I am lucky enough to get asked from time to time to talk to a group of people about photography. I say lucky enough because its a topic I love to talk about. I remember the endless discussions about whether or not photography was an art when I was an art student. It led me to proclaim one of the few things I hold as truths in this life. "Who cares!" Seriously, who cares if it is an art or not, it is photography and that alone makes it worthy of its own place in time. I think the argument must come from the idea of intent and execution of intent. Any 'artist' who knows a dedicated 'photographer' knows that the intent is the same, to make something that grabs the viewer to examine their life in a new way. I know I take photography very seriously, even the mundane situations I'm presented. I chafed with a friend today about the mundane and realized that familiarity can make for a lesser understanding of the document we wish to create(surprisingly) because we don't see it with fresh eyes. I work hard to see things with fresh eyes but find myself often confronted working for a small community paper covering the same subjects over and over again. I've written about this before, but it holds true, familiarity is good, but fresh eyes are sometimes better. I'll never know for sure which is better, not knowing my subject so I can approach it without a bias, or being part of a community where I feel my subject from within? I struggle with this in many ways, but ultimately know its best to put myself into my work so that I'm proud of my place. This isn't always evident in the individual pictures I make, but I hope it is in the overall of my life's work. Even if its a simple team picture day photo for head shots that will appear in the paper when one of the young guys does something statistically worthy of note, I want to make a good photograph from this experience. I wish for myself that I felt this every single day!
Editor/Photographer's note: This is part of a series of portraits of local woman who are tackling the notion of what is their inner superhero. This is meant to be fun, but also a meaningful glimpse into our lives and in this case the lives of ordinary woman leading truly extraordinary lives in just being who they are and doing what they do. This is just the beginning. There will be more as this project grows. "I come from good stock. My pedigree is not of royalty, but of good souls. I have always been able to wear my ancestors with honor, like a cape that flows behind me. They were, and are still, long-living survivors." began Paula Lynch as she somewhat reluctantly began to write about her inner super-hero in this group project that began over a simple Facebook post over a month ago. See the first post here http://richardsayer.weebly.com/blog/what-is-your-inner-super-hero to get more of the back story.
Lynch continues that despite her families longevity life is life. "Although, death has played a large part in my life… I have lost my father and a husband. For me, true strength can be found in someone holding a dying loved one’s hand. I have had moments of this in my life and it has made me vulnerable. Vulnerable to a country song, a Hallmark commercial, a Lifetime movie or something even more moving...another person’s pain. When I was asked to become a super hero for this project, the day was a good one… I was strong and secure and I said “Heck, yes… let’s do this.” Then the real world sank in. What right do I have to call myself a superhero? Who am I anyway? Why would I venture to put myself in that awe-inspiring light? My other superhero friends came to my rescue - they told me to be sure of myself, that I had done so much to help others. I feel that being a coffee-drinking, non-stop mother of four is my greatest fete. Then my friends urging me to do this asked what my inner strength was. My strength is also my kryptonite. The same things that work for me work against me. My major strengths are weakness, vulnerability and imperfection. I hate perfection, and have directly worked against it and the rigidness of structure in my life. I am best at whimsy, humanity and being flawed. I have no desire to have just a polite conversation with another. I want to see below the surface of a person, know how they live and what makes them cry. What wonderful and what horrible things have they lived through? My vulnerability and ability to tear myself down and reveal my thoughts is what people use against me, and yet every day they save me. Every day I feel destroyed by the drain of laundry, cleaning, errand running and supporting my family and friends. I am told that I do not like to ask for help. Recently, that is all I have done. I bend between needing no one and needing everyone. I am too complex to follow…too much to take. I would like to be able to use my strength of vulnerability to help others at their moment of need. I would like my weakness to be someone else’s strength. My humor, my smile and my tears are set, ready to begin my next great venture… Hospice. Volunteering for families when they most need support…that is where I shall wear my cape. Yes, weakness is what I am drawn to; who would I be without the swirl of emotions and the need to connect and empathize with others? I am Paula Jo,….Peaches…. Mommy…and … Wonder Woman." I recently applied for a job at a newspaper. I really haven't cared about putting together a portfolio in years. Each year I collect my favorite from the year and thats about it. And they are my favorites, not necessarily my best. And a favorite can mean the experience I had making the picture as much as the outcome of the photograph itself. I didn't do a very good (or professional) job at applying. I sent them my daily blog with a note saying, this is what I do each day which is a better indication of the type of photographer I am than if i show you a collection of my 20-30 best photos over the last 30 years. What seemed like a smart approach at the time, likely 1 or 2 in the morning wasn't very professional if I was hoping to land the job. It was a bit full of myself actually. over my 17 years at The Meadville Tribune and 30 years of making pictures I've taken a few pretty cool photos, I could sit down and go over them to find 30 pictures to showcase as my portfolio, but I'd always question if they are the right 30. To me the greatness of an image is situational and I can usually go on and on about an image and its importance to a time and place, but to say it was one of the 30 most significant is another thing all together. I am thinking about putting some images together in a book someday and if I do I'll end up having these same thoughts. Today as I was looking for an image I came across two of my yearly favorites folder's and pulled them out. Here below is a slideshow of images I made in 2010. All Meadville Tribune assignments or stories I worked on for the paper. Everything from a food shoot for a special section on local business, a lot of sports, a kid playing with a ball by himself in a gym, a teen struggling with a rare disorder that doesn't allow him to sweat, devastation at accident scenes and fires a feisty man one day away from turning 100 and when he said he was going to give up sex. In a year I get to experience and document life! So many stories, a young woman looking up to heaven for a father she lost earlier in the year after one of his cows was named Supreme Champion. A food drive where volunteers worked hard, politics. A homeless tent city, an art show, first day of school, a doggy marriage and a wrestler at the county fair. From this group I would probably edit down to 10 for my 'Best" and of those, possibly none would make it into a final portfolio. When you look over the story of your life you find a lot of strange and beautifully meaningful encounters. I began working at The Meadville Tribune in 1997 and at that time the publisher was Jeanne Moore-Yount, a strong "I'm going to get that I want" individual who had a great sense of humor and a willingness to bust and be busted back with quips and side comments as we passed in a hall.
