Steph interviews Caleb: Part One

I know that you’re still working on your project Interim. Since school has ended and you don’t have weekly critiques anymore, how has creating or editing your work changed, if at all?

I’m definitely not making new images for it with the same sort of regularity that I did when I was in school, though I think the few images I have made since then have been consistently better than much of what I was making then. I feel like I finally hit my stride with the project right as I was graduating; I had finally figured out what I wanted the project to be and what it all means and now I need more clothing and locations and time to keep making new images. I also think I’m not rushing myself as much as I did then, always trying to get enough work for weekly deadlines meant that a lot of my work wasn’t as thoughtful as it could be. I’m glad I can be a little more thoughtful now and only shoot when an idea seems worth pursuing rather than pursuing something purely for the purpose of having work to show.

You have an impressive portfolio on your website called Familiar, that includes self- and family portraits. Have you been able to answer the question in your artist statement of whether photos as documents can be keepers of memories, or instead substitute memory itself? Have you considered how this might affect significant events in history that have been photographed?

This is a huge question that I feel like I want to talk to you about for hours over coffee, but for the sake of the blog I’ll try and pare down the conversation into something a bit more digestible.

For me, I know that my memory functions in such a way that I no longer remember most events directly (is this even possible?), but rather remember remembering them, and even this is quite hazy. I feel like images can function in the same way — I do not remember the person/event but remember looking at the picture of the person/event, can recall what the picture looks like and often the feelings I’d had when previously looking at the picture. This would seem like it means that pictures do serve as substitutes, but for me, memory serves as its own substitute so that definitely complicates the matter.

I don’t really believe in true or real memory, because my experience is that memory is a never-ending game of telephone that one plays with oneself. The first message is dictated at the time of the original experience in the present, and afterwards it is simply about listening to the repeated message and passing it on. I do wonder, however, if images can disrupt that chain and turn it from a line into something more cyclical or non-linear. I haven’t quite figured out how that might work, but I will probably need to draw up some diagrams to figure it out. Maybe this means that images function as neither keepers of memory nor its substitute, but rather as something else entirely.

I feel like the question of images of historical events gets into issues of collective memory and the ways that images are currently so important to the formation of collective memory. That’s a whole other conversation, really. But with respect to the individual’s memory of charged historical events, it seems to come back to my same point that I don’t believe that memory = recalling something that is real and true and concrete and unchangeable or always interpreted the same way.

What interests me most about the old pictures of my family (and the ideas I think about when working on Familiar) is that I have no memory of those times — I wasn’t born yet. I also can’t remember being told stories about those times or those people, so I am left to piece together new stories about old times and use photographs to short-circuit the traditional memory-making process. Instead of the beginning point being sensory intake of an experience in the present, the beginning point is the dreaming up of a story about the past by looking at and comparing often contradictory photos and documents. That’s not what the entire series is about, but I do think the entire concept of memory and knowledge is something that haunts me and that I will continue to explore in future works.

You’re right in the middle of working at the PRC’s Summer Photo Camp, for young people ages 8-14. What are you learning from it about photography, teaching, and/or young photographers? (Assuming that you are learning something, which I’m pretty sure you are because I know you)

I *have* been learning a lot about teaching and working with young people. I’m not sure I’ve had enough time to process exactly what those things are, but after working at the camp I am thinking seriously about working with young adults in the future for sure. I’ve watched these young people getting excited about the process of making images, the joy on their faces when they see what they’ve made — I want to recapture that feeling for myself. They’re also a lot freer and less self-censoring than I am. They don’t question or overthink their work; they just make it. I could use to do more of that.

Photo © Caleb Cole

I am “non-lame”

Got a really uplifting email from someone I know who teaches high school photography and who finally got to see my website. She was incredibly enthusiastic, told me I may be her new photo hero, and asked me if I might allow her to use my work in her curriculum. She had “been long looking for non-lame photoshop artists, and there’s way more values that [she] want[s] [her] students to understand and embody that [my] work perfectly illustrates.” WOW. I have to say that high schoolers talking about my work and the ideas behind it is not something I ever thought would ever happen.

an image in print

Just found out that one of my (cropped) images was selected for the latest NESOP promo postcard. Nice to see it in print!

