Part 3: Anamorphosis & Engagement

Anamorphosis

From what vantage point must someone be positioned in order to discover the boundaries of form? Where must one stand in that unique space we each inhabit as artists in order to delineate those edges of form that limit us? What does it mean to explore those boundaries of form that are individual to our efforts as photographers? For the artist there seems to be no more of a personal question, one that will elicit unique and individual responses. However, some general steps getting there seem apparent. We must become proficient in those aspects of form necessary for attaining our desired artistic outcomes. We need not master every facet of the recognized standards of technique in photography, just those necessary to make the photographs we want to make, to attain the outcomes we desire. Once proficiency with the form applicable to our photography is attained, those edges become delineated, made ready for exploration. In order to explore edges of form we must know what they are and where they lie. We locate and define those limitations, those edges, in order to become intimate with them, so that we may strive to master the aspects of form that apply to us as individual photographers. Then we can seek out that realm of magic that lies beyond. As Gibson admits, “I have always, always, always worked within a set of specific limitations that always led me to an infinitely broader horizon than I would have otherwise arrived. It’s the limitations that really open the doors.”

Exploring form through the practice of photography, it is best to keep in mind Wright’s directive “to enjoy the luxurious deliberations in each step of the work.” Form here is the unique manner of performing or accomplishing according to more than just those recognized standards of technique and includes everything that shapes such efforts. We must further refine this form as best we can for our own photography. Form in expressive photography is bespoke for each of us. Form is individual. Form is founded upon and bounded by the methodology, aptitude, attitude, psyche, aspirations, desires, gear, and more, that we each bring to our photography and how we each choose to incorporate those elements into our efforts.

Where does one begin to explore this form? After all, it includes all aspects of the creative process of making photographs—from the basic to the advanced, the mundane to the esoteric. The application of a restriction to our craft is a widely accepted foundation from which to explore form. Gibson “always, always, always” applies “specific limitations” to his work, exploring the edges of form. Renowned Australian educator, artist and environmental advocate Len Metcalf, known for his transcendent square sepia images as well as Len’s School and Len’s Journal, has said that “By having restrictions . . . I find immense freedom and so much extra room to explore.” There are ample other examples of intentional restriction of some aspect of form. Henri Cartier-Bresson used only one camera, a Leica rangefinder, and one focal length, 50mm, for nearly all of his work. For Guy Tal, much like me, the restriction of where he works applies to his photography, as he confesses to working “primarily in the landscape of my home, the high deserts of the Colorado Plateau.” Photographers are not the only artists to adopt this approach. Igor Stravinsky in Poetics of Music, wrote “My freedom will be so much the greater and more meaningful the more narrowly I limit my field of action and the more I surround myself with obstacles. Whatever diminishes constraint diminishes strength. The more constraints one imposes, the more one frees one’s self of the chains that shackle the spirit.”

The choices of a starting point for applying a restriction to our work are myriad. They run the gamut from those that are universally applied to all photographers to those that only affect a given photographer at a given time. From the basic to the advanced form is all that binds, controls or contorts our efforts. Engagement with form is pervasive and unavoidable. As Ernst Haas has said, "There is only you and your camera. The limitations in your photography are in yourself, for what we see is what we are." Engagement with form is where we may begin to seek limitations in ourselves and, once found, push the boundaries, the edges those limitation, of form. That engagement will take you from an awareness to comprehension and mastery of all that limits our expressive photography. Through the application of a restriction, such considered and purposeful engagement with form may allow one to find and surpass the “wildest edge of edges” of form so that we may create something that “reverberates with the subtle texture of the infinite.”

Yet, setting off on an exploration of form’s edges seems daunting in this sea of options. Because I photograph nearly exclusively where I live, my relationships with Place and the places I go in the Pioneer Valley of Western Massachusetts are foundational components of my form. These relationships provide fertile ground for me to grow as an artist. And the “restriction” of making images in one specific location, not for days or weeks, but over years and under varied conditions and circumstances, has afforded me a vital starting point for exploring the edges of the form within which I photograph.

Engagement with Place

Joe Cornish in his masterful Scotland’s Mountains, A Landscape Photographer’s View, described his time in Scotland’s “heart and soul . . . its mountainous landscape.” In his introductory essay, Cornish explains that, with respect to his photography, “[m]y goal has been a feeling for place, for mood, depth, intimacy, grandeur, beauty.” His approach to achieving this goal included an examination of his relationships with those places. He confessed that “I have tried to learn from the mountains, to make pictures that reflect, even in some small degree, their heart and soul (or perhaps more truthfully, mine).” It was through this communion with “a landscape both complex and beautiful,” that Cornish explored the edges of his own image making form. He acknowledged that his exploration of the “wildest edge of edges” had an impact on him and his photography. Cornish declared that “[o]n the way, I have discovered a new level of patience, application and acceptance to fulfill my ideas of what makes a picture.” His pictures of the Scottish Highlands confirm Galen Rowell’s conclusion that “[t]he most interesting parts of the natural world are the edges, places where ocean meets land, meadow meets forest, timberline touches the heights.” Or known meets unknown.

