Schützenfest in Hannover, 2012

The sun shines over the laighter (and the screams). People wear colours (they are colours with strange body paint and weekend chinos). They always choose the less scary roller coaster first. First, they go on the Ferris wheel - to get used to the height. Then they move on - to the next stand where they are turned upside down (and you rush to collect the coins falling off their pockets). There is food on every second stand: chinese, german, sweets, chinese, german, sweets, chinese, german, sweets ... And you feel full from the thick smell alone; your hands get sticky from the sweet sugar vapours.

I walk through the crowds - no one else has their headphones on, no one else walks alone, no one else is there to observe the people, no one else is there to photograph the people, no one is there looking for the questions (nor for the anwers). They are there for the adrenaline rush - the one that tilts the scales towards "yes" when one doubts one's emotional state. They are there for the glucose rush - the one that makes them alert to nothing but their senses to perceive the colours of the festival through an ever more acid curtain. They are there for the plain human need - to love and to belong (because their other Maslowian needs have been covered already on the stand before).

The Peace of a Déjà-Vu

I am sitting in the car and watching her talk to her sister. And my heart skips a beat - not because of the topic or because of the approaching train that I need to take. But because I get that feeling of familiarity, the feeling of knowing what's coming, the feeling of verbal recognition - the déjà-vu. Because I've been there before - in that car, with those people, and in that conversation - but not in reality (or at least not in the conscious reality). 

I arrived late after train-station hopping with a suitcase and a camera in hand. Checking at the arrival schedule, I wonder how long it takes to get out of the gate with a suitcase that she can't carry (and I wonder - what if there is no one to help with it). Of course, the idea is ridiculous (although the guys at customs might be more helpful than they should with other motivations). And she is there and she sees me first - and I am a tad confused (seems to be the norm of late) and we walk through the airport to the train station in a daze - perhaps it is the image of the bandade and the scar below, or the image of the flying byke (and worse - the flying E.). In the train, I rest my shoulder on hers and I feel her strength - way beyond my own - but that's again the titanium bone-support.

We walk to the hotel - and it is charming - with stairs shaped like a heart, escalator with a carpet on the wall, and a welcoming receptionist like in a movie - he explains how to get around the city, and so we do, leaving behind our baggage (and the metaphorical) and enjoying our conversation (in the midst of the football game - how dare we?!). And who would have known that she has hatched a cunning plan - and I would be her partner in crime (then again, when one brings a smile and tears and a smile again, one feels no remorse). 

Day 2 starts with rain - as it should always do - because rain keeps the streets envigorated - people rushing to get away from the rain, people opening colourful umbrellas hoping for protection, people cuddling closer together under the same umbrella. And then there are the people like us who couldn't care less for an umbrella. And we walk looking for old books, new fashion cuts, and discourses on life (we are such cliches!). But then comes our chance to hatch the plan - to surprise our hosts with an arrival - and surprise we do - as they have just relaxed on the massage table, we barge in to their amazement - and they don't know if the massage oil fumes have not messed up with their eyes. 

And that's when I see the tears, mixed with joy, and smiles - when salt becomes elixir that heals wounds and scars.

Study: “Water”

The other day I read an article by Steve Huff on his website about Inspiration. And I thought about inspiration and how it comes to a photographer. Perhaps everyone has a different approach but for me a photograph is not always planned. When I go jogging and take my camera, I do not necessarily know how many pictures (if any at all) I will come back with – I just take the camera “just in case”. So, I decided to have myself a bit of a different approach. I posted on my facebook and twitter account the request for my friends/followers to give me a challenge. The outcome was in itself inspirational: topics as abstract as “dreams” or “everyday magic” to more concrete things like “water” and “the color green”. I decided to NOT make a decision as to which one I pursue but rather keep them all present and see what comes along.

There were two pictures that I took today that to my mind fit the challenge. Today N1 – “Water”. White water is argued to be the future petroleum in terms of scarcity and price, it is already a vital resource around the world. It’s scarcity in Africa and parts of Asia nowadays are, if nothing else, a scary prediction of what it may look like in the rest of the world in a couple of decades. (If you have not yet seen the movie HOME, watch it on YouTube and share it further.)

So, when I went to the city center today for my usual Saturday morning Starbucks coffee, I had my camera and walked about. I spotted this tourist asking a passer-by if this water was drinkable. When they said it was, she took her bottle out and filled it with water from this fountain. To me this was an immediate association with the scarcity of water – we have started drinking water from fountains (yes, perhaps it was built specifically with such a purpose in mind – but then again, how many people know that this fountain-looking … thing is actually providing drinkable tab water?).

The Challenges of Being Invisible - Amongst Your Crowd [graduation goodbyes]

I often face a connundrum - how to become invisible amongst those that I want to be visible to? In my surrounding, people have already learnt that when I take pictures, I prefer people not to pose and, should they notice, to continue with their conversation/activity. The mere noticing is in itself bringing about change and questions the naturalness of the behaviour onwards. But how do you become invisible amongst the people who are looking for you?