On self-promotion and risk

I’m not completely sure why ordering my first batch of 250 promo postcards was such a scary thing. After creating the initial design, I forced myself to “sleep on it” night after night, until I was absolutely positive. In that time I changed the background color three times and the size twice, but the whole time I stood by the image I wanted to use (Julio and Brando, from my series This Family/Esta Familia). Today I finally uploaded my files and paid for the cards and envelopes. It feels good to check off my to-do list this first step I’ve made towards self-promotion (other than participating in portfolio reviews, launching a website, submitting to contests, etc. I know they’re all technically “business decisions”, but this one felt like the first really obvious one).

I think part of the fear about ordering was my tendency towards perfection and dwelling on small details. I’ve learned that when it comes to major life-changing decisions, I seem to make them within a matter of minutes. But I often over-think the smaller details, most which can be changed much more easily. I have a whole day to approve the postcard layout for example, and if I come to really dislike them, I can always order new ones.

This brings me to what is probably mostly at stake here – money. I saved up for weeks so I could order these first 250. I can’t afford to order another bunch with a different image for at least a few months. While they do represent an important step for my new career and will be so helpful to me as my mailing list grows every day, it was an intimidating spend. I might even have ordered less if the printing company I wanted to use offered a smaller run.

This may be my first real example of how being an emerging photographer, and not actually making a living off my own work yet, affects my ability to promote myself the way I want to.

But I have been taught to “trust the process”, to go for it and take the risks, and to let my images decide what they need from me, rather than the other way around (thanks especially to Michael Hintlian and others). These apparently have been invaluable lessons not only in my shooting and editing process, but my business decisions as well. Spending large amounts of money may always seem like more of a risk than shooting images, but it’s a different kind of risk. I hope that going forward in my career I’ll always prioritize what’s important, and that’s definitely my work, first and foremost. Maybe writing this down will help me out if I ever need a reminder.

Posting regularly and honesty

“Sometimes I have nothing to write about […] and sometimes I have plenty to say […] The key is to write no matter what. If you write often enough a strange thing starts to happen: you stop lying so much and slowly some of the truth starts trickling in. It turns out that it shockingly hard to maintain a stream of hype, exaggeration and hyperbole without a trace of truth, fear or regret.” -Thomas Broening

Thomas Broening’s entry the other day really struck me— I struggle with forcing myself to write in my personal journal and worry that I may have this same problem over here at Existing Light. I think I even have this problem with my work— I don’t just keep putting it out there no matter what, and I think the amount of control I exact over what I do put out is what keeps me from being as honest and real as I could be. I’m definitely not intentionally hyping or exaggerating anything, but I think I am hiding my failures and only showing the stuff that makes the cut. I’m not making myself openly vulnerable, and I don’t know if that’s something I should be striving for or not. I do plan on forcing myself to write as much as I can, and hope that will break me of trying to control my output so much. As for my images, here is my attempt at showing my work as it unfolds rather than waiting to decide if I like it or not— two new shots from a recent shoot that I can’t decide how I feel about:

Caleb interviews Steph: Part One

This entry kicks off a never-ending series of interviews between Steph and I about our lives as artists and anything else we feel like asking each other. I think her first answers to my questions are fantastic— makes me nervous about answering the questions she asked me!

Aside from paying the bills, what is your greatest fear as an artist starting her career?
I’m sometimes afraid that my work won’t mean anything to anyone. That I won’t get across my point, or that it just won’t make a splash or leave any lasting effect anywhere. I think about this a lot mainly with my documentary work. It’s not easy to put together and shoot and edit a project that is really, incredibly good. I put so much effort and time into this work, and similarly my subjects are so willing to collaborate and just have so many stories to tell… I always come away feeling like I owe them so much, and I’m afraid with each project that I won’t be able to do them justice. To me, that would be such a huge loss. But on the days where I’m thinking more positively, I believe the key is to stick with it, keep learning, be willing to change or try new things, and basically just put in the time.

