PRINTING PICTURES

I have this theory that a photograph isn’t really a photograph until
you can hold it in your hands.

That’s right, kids. Just because you take ‘em and do an edit and
some post production and look at ‘em on your monitor doesn’t
mean you’re done. No sirree. If you’re serious about it, if you’re
shooting for a project or to move your practice forward you’ve
got to make prints.

prints laying around my house

I believe that making prints is what separates the men/women from the
boys/girls. You see, making a print is a form of commitment. It forces
you to make hard choices because you’re going to spend extra time and
energy and money turning your ones and zeros into something you can
hold.

As well, printing changes the way you look at images. They are no longer
back lit, glowing, things on your screen…..they take on a life of their own.
You leave them laying around, or pinned to a wall. You bump into them
on your way to the bathroom, or when you just get up. You can put the
prints in books and carry them around. They’ll have way more weight
than showing pix on your fucken iPhone. It’s a fact.

page spread from: One Room, One Night

Most folks these days come home from work and, when their daughter or
son asks: “What did you do at work today?”, can only reply: “I entered data”.
Hardly anyone, anymore, starts with nothing and ends up with something,
something complete, something they can hold and show and say: “I made
this”.

Photographers, though, do that all the time. We start with nothing (except
the world) and make something of it. But, until the photo is manifest physically
all we’ve done is “enter data”. It’s the printing and the holding of that data that
is “something”. Whether that something is a one-off print in a book you put
together, or one of two hundred thousand impressions of you photo on page
28 of some magazine, until it’s physical it ain’t nothing but data.

page spread from: Christmas in the Mississippi Delta

As well, there’s just something about the look and feel of a page turning, of
one image being replaced by the next as you work your way through a book
or a stack of prints that can’t be replicated on a computer screen.

Sure, the computer, the WWW and all it’s related aspects (blogs, web sites and
so on) are great. They’ve made so much more available. But what I’m talking
about here is separate from that.

What you’re looking at here, on your screen, what we consume so much of every
day, is virtual. Prints are sensual.

And I want my world to be sensual. Yes sirree.

more prints laying around my house

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AND, SPEAKING OF PRINTED PIX

The latest edition of CV is out.

The issue is about photos and public art. Interesting, because almost all the
images we see outside are meant to sell us something. Rarely do we come
across billboards, etc., that make us think about, for lack of a better word,
life. Some of the projects they feature use photos in traditional ways, but the
photos themselves, what they are about, ask a whole bunch of questions. Make
you consider something other than what car to buy, what beer to drink, where
to go on vacation.

Looking thru the issue made me want to take my prints outside and ruffle some
feathers. I’m definitely going to have to think about that.

Also, in this issue, is an advert for my show in Montreal. Now, I’m used to seeing
my images in print, in magazines and on bus shelters and stuff. But I must say, it
was quite a thrill to see an advertisement for me.

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A COUPLE OF UPDATES

One of the great things about long term projects is, you get to see the same
people over and over again. Get to see what’s new, how they’ve changed.

This is a photo I took of Sarah in 2007.

I took this photo of her a year later. She’d been in jail, straightened out and got
a bit healthier.

I’m pretty sure that, in my two years shooting on the corner, Catherine is the
person I’ve photographed the most. I have a real soft spot for her.

Catherine, 2007

I found out a little while ago that she’s now safe in Cornwall, in therapy
and working at getting better. I wish her well and hope I never see her
on the corner again.

Catherine, 2008. Contact print