut. This was taken in the Rockies in fall. Normally during this time I am concentrating on beautiful fall colors and aspen trees.
In this case, I tasked myself with ignoring the leaves and shooting the mountains after dark. No trees or fall colors visible. This is the Eisenhower Tunnel from the Loveland Pass road. Stars are just becoming apparent as the last light fades, illuminating the mountain silhouettes. The trail of lights in and out of the tunnel adds unique interest.
I felt good about it. Definitely not a conventional fall landscape.
January 8, 2025
En Plein Air
This is a big buzz with my colleagues who manually put pigment on a substrate (e.g. they paint). There is an aura that makes it something exotic about creating “en plein air”. Actually, plein air is what I do, too.
Plein air
In itself, plein air art is not a new concept, or even an artistic concept. It has been done commonly by painters since the 1800’s.
It is sometimes spoken like an advanced technical term. Something your have to be an insider to truly appreciate. But it is just an everyday French phrase. I have been studying French recently (another story) and was surprised to find this in normal use. It literally means “plain air”, or outdoors. Nothing fancy or hidden there. If you go to a “plein air” concert it just means you are going to an outdoor concert.
©Ed Schlotzhauer
In painting
So if you are a painter and you gather up all your stuff and take it outside to paint scenes from nature or whatever is in front of you, you are painting “en plein air”. Does that make it different or special? Maybe. Monet thought so. I”ll talk about that in a minute.
But to give the painters credit, it required some technical and workflow innovations for this to happen. We forget history sometimes.
It used to be (pre-1800) that artists had to find or buy their own pigments. Then they had to purify them and laboriously grind them into an extremely fine powder and mix them in a binder, usually a type of oil. By the way, you know those beautiful warm, rust toned palettes favored by Renaissance artists in Italy? Ochre pigment was a common, naturally occurring mineral there. Coincidence?
But then, sometime in the early 1800’s, the technology for producing and selling pigments already ground and mixed and in tubes was developed. This allowed the artists two things: first, they could get any colors they wanted. But second, and more important for this discussion, it became much easier to take your oils with you. As the desire to move about grew, enterprising vendors also developed smaller, portable easels and pre-stretched prepared canvases. Artists were not tethered to a studio nearly so much.
Now artists could pack their gear into a relatively small bundle and go where they wanted. One of the places they moved was outside.
Monet
I find I use Monet as an example a lot. I like his work, but another thing is that he was an innovator and revolutionary. He fought the entrenched art establishment and helped establish a whole new style. Something photography is still struggling to some extent to do.
Monet was one of the early practitioners of the plein air movement. One of the motivations of the whole Impressionist movement was his and others desire to paint outdoor scenes in the light of the moment. As Guy Tal put it in his marvelous book The Interior Landscape, (I get no incentives for promoting it) “Monet famously credited the success of his work to the emotions he felt when working out in nature … As Monet himself put it, ‘My only merit lies in having painted directly in front of nature, seeking to render my impressions of the most fleeting effects.’ “
Working outside and observing fleeting effects. That’s what I like to do, too!
©Ed Schlotzhauer
I work outdoors
The same impulse motivates me, even though the technology I use is very different. I find and capture my images almost exclusively outdoors. Shooting in a studio does not motivate me.
Seeing things most other people do not see excites me. Finding those things, even if they are little, seemingly insignificant things, that I can show you in a new way gives me joy. Especially if I can show you something and you share my joy and excitement.
I admit I do not have the patience for painting. It’s too slow for me. Spending a few hours or days capturing a scene would be so frustrating to me that I would quickly give up. Seeing something, visualizing what this could be and what to do with it is hard and takes lots of experience. That is one of the fun and creative parts of photography to me. And it is fast enough to not bog me down or interrupt my creative flow. The process of capturing and producing the artifact doesn’t need to be so difficult.
Other than post processing work on my computer, my images come from outdoors, en plain air.
A new genre?
Have I created a new genre of art? Should I trademark the term “plein air photography”? Sign up for my workshop!
Well, I probably can’t do that. Photography has always been strongly associated with the outdoors. I think the first surviving photograph was an outdoor scene. Admittedly early photographs were outdoors because that’s where a good light source was available. Flash had not yet been invented. Even when it first was, it was difficult and dangerous to use (and smoky).
But those are technical considerations. The fact remains that photography has always had a strong connection to the outdoors. Especially for crazy people like me who photograph outside year around in a place like Colorado.
©Ed Schlotzhauer
It’s the outdoors that motivates me. I’m a hunter. That’s where I find most of my prey. And my inspiration. It is not an uncommon obsession. Look at publications like Luminous Landscape, Nature Photographer’s Network, Outdoor Photographer magazine and many others.