An article in The Independent a few weeks ago got me thinking, again, about the gender gap in the art world. How do you feel about being a female artist in a male-dominated art world?
That article made me laugh, by the way. I guess I feel the same way as any other thing I’ve done that’s been male-dominated, which is indignant. In my life I’ve always tended to end up in situations where I’m working mostly with men. For example, I used to paint houses with a crew of guys, and I used to work in computer technology, although it was at a women’s college so the atmosphere wasn’t what you might expect elsewhere, but the field was certainly slanted one way. Photography is just another job to add to that list. I’m ready for it, and definitely not ignoring any possible gender gaps.

One question I’ve been trying to answer for myself lately, is whether different genders use photography differently. If photography is about communication, and girls and boys are taught to communicate differently from an early age on, then yes, we often do use it differently. That isn’t to say that anyone can look at any photo or series and know the gender of who took it, but that in the art world, certain ideas and forms of communication are valued over others, and that translates into whose works is shown and bought and written about, and where and for how much, etc.

In terms of how I feel personally, I’m mostly concerned with how our work is judged. In some of my classes in school I definitely observed the photos taken by guys being critiqued based solely on technique and skill, and photos taken by women being critiqued based on the personal connection or emotional content. If that serves as any kind of microcosm for the art world, then many of us have a huge barrier we’re going to have to chop down along the way. I feel like my critiques were always very fair, but I’m also the kind of person who’ll demand that if I feel I’m not getting it, and not everyone has been trained to really see the often subtle forms of sexism at play.

Basically I don’t think art world values are going to change without the values of society in general getting a massive overhaul as well, but I do think there’s a lot that can be done to make some changes. For example, projects like Women in Photography and Nymphoto, and events like the Women in Photojournalism Conference bring together and promote the work of women in a way that aims to make women photographers stronger as a group, and to do what the industry isn’t doing in terms of addressing gender issues in the field. Organizations like En Foco do similar work, but around the issue of highlighting photographers of color. Supporting projects like these are key to making some change.

Today I read a series of posts in one of the Lightstalkers discussion forums about whether projects like these are worth anything. Some of the posts made me really sad, to see that so many people misunderstand that outspoken and proactive women photographers who join together are actually trying to make our field stronger as a whole by addressing existing gender gaps, and not actually just trying to portray women as victims. I don’t understand why anyone would argue with something like that. These projects started for a reason, and while some artists or photographers may believe they haven’t felt the affect of a gender gap in their career, that doesn’t mean one doesn’t exist at all.

Whose work are you geeking out about right now?

Definitely Larry Towell and his new book, The World From My Front Porch. I’m a huge fan of his, so a culmination of his work from photos of his family at home to his documentation of Palestine, El Salvador, New Orleans, etc, is just awesome to have and see all together, and it really fits well. I also appreciate the theme that runs through his work, of land/landlessness and identity – it’s completely apparent in his images and gives his work so much meaning. I really respect photographers who are so driven by an issue or theme or question that they spend years and years documenting it, even in various forms.

Photo © Steph Plourde-Simard

Rosa and her bear

Military censors images of casualties

It’s certainly not news that during this war with Iraq, images of deceased or wounded U.S. soldiers and marines have been disproportionately absent from the media. And since 1991, the White House has enforced a policy banning images of flag-draped coffins. While much of the discussion around this has focused on the issue of good/bad taste, what’s not to be missed is the subject of today’s NY Times article and accompanying slide show – that the military is censoring images that their own rules say are alright to publish, and it’s becoming increasingly more difficult for photojournalists to cover the war.

Check it out: 4,000 U.S. Deaths, and a Handful of Images, by Michael Kamber and Tim Arango.

The article details the recent dis-embed of Zoriah Miller, a photojournalist who published photos of deceased Marines and Iraqi civilians on his website, and the cases of other photojournalists kicked out of their embed positions after photographing similar situations. The case of Chris Hondros, of Getty Images, is also a poignant one. He photographed a screaming young Iraqi girl, who’s unarmed parents had just been killed by U.S. soldiers (below). While he didn’t break any of the military’s rules, he was kicked out of his embed nonetheless.

