Random Thoughts on Photography

Have you ever noticed how many influential photographers did not study photography formally? I thought about that recently as I re-read “Teaching” in Robert Adams’ 1994 book Why People Photograph. His observations have aged well even though it was written some 30 years ago. You can disagree with Adams, but it is hard to think of another writer on photography who has dealt with important issues of the medium quite as well.

Adams talks about what it takes to be a successful teacher and about how teachers struggle to balance being there for their students versus being there for their photography. At one point he questions whether “seeing” can or even should be taught. “As for studio courses in ‘seeing’ – which usually place student work up for evaluation by both classmates and teachers – I was never tempted to take one, and so am not attracted to teaching one. Arrogantly I believed right from the start that I could see.”

I like his mention of arrogance. I like how it implies that he felt he didn’t need a teacher, that he could trust his own judgement and did not need to submit his work to a mentor or other authority for approval. I have felt the same way about my own work. Why place yourself in an inferior position of supplicant if you know and value what you are doing while those passing judgement on your work perhaps do not? Just imagine if Walker Evans had done what Roy Stryker had wanted. Evans was the artist, not Stryker.

In an academic situation, how helpful can observations be that come from students who are still sorting out their own paths and practices? How many people, young or old, come equipped with the generosity of vision to recognize important, original work? You can argue that many people in positions of authority do not. Success in an institution or profession depends on chutzpa, personality, and apparatchik skills more than on independence of judgement and insight. Indeed, you may not go far professionally if you display too much of the latter…! If you do not agree, try to think of recent major figures in art who were discovered as unknown outsiders and promoted due to the deep discernment of a museum curator. Original work does something different and changes the conversation, and history-oriented academics may understandably be slow to follow.

There are of course exceptions to the rule. I am still in awe, for example, at how John Szarkowski made William Eggleston into a star by recognizing his talent and giving him a big show and a landmark book, William Eggleston’s Guide. Szarkowski was an outsider at the beginning of his tenure as photography curator at MOMA in New York, but he became an important tastemaker and trendspotter. Few curators have had his independence of judgment or have deservingly wielded such influence.

Getting back to my original point, an older generation of photographers did not study photography formally because there were no established programs of study; photography was recognized late as a medium worthy of study. One route to recognition in the early years was working as an apprentice, as Robert Frank did in Switzerland. Another route was taking an established figure as a mentor. For those who can find them, both options are still viable entry points into the photography world today. And if you link up with someone with status you gain instant respect as an art world insider, something that will stand you in good stead as you struggle to establish yourself. Just think – people will answer your emails!

If it takes time to be recognized for creative work, I would argue that it takes even longer for artists who do something original and different to be understood. Most of us put artwork into established mental categories and dismiss as unsuccessful work that does not fit neatly into the accepted order. Think Van Gogh. Think Robert Frank. You had to venture outside the box to understand them.

Like the Turkish astronomer in Saint Exupéry’s The Little Prince, part of the problem is that our work is inevitably judged by the context. The astronomer had discovered a new asteroid, B-612, but when he presented his findings at the International Astronomical Congress, no one believed him because he was wearing old-fashioned, traditional Turkish clothes. But when he presented his discovery a decade later wearing a modern European suit he was believed.

An example in photography is Larry Sultan. He is rightly lauded for his innovative 1992 photobook, Pictures from Home. It used extensive layered texts and photographic images from diverse origins – film stills, family snapshots, formal portraits, documents, advertising images, and so on – blended into a coherent whole to tell a story. Eleven years earlier, however, photographer Richard Zybert had used the same techniques. But Zybert’s memorable 1981 book, Notebook on Time, was self-published, diminutive, and cheaply made. Guess which book is recognized today as a landmark and canonized in Badger and Parr’s The Photobook: A History? Yup. You’re right. Not Zybert’s sketchy self-published softcover but rather Sultan’s fine cloth hardcover from publisher Harry N. Abrams.

In my case, my first photobook, A Second Year in France, published in 1982, was an early use of a sequence of photographs that re-created an experience through time. Was it the first time this had been attempted in a photobook? I do not know. I had never seen anything done that way. I was inspired by Lewis Baltz’ Park City as well as Duane Michals’ A Visit with Magritte. But when I showed it to people, few seemed to see what it was doing. Instead they commented on individual photographs as if the book was a collection of single stand-alone images. No one mentioned the technique or my exploration of an unusual theme, that of a year abroad. The most common reaction was embarrassed silence, as if they felt sorry for me because everyone knew that books of photographs were not supposed to look like that.

I mailed copies of A Second Year in France to people like Robert Frank and William Eggleston and predictably did not receive replies. But Lewis Baltz understood the book right away when I showed it to him in Arles. Robert Adams wrote back and invited me to visit. And John Szarkowski replied as well. I still have his letter, and I have been told that it was unusual of him to write.

In my more recent photobooks, I have continued exploring subjects and situations atypical of photobooks – a day-long excursion with a class of middle-schoolers, a look at teaching from a teacher’s point of view, a day of fishing, a visit to a French market with a friend, a memoir/journal documenting a year of travel and university study. I have also used extensive texts and have organized images into thematic units or chapters, something I have not seen before. But most responses from viewers are still comments on individual photos – “shots” – that do not show an appreciation for how the book is organized. Do people notice and not point it out? Or do they simply not notice? Or is it perhaps that it works so well that it is invisible? Maybe that’s it. Maybe. I would like to think so. But who knows?

Maybe I just expect too much.

I wonder what viewers’ reactions would be if my books were published by an established publisher. Would their reactions be the same if they had cloth covers with inset photos and super high-quality printing? Hmmm.

There are pleasures as well as perils to self-publishing. First among the pleasures is freedom. You get to follow your muse. You get to call the shots. No one will tell you not to do something. And if you are curious and like to learn new things, another satisfaction comes from doing your own layout and design. The perils include the struggle to sell – including finding places to sell – plus potentially having to live with regrets and mistakes. You have to make all the decisions, and if you do not know what you are doing you can mess up big time and realize it only later when it is too late.

In my case, when I started out, I relied on designers for the technical part, which added to the cost of making a book. Now that I do it myself it is money I do not have to spend and I have more for design upgrades and promotional travel.

These days, except for a very few publishers, in most cases photographers pay for publishing, so really it is just self-publishing by another name. You pay so that you do not have to do the work. Someone else takes care of everything. But you may have to compromise your ideas. Often publishers see your work as raw material for the book they want to make. There are exceptions of course but many platforms and consultants are basically variants on pay-to-publish.

Why? It’s because it is hard to make money on photobooks. There is a lot of risk involved. Publishers avoid risk by having authors pay for their design services and for printing, and then they keep profits from sales as well. Photographers get a book that showcases their work, and many are quite happy with that. Publishers get a viable business, a job, perhaps a calling.

It is reassuring to know that as a self-publisher I am in good company. Lee Friedlander, for example, created Haywire Press in order to maintain complete control over the design, layout, and sequencing of his photographs. Famous authors who have self-published include Mark Twain, Jane Austen, Marcel Proust, Virginia Woolf, and Edgar Allen Poe. I like to think that I am the same, that I have figured out what to do and do not need anyone’s approval to share my work. We will see how it goes. Time will tell.