To the painters, if working outside motivates you, excellent. We share a common bond. I hope the outdoors inspires us both to do our best work. But working outdoors is not a new concept or unique to painting. Plein air just means “outside”.
I’ll be looking for you outside. But we will just pass each other. I’ll be moving about a lot discovering and shooting a lot of things while you are painting. Not to say one is better or worse, just very different art forms. Both en plein air. Let’s wave to each other.
December 11, 2024
Don’t Show It All
Not like that. This is a follow up to my last post on portfolio selection. A simple, overarching principle to keep in mind is: don’t show it all, or even most of it. Actually, not very much of it.
We’re proud of our work
A blessing and curse of digital photography is that we now shoot thousands of images. Of course, we’re pretty good, too. Everybody should like to see 500 pictures of my cat. After all, they are all different poses. And that big trip we enjoyed so much, here are the very best 900 pictures from that great trip to France. They’re all worth seeing.
We fall in love with our own pictures. This is a fact of life. Each one is special because it was exciting, memorable, unique for us. We remember what we experienced at the time. It makes it significant to us. To us, each one of those 900 pictures from France is worth showing to other people.
And when we are too attached to our pictures we tend to overlook problems that are obvious and distracting to others. The telephone pole growing out or your kid’s head is not seen. After all, it is a really cute expression. And we overlook all those people in the foreground of the beautiful picture of Chambord. Just look at how spectacular that Chateau is. It is too easy to convince our self that that tilted horizon is not a problem, or the poor composition, or the bad color balance.
But we have to be adult. Part of that means being very aware of the actual quality of our work and of what is appropriate for the situation. And in most situations, less is more.
Other people generally don’t care
I don’t want to pour cold water on your enthusiasm, but other people are not excited about what you have. That is a hard reality you have to learn.
They weren’t there. They did not experience what you did. None of these images have the same meaning or impact for them. It wasn’t their vacation, or their family, or their cat. Call up your pictures of France and hand the phone to someone to page through. If they are good friends, they will fake interest and flip through a lot of them. But even they will probably not look at any image for more than 1-2 seconds.
When they look at your pictures, they don’t see it the same way you did. They can’t and never will. Understanding this is a key to getting our images viewed by other people.
It gets much more challenging when we are wanting strangers to view our work. They do not know us, they were not there when the image was taken, it may not be anything they are interested in. But here, look at my pictures. Thanks, but I’ll pass.
©Ed Schlotzhauer
Context is key
The context where we are and where and when we are presenting our images makes a huge difference. Is it to friends or strangers? Is it one-on-one or a public venue? What is drawing people to pay attention to your photos?
Pushing pictures on social media is a main venue for many of us. The audience is friendly if it is our network. They will politely scan through a few of the pictures. A few of the viewers may even give us a thumbs up to make us feel good. But did they actually see them or care? We can’t tell. And we won’t know.
And how often have we been cornered by friends who have “a few” pictures to show us? They hand us their phone, sure we will love the 50 pictures they took of the great sunset last night. It is one of those “just shoot me” moments. But if they are a friend, we have to be polite. Back in the film days it was a common joke theme to go over to a friends house only to have them get out the slide projector to show “a few” pictures of their trip. After the first few hundred we want to fake a heart attack to get away.
Up to here we are only bothering captive audiences. We can get away with little editing and selection. It will make us look foolish, but our friends will forgive us – eventually.
But perhaps we decide we’re pretty good and book a booth in an art fair. Now the audience has no connection to us and no inherent reason to look at what we have. We will get a glance as they walk by. People will only pause to give a second look if we present something that captures their attention. They will only come in to look more closely if we show them something exceptional.
Now take it to the big leagues. We get an opportunity to show our portfolio to an art director or gallery manager. That is a tough audience. These are professional art viewers. They look at huge numbers of pictures and it is their job to reject almost everything. What are you showing that will capture their attention? It better not be 100 of your best cat pictures.
How many?
How many images are in a portfolio? There is no hard rule for this. It depends on what the portfolio is for.
Peter Eastway, the publisher of Better Photography Magazine, has a nice little ebook titled “Creating a Portfolio“. It is worth reading if you can get a copy. He tries to address this and many other considerations of putting together a portfolio.
In his Australian humor, he says “The number of photographs in a perfect album is 12. Or sometimes 8. Or maybe 24.” In other words, it depends. No rules. But the number is probably much lower than you thought, and whatever you put in needs to be the best. No filler. Nothing that’s there because you want to show some variety to widen the interest.