Other photojournalists interviewed discuss difficulties in covering combat, and the restrictions of the military getting tougher, while they had much more freedom covering the Vietnam war. I wonder if the volume of images in the media of American casualties plays any role in the numbers that make up the anti-war movement. While polls show that most in this country are opposed to the war, not everyone has been motivated to action (I should also note that I hope we are equally as motivated to action by images of deceased or injured Iraqis as we are of American soldiers and marines).

Whether we are photojournalists or war photographers or not, we should all be concerned about an administration and military that have the power to censor as they please by citing something as vague and up to interpretation as “security reasons”, without accountability to anyone.

Photo © Chris Hondros-Getty Images

Shooting pinhole and my process

Since I’ve participated in a number of portfolio reviews lately, I’ve gotten used to answering a lot of similar questions. One that I really enjoy answering is about my process to make the images in my Grounded series, which are large format pinhole images that I print with platinum/palladium. While I think describing the process is important to some and not others (what really matters is the final images themselves, right?), I do like answering the question to those who are interested enough to ask. So for anyone curious about the logistical aspects of this part of my work, here it is.

I shoot with a wide-angle 4×5 pinhole camera, which is basically a wooden box that takes both Polaroid backs and film holders. I actually have a few of these cameras now, because I’m impatient and sometimes like to set up my next shot while the first one is being exposed over a long period of time. I chose to work with pinhole first out of curiosity, and stuck with it after time because I love the simplicity of it. In the beginning, infinite depth of field was a challenge, and later I started making images that needed it. I also enjoy spending a lot of time with my images, and shooting pinhole even in the brightest light, definitely slows one down. It forces my typically impatient self to think and plan and compose carefully. In a way it works well for my personality, because it gives me the structure I can’t always give myself.

I generally use Polaroids to compose the images, since I can’t see through the camera. After working this way for a while, I’ve begun to understand and expect what the camera will do if placed at a certain angle and distance from the subject, so I don’t always use them (to cut costs), but they do play a big role in the process. I use a light meter and some math to figure out exposures, because my light meter doesn’t read for f/500. Thankfully my cameras are heavy enough that I can just place them on the ground for a while, and still get sharp images. Sometimes I dig a little hole or prop them up with sticks or rocks. I’ve found that for the work I’m doing now, I just can’t get low enough with a tripod.

I know that a lot of folks enjoy pinhole cameras for the surprises, blurriness or imperfections they can create. I think pinhole is assumed by many to always do this, and in a way not often taken seriously by a lot of professional photographers. I believe in pinhole cameras as tools just as any other cameras are, and we each choose our tools and how we work with them based on the images we want to make, our own style, and of course personality. When I shoot pinhole I know exactly what I’m going to get from it, because I want to control every aspect of it. Not everyone uses it in the same way.

The result of this is the series I call Grounded, in which placing the wide-angle camera on the ground provides a view of the world that I couldn’t possibly see without photographing it in this way. I like to think of the images as what a bug might see, by creating intimidating and often distorted landscapes that force the viewer to see from the immediate ground up, instead of our typical (human) angle of view.

Photos © Steph Plourde-Simard

untitled

String

In the Garden

What can a photograph say?

Coming from classes where no one seemed interested in critically discussing issues with photographing other people, with photographing and claims of truth or knowledge, I’d been feeling very alone and strange— is it expected that photographers believe in some sort of core truth that can be gotten at with a camera? Or at least that there is in fact something that can be shown/learned by photographing and looking at photographs? I wasn’t sure how I felt. Then, as if someone somewhere heard my internal monologue, I was delivered two interviews/articles that gave me some great things to think about: Jorg Colberg’s interview with Alec Soth and a Guardian article about Pieter Hugo’s work.

Pieter Hugo: “I have a deep suspicion of photography, to the point where I do sometimes think it cannot accurately portray anything, really. And, I particularly distrust portrait photography. I mean, do you honestly think a portrait can tell you anything about the subject? And, even if it did, would you trust what it had to say?”