Early on I went to her with an idea. I was working on a story about a local man with Cerebral Palsy and I wanted to present this story as a no ad tabloid-sized section. No ads? Nope, 'never going to sell this idea.' I was told. But I did sell it because Jeanne listened (and the newspaper industry wasn't in the toilet yet!) I had respect for her willingness to showcase strong photo work in a different way. We did several stories over the next few years and, though, I never asked for no ads again, many times 2 pages would be opened up for excellent layouts of strong photographs and good stories and 2 or 3 day series. Now, she and I also butted heads on a few occasions over the years and there were times a less strong individual would've probably fired me. But she didn't. Notice I've mentioned her strength a couple times already? One thing we disagreed on was when she implemented a policy about photos that strictly forbid us to use a picture if someones head or top of their head was cut off. She thought it looked like a mistake and that we shouldn't use an image that looked like a mistake. I argued that its never what 'isn't' in the picture, but what 'is' in the picture that matters most. She was the boss so you can guess who won. But I would still bust her about it and push the envelope many times and even get passionate(my way of saying I'd yell) about my arguments. Again, she never fired me. And we still got along just fine. Strong. She left the paper many years ago and we'd occasionally run into one another. Her son and daughter worked in town and we'd see each other a few times a year and exchange what we think of pleasantries, meaning we'd bust each others chops and laugh. I was surprised she would mention a photograph I had taken and I knew she was still paying attention to what was going on with the Tribune. But I really thought that was the extent of our relationship, nothing more than that, a couple people who just knew each other from another time and we could just enjoy seeing each other.. I was surprised when she asked me to photograph her son's senior portraits. I agreed but told her i couldn't promise her anything and that perhaps I would make pictures chopping her sons head off, or at least the top of his head. She gave me a classic Jeanne look of disapproval, then smiled and we laughed. I made the pictures and we had a business relationship, we talked about the Tribune and who was still working there and just had a good time. We then became friends on fb and a few likes of posts and comments of posts and again we just had this sorta friendship that was comfortable but not really close. Fun to see each other, chat with each other, bust each others chops and part our ways feeling good about each other. Then I get this message earlier this year. "I was diagnosed with cancer." My heart went to my throat as I read on. She was about half-way through chemo and had lost her hair, but was showing very positive signs of beating it. She went on to say "I want to take photos of this phase of my life, just a little bump in the road." Strong! Now this friendship just took on a whole new meaning. She trusts me to make these pictures of an extremely emotional and delicate time in her life. What an honor! We met at her home and we made a few pictures with her daughter and there were tears. Good tears, beautiful tears. Tears that give understanding to life. We then made a few pictures of just Jeanne. My favorite part of the day was when we went out into this field beside her house and just sat on the ground and talked. I made pictures as we sat about 10-15 feet apart. Some of my favorite pictures were from this conversation. Before we sat down we were trying to figure out what kind of pictures we were going to make and were just horsing around. It was awkward because we wanted them to be meaningful and not cheesy. Thats when she started to dance around the field and laugh at the absurdity of us being out there wondering what to do. I love this picture above because to me it shows Jeanne's personality that says 'I'm me and I don't care what you think' and it shows her joy for life that she might not have fully realized until this entered into her life. I think it also shows her determined strength to get over this "bump" and plow forth! It may not be the best picture in the world, it may not even be the best picture of that day, but it signifies something about her moment in time as she was about to transition away from that ' bump in the road' to the future endeavors awaiting her. As of now her test results have been very encouraging that she has beat the cancer!!!!! And so you all know, early on in our conversations when she said she was bald, she said "this might be the first time I'll be ok with you chopping off the top of my head!" and we laughed. Strong! There is this style of photography called "street photography," if i had to pick a style that i like to look at the most it is probably this. Its documentary photography really focussing on capturing the everyday life of people and their surrounds. I love to just 'go out shooting' and don't really get to do it enough. On instagram I post most of my street photos but occasionally share them on Facebook as well. I made this image just yesterday waiting for my flight in Tampa. Its this sort of moment captured that makes me want to make more and more images on the street or in public places. It was just taken with my phone and thats ok its a camera that has its own properties, one of which is the ability to stay anonymous with a camera and capture real moments.
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AuthorI have been a photographer/artist for the last 30 plus years (since 1966 if you believe as I do that I was born to do this!) CategoriesArchives
May 2015
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