ยฉ Kwame Brathwaite
A Definition Will Not Save Your Work
Sooner or later, a moment arrives when definitions stop being helpful. Street photographer, documentarian, artist. At first they serve a purpose. They orient you, help you explain yourself, give others a way to place you. Then, slowly, they start to weigh you down. They become a frame that comes before the image, instead of emerging from it.
Many photographers oscillate between two opposite positions. Some feel the need to define themselves precisely, as if a role could guarantee seriousness, legitimacy, coherence. Others reject any definition, as if ambiguity itself were a form of freedom. In reality, both positions can function as defenses. One clarifies too early. The other avoids real exposure.
The problem is not choosing a word. The problem begins when that word turns into a shield. When it is used to explain the images instead of testing them. When saying โitโs documentaryโ is enough to suspend judgment, or โitโs artisticโ is enough to remove it from any questioning. At that point, the definition no longer accompanies the work. It protects it.
In editorial work, this becomes evident very quickly. Some images hold only as long as they are supported by a role. Without that label, they lose weight, because they have not built an autonomous relationship with the viewer. Others, instead, continue to function even when you donโt know what to call them. Not because they are vague, but because they have taken a position before taking on a category.
Perhaps the issue is not deciding what you are. It is understanding whether your photographs could stand on their own if you stopped saying it. If you remove the name, the context, the declared intention, does something remain that holds? Or is there only the need to be explained?
When a photograph needs a definition to exist, it is often asking for protection. When it manages to stand without one, ambiguity stops being an escape. It becomes a real risk. And there, finally, there is nothing left to hide behind.
Marco Savarese
Editor-in-Chief
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Marco Savarese
Marco Savarese is Editor-in-Chief at Eyeshot, the independent publisher he founded in Italy in 2018. He spends most of his year reading portfolios, judging the Open Call, and editing the magazine catalogue. The reading desk is open, and he takes one-to-one Professional Reviews from photographers working seriously on long-term projects.
Who Finishes Your Photograph
NOTE #210. A photo isn’t finished until it survives to where people see it. Paul Strand chose hand photogravure for Photographs of Mexico so the printed copy kept the tonal weight of his prints. Protect the tone to the end, or the worst medium decides for you.
What the Dark Does
NOTE #209. A face lost in shadow reads as underexposed, a defect to fix. Gordon Willis kept Brando’s eyes in the dark in The Godfather and held it against the studio. Before you rescue a shadow, ask what it does; if you can say it, you decided it.
The Place After
NOTE #208. Of a huge event, often only an ordinary place is left. In On This Site (1996) Joel Sternfeld photographed fifty banal American places where violence happened, each with a line of text. Photograph the aftermath, and let the line do the work.
The Photo Made Together
NOTE #206. Street photography teaches you to steal people; there’s another way. In Malick Sidibรฉ’s Bamako studio the youth chose how to be seen. Before you take someone, ask how they’d want to look, and make the photo together.
Write Your Own Rules
NOTE #205. The thing that improves you most isn’t a new camera, it’s a short list of your own faults. Tony Ray-Jones kept a notebook of orders to himself and it shaped Martin Parr. Write your three rules and keep them in your pocket.
Watch the Master Work
NOTE #204. You don’t learn from a master’s finished prints, you learn from watching them work. In 1962 Joel Meyerowitz watched Robert Frank shoot, quit his job that day, and picked up a camera. Watch the body, not the result.
The Work Before the Name
NOTE #203. The worth of a photo and the worth of the byline are two different things. Koudelka shot the 1968 Prague invasion anonymously as ‘P.P.’ and revealed it sixteen years later. Photograph what must be photographed even when no one will know it was you.
The Subject You Run From
NOTE #202. The strongest subject you have is the one you’d rather not photograph. Ishiuchi Miyako went back to Yokosuka, the occupied base town she was taught to fear, and made it her life’s work. Point the camera where it’s uncomfortable.