Soul Searching - The Lost Art of Imperfection

These days, I don't seek out or need the newest, shiniest, sharpest and highest resolution photographic equipment money can buy. In fact, I'm consumed in my quest for the complete opposite - a kind of illusive, soulful quality that I've only experienced shooting with vintage lenses.

Years ago, before we (us humans) refined the process of mass production, things were crafted with our bare hands. Even those things that weren't entirely handmade at least had a visible human touch. It could be seen in loose dabs of paint or in the way, for instance, the corner of a piece of wood or metal was finished. It's now the kind of thing sought after by collectors but I've had an appreciation for it since my childhood.

Nowadays, if something is not perfect, we demand a replacement and, by cracky, we'll get it. While there are a few things in my life that I wish were perfect, my own photography is not one of them.

I spent years honing my craft so that my photographs would look "professional". At some point, I think I crossed that threshold because, looking back on my early attempts, I can clearly see marked improvement.

When I reached my goal, I thought I would be ecstatic but the more "perfect" my images became, the more they drifted from my vision of what a good photograph ought to be. With the passing of time, each image became more sterile, more clinical and had less... soul.

Today's cameras can capture enough information to faithfully render the appearance of anything we choose to shoot. Yet, companies keep telling us we need more resolution, bigger screens, more colors, sharper images. It's insane. What they don't say is that you need a brand new computer to process all of that new and unnecessary information or a bigger room to accommodate your giant TV. Now the multimegapixel photograph of your cat that you shot with your phone can be printed to fit a billboard in Times Square. You can also capture video of that same cat on your phone at a staggering 4K Ultra HD resolution that wouldn't look amiss on an IMAX screen!!

Aside from all this absurdity, it also becomes cost-prohibitive. For my upcoming trip to Alaska, I wanted a lens with a decent reach for my anticipated wildlife encounters. Fujifilm's new 100-400mm lens is almost $2000! I can't afford that. So I did my research on the Web to figure out a decent alternative. A quick look on eBay resulted in the discovery of a Russian lens, made in the 70s, that closely resembles a rocket launcher. It is 300mm (with my crop sensor, that's about a 450mm full-frame equivalency). It has no image stabilization, no autofocus but, with some care on a tripod, I can get perfectly acceptable shots. They are not going to be edge-to-edge sharp but I don't care. The lens cost me $80.

I have a couple more vintage Russian lenses that have helped me find the soul in my work once again. Maybe it's the flaws in the old glass, maybe it's the fact that I have to be more methodical using manual focus, or maybe I'm creating something beyond the basic image. Is it possible to photograph the emotion or feeling of a place? I think it is and these old lenses somehow strip all the precision away and facilitate that magic.

My most unusual experiment recently has been to couple my Fujifilm camera with an old pocket bellows camera from the early 1900s. The camera has none of the modern technology we take for granted like lens coatings and precise focusing, etc. but it produces a picture that sometimes gives me chills.

This is what fires me up so much about photography; capturing an unexpected presence, not just getting the perfect shot. If I wanted perfection, I wouldn't even have to pick up my camera, all I'd need to do is search through hundreds of similar images on Google. Now where's the fun in that?

My Adobe Spark (formerly Slate) presentation of this post is available here

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Life - The Truth is Out There

Traveling around a huge country like the United States teaches many lessons, but it mostly highlights my own ignorance. What I mean is that I have my own preconceived notion of what a place will be like before I arrive but the actual experience of being there and learning about the area is entirely different. Is this the ultimate road to enlightenment? Maybe not but, in the meantime, I'm enjoying the window view.

(I'm including some photographs I've captured over the past few weeks to accompany my thoughts).

I was educated, if you can call it that, in Ireland. I wasn't career-minded and didn't go to college because I had my sights set on being a rock star. Being educated, at the time, was nothing more than an inconvenience in my life, a hurdle to what I really wanted to do.

Years later, ironically, I had an epiphany; education is important. Not for the obvious reasons of getting a better job, etc. No, it had more to do with realizing that an education meant a greater potential for a rich life experience. To understand things, to know how one thing connects to another, to put things into historical perspective and to have the ability to critically think is...fulfilling! This is what my teachers were trying to tell me all along but my ignorance and resulting arrogance filtered it all out.

Never fear, because this sad story has a happy ending. I met some people along my journey who became mentors and made me want to be smarter. My diploma came from outside of an institution. Under the category of "Education" on my Facebook profile I named "University of Life Experience" as my college. While it sounds facetious, it's actually true.

I feel better now, in later life, that I did finally take the time to read the classics and learn, for example, some history about my own divided country. If nothing else, it gave me the confidence to discuss these things because they were backed up by facts, not uninformed opinion.

Which brings me back to my original thoughts about traveling. I feel like I'm constantly blowing cobwebs of my own ignorant thinking away. I had a preconceived notion of what Mississippi would be like, I was wrong. Its history is so profound that I have an entirely new appreciation for its diversity. Texas, with all its stereotypes and cliches, is full of beauty and kind-hearted, hard-working people. California has been a revelation. I never knew it had such variety of people and landscapes. We've been there the longest and never get the feeling we are stuck in one state (literally or metaphorically). The list goes on and we tackle Alaska this year also. I'm looking forward to gaining a new understanding of that magnificent state.

There is no substitute for experience, as the old saying goes. I'm here to tell you that there's a deep truth in those words. I would encourage as many people as possible to just get out there and do some serious exploring of this amazing world. At the very least, discover what is in your immediate area. You'll be surprised by what you might find and you just may learn something worthwhile.

