18 Jan The Universal Language of Photography
Photography to me is arguably a language in its own right. It opens up the feeling side of communicating, which is why I love to do and share it. It means you can switch off the usual narrative that tends to crop up when focusing on everyday life and, for me, at least sense that wonderful feeling of timelessness. Most efforts to intellectualise images are fruitless as far as the true essence of the message may be concerned and are, at best are a collection of words to convey a feeling that by its very nature should already be accessible upon viewing the photographer’s message lying within the photographs themselves, and may even contain a divine message that does not do well when analysed. As such, translating the language found in a photograph into English or any language is of course lost in the translation to a large degree. Sometimes the less said, the better, and the more that is felt in energy from the pictures the better, and the more understanding on a deeper level can be achieved, possibly positively influencing the subconscious within and ideally leaving the viewer lifted and better off from the experience. On occasions, it may be helpful to guide the viewer towards the photographer’s vision. However, this may also take the viewers down a certain overthought path, depending on the photographer. Each person brings a very different subjective interpretation of life from their particular view, which is, of course, because of one’s experiences and subconscious conditioned understanding. A photographer’s job, as I see it certainly to me as a fine art documentary photographer, is to cut through our conditioned past as best we can and breathe new life into the finished prints as a vision of some future worthwhile feeling that can be brought forward to our awareness in the now so all can benefit.