Peter gives an interesting test. He says do not put an image in your portfolio unless you think you will still be proud of it in 12 months time. That is significant to me. I often am enthusiastic about an image, only to find I cool off toward it with time. My filtering process has built in delays. It take months for me to elevate an image to “one of the best” status. I do that intentionally to let the initial enthusiasm be replaced with a more objective evaluation.
In general, between 12 and 20 for any collection of images in a project or portfolio works for me. I would feel free to violate my own rule if I were doing a documentary or a book. Or for a multi-year project that had significant importance to me. But I would have to make a very conscious exception.
©Ed Schlotzhauer
Less is more
I advocate that we take a mindful “less is more” attitude. Always take out images until it hurts. Then take our a lot more.
Remember, your audience has a short attention span compared to your view of your portfolio. Any weak image will loose their interest. They may even abandon looking at that point. I have heard it said that you will be judged by the weakest image in your portfolio. I believe it. It is human nature to find the worst as a way to critique the whole.
I consider building a portfolio kind of like an athletic contest. Teams have to compete in and survive multiple rounds of playoffs to be chosen the champion. Hopefully the best emerge. Same with our images. It is a brutal, hand to hand contest.
If you are evaluating coolly and objectively, every one removed makes the remaining set stronger. Remember, when you remove one, you are not saying you don’t like it or it is a bad image. You are just acknowledging that it does not hold up against the competition of the rest of the group. That is good. But hard.
It is very hard for me. If I want to select a project with max 20 images, I may pull at least 60-80 very good candidates. Doing the first cut is only a little painful. Maybe that gets me down to 50. I try to toughen up and go slashing again. Now maybe I have 35 left. OK, I swallow hard and cut some more and get it down to 30. Still a long way from 20.
The trouble now is that I really love every one of the 30 candidates that remain. The pain of eliminating any of then is extreme. Remind myself over and over that taking one out is not saying I don’t like it. It would be a lot easier to relent and let myself use all 30.
You would think it would get easier now. After all, I think all of them are great. But the reality is that there is a rank order to be discovered. Some are better than the others. That is what I still have to resolve. Eventually I get there. It is painful and lengthy. But a funny thing happens. I love the set that survives, and forget about the pain of the ones that didn’t make it.
The optimum number to show people is fewer than you think. When we learn that we don’t have to show it all, we can build stronger portfolios.
If you’re not your own severest critic, you are your own worst enemy.
Jay Maisel
November 20, 2024
The Hardest Part
I have figured out what I consider the hardest part of photography. Excluding Marketing. It is selecting a portfolio.
Pick a few
It’s a common situation. Perhaps I am entering a selection for a gallery competition. Maybe a client has requested a few choices for a job. It could be just needing to pick some images for this blog post. Whatever the reason, I am faced with the problem of selecting a small set of images for a certain use.
Oh sure, I have the images that would work. It’s not like I”m not happy with my choices. The problem is selecting only a few.
I’m calling what I am doing here making a portfolio. That is not precisely correct. Formally, a portfolio is a collection of images designed for presentation to an audience. Often one-on-one. However, the process is substantially the same for that and the situations I described. So I will not distinguish them.
Embarrassment of riches
Please don’t take it as bragging, but I have lots of images that I like. I have been at it a long time. Lots as in many thousands. That’s just the ones I promote to my top level selection category. A lot of others in my catalog would be useful for certain applications.
Yes, I have a disciplined filing system. Everything is culled through multiple levels of selection. I find it is hard to pick the ones I like best from a shoot, so my process is oriented around rejecting the ones that are not as good. I don’t know why, but it is easier for me to say “I don’t like that one as well” than to say “I like that one best.” That is repeated through multiple levels. I apply more stringent criteria at each level.
©Ed Schlotzhauer
Most of my images are filed geographically and I have an extensive keyword system for tagging all sorts of information. And I use it.
All this should make it easy to find just what I want. You would think, but no. It is easier in that I am only wading through thousands, not hundreds of thousands of images to pick. But that’s not even the most difficult part.
No guidance
We are awash in training material to help us become better photographers. Some if it is actually good. There are thousands of hours of videos on camera operation and composition and visual design. Many more on techniques in the field and techniques for post processing. And gear guides are limitless. As are books to supplement the videos. All of this can help boost our knowledge and improve our technique.
But when it comes to pulling together a portfolio, the advice is: it’s hard, keep editing, get it down to a few great images.
Thanks, but that is not really helpful. Well, it is helpful to find out that I should expect it to be hard and I have to do it myself. But where is the video that shows me to pick this image instead of that one?
