From Syl Arena’s Lessons I Didn’t Learn In Photo School…
3. Powerful photographs touch people at a depth they don’t anticipate.
If you want to be a strong photographer… strive to create images that touch people’s lives. The most challenging part of this has nothing to do with the details of creating a photograph and everything to do with living an enriched life. If you know tons about photography but create shallow photos, then read literature, visit art galleries, learn ethnic cooking, volunteer, watch foreign movies, attend theater, travel, coach youth sports…
This week, your task is to take a photo inspired by external sources. Do some of that stuff and then take an inspired photo. Provide a single sentence/paragraph with your picture to explain your motive.
I didn’t take this photograph. This is a self-portrait of my grandfather, taken in Korea in 1955. The one thing I can accept credit for is scanning in and restoring the image after the slides were passed onto me this week. I suppose in that way, I created the image you see before you in its current form, but I did not compose the shot.
For me, this is a very touching image. While I knew my grandfather well as a grandfather, this picture represents a man I never met. A man who didn’t have children, let alone grandchildren. In this photo he is the same age as I am now – I’m fascinated wondering what he would have been like.
Jonathan Gazeley 