Artistic Statement

The Impressionists: I first discovered Monet as I child of around eight or nine years old. Somehow I was fascinated by his bold brush strokes, the abundant and seemingly - at my age - free use of colour, by the emotions his paintings (and those of his contemporaries) released in me. But the other half of my brain - the rational side that deals with logic and structure - well, it was not entirely satisfied. How best to describe my dilemma? I’m not entirely sure that I can but the first analogy that springs to mind is a wonderfully smelling, looking - and indeed tasty - soup that has no bowl; there is no form to contain this heady brew. I need some structure, a container if you will, otherwise everything simply spills over. Abstraction, it seems, has clearly identifiable boundaries in my world.

First Steps: It was around that time that I received my first camera and started taking photos. Apart from the usual holiday snaps one might expect from a ten year old boy I also experimented a little with structure and form; but I never strayed too far from “reality”. Shadows proved to be an early fascination, especially strong diagonals. (Even today I actively seek scenes that include shadows, as evidenced by some of the photos in this portfolio; often they are strong secondary elements within the compositions.)

Trials and Tribulations: Photos taken during my teenage years were predominantly documentary, both in their nature and also style; all too often they (unfortunately) exhibited a distinct lack of technique, but that’s another story. I did not invest the time to overcome these shortcomings and, sometime in my early twenties, I simply lost interest and stopped actively using a camera except to record specific events such as trips and holidays. Fast forward a few decades: a combination of more time on my hands, a personal crises partly (though not entirely) triggered by a failed relationship - and a few other events - led to a renewed interest in photography. Suddenly I experienced taking - making! - photos as more of an art form, an outlet to express sometimes intense emotions that I was otherwise unable to translate into words. In short, something quite different from - and therefore a counterbalance to - my “rational” life as a professional engineer.

Technique: After selecting a composition I strive to create a photograph that reflects my emotions at the time the camera shutter was released. I try not to analyse these emotions at the time of capture as I do not want to interrupt the flow with rational thoughts and internal debates, and thereby risk killing the moment. Usually it is just a feeling, intuition if you will, that causes me to stop and get out my camera. I then hope, though not always with success, that these emotions will reveal themselves during subsequent post-processing on a computer. (Currently I only use digital cameras but maybe one day I will return to analogue.) I always try to let an initial idea crystallise somewhat before processing the image. However, I do not stick dogmatically to the idea if I feel my subconscious is saying something else. Often I will re-visit a photo over a period of several months before deciding when it is “finished” - if it ever is - as I find the passage of time influences my perspective.

So there you have it: one part of me requires an overall structure but within those boundaries I move freely, not tied to any particular photographic genre although - for whatever reason - I seem to prefer photographing objects that don’t move*.

*The irony of this last statement is that some photos in my portfolio were created using a slow shutter speed while moving the camera, a technique often referred to as ICM, or in-camera motion. The resulting images are blurred but the initial form remains recognisable - my soup needs a bowl! :-)