Should a choose a tight theme with carefully coordinated image selections, as for a project? Or would it be best to present a range of subjects and styles to show the breadth of my work? Would it help to research the curator of the exhibit to try to guess what they would like? Why would this image work better than that one?
I feel kind of left hanging out there.
I’m on my own
That’s the point and the conclusion. We are on our own. We have to be grown ups and make responsible decisions. That is no fun. It is downright hard. That’s why, to me, this is the hardest part.
©Ed Schlotzhauer
So a typical scenario is that I have to select, say, 4 images for a gallery. Open theme. I’m on my own. No guidance. It is very easy to go through my catalog and pull 50 images that I would like to submit. Another pass or two might get it down to 30 images. Then it gets harder and harder as I push on. I love every one of these images. Eliminating one seems like I am abandoning it. I know that’s not the case, but the feeling is there.
It is sometimes easier if I set it aside for a few days to let the emotions settle down. Then I do my best imitation of being coldly realistic to screen out some more. But what seems to happen is that I get down to, say, 8 images. I can only have 4. That final cut is extremely painful.
i envy people who have a colleague or mentor they can work with to advise the process. I don’t. The decisions have to be made by me with no help. I have an awesome wife, but she isn’t an artist and cannot help with this.
Well, I get there. It is painful. I come away with sadness because I had to eliminate some of my favorites in the final mix. That disappears with time, though. After a few days I can look at the final set and be proud of them.
Overthinking it
A reality is that I tend to overthink it. What I know is that the images I pull are all very good. And I know, and have demonstrated to myself often, that, with a set of excellent images, every time you eliminate one, you make the overall set stronger. That is, if you make intelligent choices. I try to remind myself of great advice I got one time that you will be judged by the worst image you show.
So why do I agonize over it so much? It’s not like I throw a great image away if I remove it from the set.
I think there are two problems. First is that I love these images and feel bad about taking one out, because I’m emotionally attached to it. I can live with that. But the second and bigger problem is, how do I know I have made the best choice?
Self doubt
That is the core of the problem. There is no guidance. I am on my own. There are much bigger and more important choices in life that are like this. Who to marry, what career to pursue, where to live, what investments to make, etc. We must use our judgment to make the decision. It hurts. We want someone to look over our shoulder and tell us we did the right thing. Unfortunately, being an adult doesn’t work like that.
Picking some images for a use is way down in importance from those big life events. Why is it so painful then? I think it is the same fear of failure and the consequences. But I try to be realistic.
So I try to convince myself that the final set I choose will be excellent. Even though I feel like I am in the spotlight and I am being examined to see if I am worthy, I know that if I do the best I can, that will be good enough. And if not, well, nobody dies.
I tell myself that, but it doesn’t feel like it when I am in the pain of the process.
All parts of the photographic process are interesting and challenging. All are subjective, But there seems to be a lot of help to be had in all phases of it up until the final image selection.
Resources
There actually are a couple of resources I have found to help give some education in this. Unfortunately they are not freely available. Peter Eastway, editor of Better Photography magazine, has written an excellent ebook on creating a portfolio. As it says, it is specifically oriented to putting together a portfolio or exhibit. But it still gives a lot of good insights.
Creating a Portfolio might be available at www.betterphotographyeducation.com without a subscription. If not, it is an excellent publication and you will enjoy it. 🙂
Another option that I have found out is not paywalled is a three part series of newsletters in the Paper Arts Collective newsletter. This is a hidden gem of a publication. The series I’m referring to was titled Evolution of a Small Project, and it traced the decisions and selection process he went through to put together an exhibit. If you do prints then you should check out Paper Arts Collective.
But I come back to my original problem. It is hard, no one can really help you, you have to make hard choices yourself based on your judgment and artistic vision. And you have to have confidence in your decisions. To me, it is the hardest part.
November 13, 2024
Authentic
The important people are constantly telling us we need to be authentic. As if authenticity is some kind of badge of artistry or truth. Is this really true?
Authenticity
Authenticity means to be genuine or of undisputed origin. It can also mean accurate or reliable. These are correct definitions of authentic, but what does it mean to us?
I am completely ignoring any discussion of forgery or fraud. That is a huge subject, but not very applicable to me.
What we are usually told, and what I have said before, is that we need to be ourselves. Everything has been shot, painted, sculpted, and written about. True originality is rare. The main way to differentiate ourselves is to be authentic. To show our unique and individual interpretation of the subject.
This is very true. I believe that. But it is hard for some people. Especially if the only metric you have to go by is social media likes. And I think some take too simplistic an interpretation of what that means in practice.