I am standing in a big hall - in a hotel, with plenty of unfamiliar faces, quite a few familiar faces, many waiters, many smiles, many bottles of wine and cocktail glasses. I listen to music from the decades, moving my feet ever so subtly (although my suit is showing the movement as if it's a magnification device), and I look around. I know the people, and I know the feelings they are having, and I know that at a graduation ball, you think you are saying true goodbyes. But you simply don't know the next time you'll see that person. Have we been spoilt by technology, by proximity, that we have forgotten how people did it back then? (You know, when they wrote letters, send postcards, and used the telephone for very short messages) Why is it so challenging to simply smile and accept that you won't see the person tomorrow but at some indefinite point in the future?!

And I am there with my camera, and I see (or I think I do) the sadness penetrating - the eyes see the lens but they look like through it because it is not the camera that one cares about - it is oneself - the impeding change, the one that we had a whole lot of time to prepare and that still surprises us, overcoming us in the form of an emotional tsunami, eradicating all the memories we don't need and keeping the ones that could stand - the ones that will put a smile on our face anytime, the one that made us question ourselves and through which we discovered something new about ourselves, the one that guarantees that next time I see 'you' I'll be different (and yet perhaps not). No, the camera doesn't capture all that - but when I look at the picture, that's what I see - because that's not your picture but mine - it is not a picture for you but for me - it is my memory bank, not yours. And it is still empty - I don't see every memory I want to, I don't see all the ones I've made and collected and I don't see the ones that are yet to be created. And that's why I continue taking those pictures - because sometimes, it is the only way to be invisible amongst your own crowd.

The Unlikely Duel - M8 vs. M9. Or Not.

Sometimes, it helps to be undecided. I won't claim that I haven't been too fortunate (or too extravagant) to actually own both an M9 and an M8 (not because of necessaty or frugality). I started with the M8 two years ago. I won't go into how it all happened (the mythical image precedes the know-how). A year after the release of the M9, I thought I could see the prices on the used market starting to go down and I thought this might be might chance. I put the M8 for auction quickly, I cleaned up the lens collection (that gear acquistion syndrom in reverse - I can't believe that back then my latest version Summicron 50 was just 700 euros - it goes for double this right now), and I had the cash for the M9. About a year later, in September, I was preparing for my first big wedding shoot and I knew I should have a spare camera - not because I didn't rely on the M9 alone but because I wanted to have greater flexibility with lenses and not need to change my mindset with every picture. So I went for a spare M8.2. With all of its shortcomings, I had forgotten it was my first fling with rangefinders. It didn't replace the M9, but it was there, calling for me. The files it produced in black-and-white were different from the files coming from the M9 - probably the algorythm is different but it was helpted by the infrared sensitivity of the camera. The files had a certain crispness which I didn't seem to get from the M9 (I am even thinking I might need to send in the M9 for clean and check). It had a different look and style as well with its less-reflective black-chrome top (ok, not a real M8.2 but an upgraded M8) combination. But the point of this post is not to compare the M8 and the M9 - for one thing, there have been enough comparisons made already (and most anyone would claim that, should money be of no concern [which, let's face it, with a price point like this, it would be only for very few people], you should get the M9). For another thing, I don't really care about this comparison. And I do get the question "what camera did you use?" often - often enough that I am reminded of that joke about the photographer who bit his lips receiving the compliment "monsieur, I love your photographs; you must have a wonderful camera" from the hostess at a social party; at the end of the party, he goes to the hostess and tells her "madame, I loved your food - you must have a wonderful oven". [please, remind me who this was]

The real problem we face as photographers is becoming attached to the equipment more than to the subject of our photographs - and that's what's scarying me and what's making me use different equipment every now and again - getting rid of the M8 again and again (I think I've bought and sold 3 or 4 M8-s since my acquisition of the M9 - at least the M9 is still the very same one which I got from another great street photographer, Guido Steenkamp).

Why do I categorize my photographs in order of equipment rather than in order of subject? Is the reason for a landscape to exist different from a street photograph to exist? Why does a photograph of Yosemity park taken by Ansel Adams attracts different cache than the same photograph taken by an unknown hiker? Why would a photograph taken with an M8 have a different value than one taken with an M9 (or any other cell-phone)?

Perhaps this is related to our own individual conception of what constitutes art:

☐ anything

☐ something

☐ nothing.

[tick where appropriate]

And perhaps the institutional definition of art has its merits, as does the Kantian and Hegelian and all western-centered philosophers' (and one can even fit the functional definition of art in there somewhere when one looks at documentary photography). 

If we talk about esthetics, yes - of course the technical specifications of the tool will lead to different esthetics - but a tool is a tool - the tool for a job - the job begins in the mind rather than in the hand. Or does it - because how often would I pull out the iPhone when I have the Leica? In fact, having both is confusing - it is the beginning of an inner dialogue that is about choice - and the risks of taking the wrong one (and shooting with the wrong tool). Perhaps here the saying that the best choice is the one you've already made is the most sparing mantra. Esthetics aside, we are in the search of capturing a moment - and all that is contained in that moment (a hundredth of a second). And the tool is the emotions carrier - the canister that can contain our love, our pain, our strength, and our sorrow. 

Why do I have so many tools then?!