One foundational aspect of form in landscape photography must be place. Place is typically integral to most of the outcomes landscape photographers seek. Place has its place, even for intimate landscape images. Ultimately, we strive to present to the viewer our interpretation of, engagement with and emotional responses to the places we go, whether or not we reveal or make recognizable those places in our images. We do this, in part, in order to arouse in the viewer an engagement with and an emotional response to an image—their own interpretation of our experience in that place. We do this, at a basic level, to transform an image from a deliberate documentary representation of a place into a presentation of our intention to create something more, that is, to make art. Photographers must, at a fundamental level, ardently engage with the places in which we work. This is critical to best achieving translation of our interpretations to our audience. Engagement must go beyond that afforded through the intermediaries of camera and lens to foster and grow our relationships with the places we go. “To try to cover the relationship of photography to our serious reactions to nature,” as Wright suggests, remains “the most important consideration” when making photographs. Our relationships with Place and the places we go warrant diligent and continual examination.

Place is a cornerstone of the form for all outdoor expressive photography. As a documentary instrument, the camera must adhere to a certain, if not comprehensive, fealty to the “reality.” That fealty is informed by “how film sees the world.” We are bound to a considerable degree within the “reality” of the places we encounter. From the scenery to weather and atmosphere, to the topography and accessibility, to seasonal changes of rebirth in spring, summer’s boom, the decay of autumn and winter’s icy deprivation, these aspects of place frame our efforts. For those of us who, over time, visit and revisit in order to explore the same places again and again, we do so in lockstep with the incessant march of entropy. Blemishes of time appear and leave scars that add or take away from the character of the face of the land. Even after we leave, we are bound to a place as we move to the next phases of photography. We are not afforded the latitude of J.M.W. Turner or Richard Wilson or Thomas Cole—or any landscape painter. While processing an image one may be able to remove or even add features and qualities lacking in the field, we must be true to a greater degree to what was or was not present in the field. Exceptions abound and the degree of allegiance to the “reality” of any given place any photographer carries through to the final image is personal.

Place is more than the physical space—the landscape—from which we build images. Place encompasses all that is beyond the lens. It includes one’s relationship and engagement with place beyond mere photography. It involves not only those things that you can see, but the history of the place, the uses put to it, if any, and any threat or benefit those uses pose to a place. Place for the expressive outdoor photographer includes the smells and sounds encountered and the feelings evoked in that environment at any given moment. It also includes the photographer’s engagement with the creative process when in a given place. It includes and is shaped by our hopes and the purposes we bring to a given place. The expectations we carry into a place are included. Creative engagement with a place encompasses one's ability and desire to bring into the frame—or leave out of it—their expectations, thoughts, emotions, sentiments and history with a place. The importance of the attributes of any given place is up to the photographer. All these and more encompass the essence of Place in outdoor expressive photography. This process, this engagement with Place, is an important part of the form we must examine in order to push our photography to the realm of magic beyond the “wildest edge of edges.” But how? The inimitable nature writer Barry Lopez, in his short essay A Literature of Place, provides a wealth of insight into fruitful engagement with Place and the places we go.

Lopez was “a lyrical writer who steeped himself in Arctic wildernesses, the habitats of wolves and exotic landscapes around the world for award-winning books that explored the kinship of nature and human culture.” Author of the acclaimed Arctic Dreams: Imagination and Desire in a Northern Landscape, Lopez, in A Literature of Place, submits that,

[i]f you're intimate with a place, a place with whose history you're familiar, and you establish an ethical conversation with it, the implication that follows is this: the place knows you're there. It feels you. You will not be forgotten, cut off, abandoned. . . . How can a person obtain this? How can you occupy a place and also have it occupy you? How can you find such a reciprocity? The key, I think, is to become vulnerable to a place. If you open yourself up, you can build intimacy. Out of such intimacy may come a sense of belonging, a sense of not being isolated in the universe. . . . A succinct way to describe the frame of mind one should bring to a landscape is to say it rests on the distinction between imposing and proposing one's views. With a sincere proposal you hope to achieve an intimate, reciprocal relationship that will feed you in some way. To impose your views from the start is to truncate such a possibility, to preclude understanding.

This is a frame of mind I try to bring into all places I visit including Poland Brook Wildlife Management Area, where the images here were made. Poland Brook is an area I have explored scores of times since I first went there in the summer of 2020, many times without my camera. Being there evokes emotions difficult to articulate but to which I have been drawn to most of my life. When in them, including Poland Brook, I pursue the vulnerability Lopez speaks of so as to build an intimacy and form a reciprocity that can serve to enhance my experience and find “a sense of belonging, a sense of not being isolated in the universe.” Photography only enhances that sense of belonging even after I leave.