Alec Soth: “Photographing people, with or without permission, usually leads to all sorts of ethical dilemmas. It is unavoidable. I do my best to be good. I ask permission. I’m honest about how I use the pictures and send everyone I photograph a print. But the truth is that when I take a picture of a person I am ‘using’ that person. They are becoming material for my work and I’m turning them into an object, a piece of paper that is a commodity. It is all troubling. All I can say is that on the long list of ethical crimes a misdemeanors, photographing people in the name of art isn’t the worst violation.”

These quotes hit me hard right now because I’m trying to move on to shooting other people more, something I’d for the most part avoided but something I had always appreciated and envied about other people’s work. It takes a certain amount of guts and confidence to photograph others, but also a way of seeing things that lets you feel ok about using them, about making them into an art object. I fear that I am not that type of person, or that I cannot become that person. If photographing another person is a sort of one-sided exchange, and if that photograph doesn’t say anything about the subject, what incentive does a person have to consent to having their portrait taken? This is the question that nags at me. I wonder what I have to offer to others when asking to take their picture. Currently, I offer cookies, but are some oatmeal coconut chocolate chip cookies a fair trade?

Pieter Hugo: “It sounds extreme, but for me to work at all as a photographer, I have to be conscious always of the problems inherent in what I do. I have to be conscious, if you like, of the impossibility of photography.”

This is so important, always being aware of the limitations of your medium, but how do you avoid letting this paralyze you? How do you put it enough aside to keep making your work and feel like there is some meaning in what you do?

I started writing this post feeling like I had so much to say but have ended it with more questions than answers. I keep thinking about the question “what can a photograph say?” and I don’t know, but maybe that’s part of why I keep shooting— I’m searching for clues in each image about what I can learn, if anything, about other people, the world around me, and myself.

Art Matters

My fiance linked me to this article yesterday: “Monet? Gauguin? Using art to make better doctors” from The Boston Globe.  I’m all for promoting arts classes to students who are unlikely to take them of their own accord, and all for arguing that art can serve a purpose greater than expensive decor.  At first I did, however, feel a little like works of art were being used in a type of high-brow I Spy until I got to this section:

“The most difficult part of the class for the high-achieving Harvard students, Miller said, seems to be letting go of their urge to find the one right answer.

[...]

‘When we get fixated on getting the right answer, we miss the diagnosis because it blocks the ability to think flexibly,’ Miller said. ‘We want them to puzzle through things’”.

This is exactly what I love about art: that it makes me puzzle through things, makes me revel in the multiplicity of meanings and narratives and feelings.  If classes in art can help more rigid, linear thinkers open their minds to broader possibilities, that fills me with all sorts of hope.

Introduction

Hello all! My name is Caleb and I love making art.

I graduated from NESOP in June with a hazy plan: do whatever odd assortment of work I could to make money (hopefully most of that work would be related to photography in some way) and keep making art, both for Interim and new projects. I wanted to take this summer and spend it trying new things to further figure out what I like, what makes me feel good and proud and full. I’ve also been trying to enter contests, apply for grants, and do all the things a good little emerging artist is supposed to do to jumpstart his career. So far, here is a selection of the things I’ve been doing, even the things that aren’t cool or helpful to my art career:

- started interning for the Photographic Resource Center— fortunately this is both cool and helpful to my art career. I was a TA for the Second Sight program and had the pleasure of working with 14 and 15-year-olds on weekly photo projects. I’m now working with younger children at the PRC’s Summer Photo Camp and after that will be doing more traditional intern stuff for them leading up to their Annual Auction.
- shot a college graduation, which was challenging and made me question whether I wanted to continue to shoot event work
- then shot at an eye clinic, which turned out to be an incredibly rewarding experience that including shooting children undergoing eye-related therapies
- started training to be a wedding DJ (why? I have no idea); started talking about also doing videography and second-shooting for this person
- have been doing web work and post-production for a portrait photographer who both values my work for her as well as encourages me to continue making art
- have been talking to a photo rep who believes in me, lets me shoot in her rubber corset and her daughter’s clothes, and hooks me up with meetings with gallery owners and curators and other fantastic people. I bake for her and assist her when she goes to show her photographers’ portfolios at agencies. She’s also a super nice and super fun person. It’s a beautiful symbiotic relationship.
- in August I’ll start working for NESOP (both in the digital lab and the stock room) and TAing a class there
- I have a solo show or two in the works, as well as a feature in a museum’s online gallery coming this fall — more details to follow.