My Adobe Spark (formerly Slate) presentation of this post is available here

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Erie Street - Americana in Bisbee, Arizona

I was born in Dublin in the sixties and spent the first twenty two years of my life there. It was a relatively simple world when I was a kid and we only had a couple of TV channels where I lived. Every Saturday afternoon, on the BBC, there would be an American movie playing that kept me glued to the screen. I found myself particularly drawn to stories of the Bogart and Hitchcock era, set in small-town America. Everything about them fired my imagination.

Americana, that optimistic era of the forties and fifties, full of ingenuity, has cast a spell on me ever since. Through my eyes it was a time when cars and architecture were more like works of art than mere machines and structures of utility.

The reality, of course, is that it probably wasn't quite as glamorous as nostalgia and Hollywood would suggest. Nonetheless, it left a beautiful legacy that can occasionally be seen off the highway, in small tucked-away towns.

One of those places is Bisbee in Arizona. It has a rich and colorful mining history and resembles a European town entwined in steep hills and narrow, winding roads. As fascinating as it is, I was much more attracted to one of its lesser-known attractions in the nearby community of Lowell.

Just down the road from the massive open pit of Queen Mine sits a '55 Ford station wagon. Parked in a vintage Shell gas station, completely devoid of people, it feels like stepping into an episode of the Twilight Zone. This was my first introduction to what is known as the Lowell Americana Project.

The project is the brainchild of Jay Allen, one of a handful of people who live on the curious and otherworldly Erie Street. Its mission is to showcase and preserve a time in the forties and fifties when the area thrived. Long term plans include rebuilding and repainting all the existing storefronts. They will then be populated with authentic merchandise to create an immersive time travel experience for visitors. Don't bring your credit card, though, the interiors will be for display purposes only.

Restoration has already begun and the Shell gas station and police station/jail have gotten recent makeovers. Other buildings, like the garage, are actually functional, although the pumps are only for show.

Each year, Lowell hosts a music festival that includes a car show and work from local artists. The funds raised go towards advancing the goals of the Lowell Americana Project. For more information on the event, click here.

Down Memory Lane
An old taxicab waits for a passenger as the sun rises over Erie Street.

Preserving Authenticity
Vintage cars, coupled with restored facades, create the quintessential atmosphere of Americana.

The Automobile as Art
In our modern world of generic cars, the designs of the past, especially these magnificent fins, are thrilling to see.

Realizing a Dream
Jay Allen's vision slowly takes shape. The "new" Lowell police station and jail breathes life into the old street.

Great care has been taken to maintain the integrity of Lowell's past. Signs are hand-painted to replicate the styles of the time.

While peering through the window of the dilapidated Sprouse Reitz store, I noticed some old broken mannequins stacked up. There was something almost human about them, like they were sadly staring out at the real world. Even the expressions and gestures felt a little unsettling to me.

What's most striking about this street is the sheer detail of everything in it. Posters look and feel authentic and I had a great appreciation for the character of each door and window frame. Even the gas pumps looked like something out of a science fiction novel. During the few days I spent there, I couldn't help feeling that this kind of workmanship is just not that prevalent anymore.

I've been to many auto shows in my life and seen all sorts of vintage cars but walking down Erie Street is an entirely different experience. For me, it's all about context. If you listen hard enough, you can almost hear the voices and footsteps of those who once shopped for bargains, lined up for the matinee or treated themselves to a milkshake.

Erie Street transcends its relatively small footprint. Although it's just over seven hundred feet in length, it's easy to imagine the scope of what it once was. With the efforts of people like Jay Allen and countless other volunteers, perhaps it truly can be resurrected to remind us of a time in our culture when life was simpler and full of optimism.

My Adobe Spark (formerly Slate) presentation of this post is available here

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All Souls Procession - A Celebration of Life and Death

I was fortunate enough to be in Tucson, Arizona visiting friends at the same time the city was expecting one hundred thousand people to gather together in solidarity. What was the unifying factor? Loss. Specifically, the loss of loved ones yet it was not a solemn event. Quite the opposite was true at the annual All Souls Procession.

It all began back in 1990, when local artist Susan Johnson was dealing with the death of her father. Instead of grieving in the expected way, she chose to create art to memorialize his passing. Her creativity inspired other artists to follow in what has become an all-inclusive yearly procession to celebrate the lives of deceased family and friends.

Although the masks and costumes are somewhat reminiscent of Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead), there is actually little that ties the two events together. Any similarity is probably influenced by the myriad participating cultures, including Mexico.

Many of those active in the event believe that the living and the dead are separated only by the thinnest of veils at this time of year. The abundant skeleton motifs embrace this idea.

As a photographer, I expected to find image-making aplenty and I did but what I didn't expect was to be so emotionally impacted by the experience. I absolutely felt the vibrant, joyful energy while walking around. I've never seen so many photographers gathered in one place and everyone was more than willing to pose for the camera. What I noticed later, however, while culling my photographs, was a depth of sorrow in the eyes of some of the people I had captured. It was almost like I caught a tiny glimpse of what remained unhealed in their hearts.

A Perpetual Rhythm
Throughout the evening, the DJ played hypnotic music and read the names of people who had passed.

The Ultimate Sacrifice

So many stories integrated into some of the more creative costumes of the evening.

Life and Death

Both exist side by side during this celebration and perhaps it was also a reminder of how fragile we all really are.

The procession would continue into the night but we didn't stay. The couple of hours I spent there had been a learning experience. It was a refreshingly different way of thinking, especially for me as a recovering catholic. In my church-going days I was taught that death was something to be feared, certainly not embraced. On this day, I could find at least a hundred thousand people who would strongly disagree.

My Adobe Spark (formerly Slate) presentation of this post, which includes many more photographs, is available here

If you would like to keep up with my travels, sign up to be notified of new posts. Peace.

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