Opposite of authenticity
The opposite of authentic is to copy someone else. The world strongly encourages us to copy others, even as it says we need to be unique. Social media is a powerful crucible of conformity. Mediocrity is enforced. Everyone is pushed to the average. True originality tends to be knocked down. If you want likes and positive comments, you have to show things that are basically just like everyone else.
In a similar way, many self appointed gate keepers set themselves up as the authorities to vet the worth of other people’s art. These may take the form of teachers, “influencers”, critics, curators, contest judges, gallery owners, etc.
When they reject our work, the only true statement these people can really make is “I don’t care for your work.” If they are actually running a business, they could say “this work is not a good fit for my market.” That is a useful and accurate statement of fact rather than opinion.
But what usually comes across is “I deem you unworthy as an artist.” That is arrogant and offensive and discourages many artists. History teaches us that the intelligentsia are not good predictors. They more often opposes things that seem a threat to their established position.
I hope even just the description of that makes you want to rebel against it. But I’m afraid too many accept these forces as the arbiters of taste and art.
We are complex
Please pardon the rant. It is a hot button.
It seems to me that artists settle into one of 3 broad groups. They conform their work to be similar to what is popular, they intentionally oppose the mainstream, or the take little notice of what trends or authorities have to say.
Personally, I value this last group.
But let me get back to the idea of authenticity. We are told we are all unique (just like everybody else). And as such, we should express whatever it is we see or feel.
Well, yes and no. Humans are extremely complex beings. We have lots going on in many dimensions. Not all of which is useful or beneficial.
The mantra of being authentic should not be an excuse for removing our filters and doing or saying or making anything that pops into our mind. We should be thoughtfully and intentionally creating, not just pouring out our random impulses. Our work should never be the equivalent of “oh, did I say that out loud?”
The real me
Let me give an example in the opposite direction. I am boring. I’m the most boring person I know, and I know a lot of really boring geeks. Watching me work would be like watching paint dry.
That doesn’t mean my art or writing should be boring. Our creative engine is completely separate from our daily life. Like most of us, what we create can rise above what we appear to be on the surface.
I have heard it said, for instance, that many good writers are introverts and pretty boring in real life. There is an apocryphal story about a famous writer who went to a hotel for a conference. One day while he was there some students went to meet him for breakfast to visit with him. They came to the front desk and asked if he was up yet. The answer was “how would I tell?”.
As a person he certainly didn’t light up the room.
That’s me. If I was around, you probably wouldn’t know it. You probably wouldn’t even be able to find me. I would just be out by myself exploring and taking pictures.
That’s the me in real life. But I try hard to make my art different and compelling. I try to make my writing interesting and engaging. Does this mean I am being inauthentic? Not by my definition. The reality is I am truly being authentic by expressing my vision and values. My creative side is different from my public persona. My audience deserves the best I can create. And why would I be satisfied with anything less?
©Ed Schlotzhauer
My take on authenticity
Authenticity is a holy grail for some people. I have to conclude that is because they know, deep down inside, they are fake. If you are following trends or popular influencers, you are living their life, not yours. Your art is going unmade.
Authenticity is not something I worry about. I am authentic in my life and work. I never consciously copy anyone. My images are an authentic expression of my perceptions and feelings and viewpoint. They are not done to get likes or popularity. But they also are not unfiltered outbursts from my subconscious. I aim to bring you positive, well crafted works that make you better somehow. Or at least make you see or think something new.
If I am shooting something I know is substantially the same as what others have done, I will ask myself why I am taking this picture. Unless I can say something appreciably different or bring you a new point of view, why do it? Sure, I take familiar pictures, but for myself. My memories. Why would I show you a copy of something someone else has already done?
I can’t talk at any length about my style. I’m not sure I understand it. Talking about vision sounds a bit self important for me. But I can promise you that what you see or read from me is authentically me. It also means it is not AI generated. But that is another topic.
Today’s image
This is at first glance a throwaway travel photo. It was taken during a cooking class in Italy. This section was doing pizza. The instructor could communicate well, but her mother, shown here, did not speak English. She just yelled at us in Italian. You know, speak loudly and make lots of gestures to try to be understood. What us Americans usually do when we travel. 🙂
But notice the repetition of angles and forms, including the pizza edge and the shadows, the repetition of triangles in the oven, and the “decisive moment” of lifting the pizza. Everything seems poised in anticipation.
Nothing is setup or posed. And even though it was a quick grab during a class, I had the presence to think artistically. It is not a world class image, but it completely represents the event and has enough staying power to hold my attention. It is authentic.
October 9, 2024