The Online Photographer

I was very enamored of a certain idea when I was a "yoot" (youth). It was probably inspired by Henri Cartier-Bresson, and a little bit by Nicholas Nixon (who, inconveniently, publicly embarrassed himself later in life and lost his teaching gig and some of his cred as one of the good guys, but who was dedicated, inventive, and inspiring in his own yoot—he visited and spoke when he had a show at the Corcoran Museum during my student years). I got this notion that I would remove gear from my photography, and make up for it in technique, skill, and hard work. I would use a cheap camera and an ordinary 50mm lens, ordinary "fast" (ASA 400) B&W film, the universal standard developer D-76, and make full-frame prints, including the blackline, the filed-out edges of the negative carrier, on 8x10 paper. Pretty much what any beginning photo student in those days used. I called it my "Photo 101 Technique." But I would master it so thoroughly that it would transcend its limitations. That was the idea. (Yoots can be idealistic, with a dollop of foolishness slapped on.)

And then, inspired by Eugene Atget, I would just continue using that same technique for my whole life. That appealed to me strongly for some reason. I liked the idea of going my own way, I guess. Here's a portion of Atget's bio at the National Gallery of Art website:

Atget's equipment was simple. Because clear, sharp details were necessary to his work, Atget used a large view camera that held 7 x 9 inch glass negatives, standard when he began to photograph but antiquated by the end of his career, when smaller and more versatile cameras were available. He developed the negatives in his workroom and contact-printed them in sunlight on the roof of his apartment building. He usually printed on albumen papers, even well after most photographers had abandoned the process in favor of platinum and silver papers.

When he started out, his equipment was mildly obsolescent. At the end of his life, it was obsolete, if not antiquarian. But he soldiered on. I loved that.

I wrote a one-page manifesto of my own intentions and lovingly re-wrote it a number of times until it was just so. I was very fond of it for a while. Most of all I loved the feeling of having my ambitions clear and settled. There can be great satisfaction in working your ideas until your decisions are fully thought-through. You know you've made the right decision because of the feeling of rightness and clarity you get when you arrive at the correct solution.

I needed one thing to happen, though, and I wasn't sure that it would: for 35mm film photography to become obsolete! Back in those days, I couldn't quite see that happening.

Of course it did happen, eventually—which you would think was lucky for me and my early ambitions. But not so much. By then I was writing about photography, and you can't ignore new developments if you expect to write coherently about something. And life, by which I mainly mean penury and having to live as a nomad, kept interrupting my work anyway. Not to mention alcoholism (now long in remission). Digital interrupted and fractured my photographic work significantly, but it wasn't all digital's fault—I mostly have my own laziness and lack of foresight, dedication, and determination to blame.

And to think, I could have done it. They still make Tri-X. You can still buy photosensitive paper. The cameras still work. There's no real reason I couldn't have worked that way till this day. I just didn't have enough fight in me.

Naturally, that half-inspired, half-boneheaded youthful idea dimmed and slipped away over the years. I'm okay with that. I got more consistently rewarded for writing, and got less reward for my photography. What the culture encourages you to do tends to be what you do. The fork in the road led the way it did. But I still think of that "future that never was" from time to time...and you know what they say: Oh well! 

Mike

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Featured Comments from:

Mark: "I have always been jealous of Michael Kenna's ability to stick with his Hasselblad and darkroom printing at the same size for his entire career. I often think I would have been financially and artistically better off to stick to what I used in 1975. I'm not sure my current output is any better. Wow, that's a reality check to admit that. Not sure I enjoy it anymore either."