Where do I go from here? I have no idea, but I do know I’m willing to try just about anything and will need to keep pushing myself to work hard and take risks and put myself out there. That’s part of what this blog is about for me. I hope you’ll come along for the ride.

Intro (It’s all gonna be OK)

Hello all, and thanks for reading (or rather, thanks for reading in the future, as this is just my first post and nobody knows about this blog yet). The About Us page will tell you some quick biographical information about Caleb and I, but I wanted to make another kind of introduction as well, letting you know where I’m at in my photographic career and why the desire to blog about it.

Well, I’m at the very beginning, career-wise. While I’ve been studying photography off and on since high school, and maintained my first photo website from 2001-2003 (photos I took while participating in various protests and campaigns as a social justice activist), I never tried to make a living off of it until now. Back in 2003, ColorLines magazine contacted me because they were writing an article on a friend of mine, and I had taken a photo of him they wanted to use. Seeing it in print was the jolt I needed to realize I might actually be able to do this for work one day. Of course it took another 4 years at my 9-5 job to save some money and enroll in the professional photography program at NESOP.

Now that I’ve graduated with a few portfolios under my arm, I’m venturing into my new career at an interesting and challenging time. While newspapers cut pages and layoff staff, magazines fold and/or budgets decrease, somehow gossip magazines can still manage to enter multi-million dollar bidding wars just for photos of Brad and Angelina’s new babies (I think this says a lot more about our society’s collective priorities today than the world of print media, but that’s a whole other discussion). I know there are more photographers out there than jobs, by far. I also know that I’m just one of many new talents trying to squeeze into a field already wracked with competition. It seems that everyone wants to remind me of this on a regular basis. My replies have boiled down to the usual “I know, it’s tough, I have some ideas, we’ll see what happens, I want to focus on making some more work and getting it out there, no I don’t mind having a day job for now, blah blah blah”. I try not to be delusional and at the same time be optimistic and believe in my work. I go back and forth between reaching for large goals and focusing on small victories. Currently, life is ping-pong, but I don’t expect otherwise.

Right now I’m assisting a couple fine art photographers/artists. I’m sharing a one-room studio apartment with my little sister. I don’t have nearly enough paid work yet, but am submitting to as many contests and participating in as many portfolio reviews as I can afford. My first show will be this fall (details to come). I’m painting my dad’s barn next week to make some extra cash. I’m printing and planning for my first Open Studios experience in September. I’ve decided to view this era of my life as a time to collect interesting stories to tell when I’m a successful photographer, about the amusing things I had to do to pay the bills until I was able to make a living off my work. Growing that list and remaining positive about it seems like the best way to get through right now. And of course, making photos every chance I get.

So the desire to create a blog came from a few needs. First, people say having a blog is a great way to promote your work and drive traffic to your website. I have some ideas about whether this is true or not, but I’ll save them. For now I’m testing the waters. More importantly to me is the second reason, which is that I miss the photographic community that was freely available to me while I was a student, and although I’m working to keep that going with friends, former instructors, etc, I want more ways to connect and start communicating with folks I don’t know yet. Third, I just have a lot to say.

I hope you enjoy what’s to come. Caleb and I have a lot of ideas for Existing Light, and some perspectives that we feel aren’t necessarily represented yet in the photo blog world. I’m excited to be sharing this blog with Caleb, not only because he’s a great photographer who’s work I really enjoy and admire, but also a friend and an overall smart and thoughtful person. While many other blogs have slowed down for the summer, this is our time to kick it up and really produce an interesting and critical blog worth reading, so please subscribe and/or check back often!