Since the first known photograph was captured in 1826 by French inventor Nicéphore Niépce, the craft many of us love and work with has been evolving. Never quite so fast as it has in the past three decades, however.
Daguerreotypes, black and white slides, the invention of colour and Kodak, the Polaroid, onto digital, phone technology, social media, editing processes, AI and everything in-between. The currency of our craft is in constant question and yet there are so many truths that remain.
Aspects of what we do as Masters of our craft that we always will hold close. The nuance of our language that threads together what we see and how it makes us feel, just as the smell of our Mum’s perfume or the taste of a favourite elder’s baking transports us back to childhood. How the shift of air temperature tells us the season is changing or the emotive charge of a fellow human we adore filters from our heart to down to our fingers.
There are triggers to the human condition which serve as return tickets to feelings and adventures gone by, photographs nestle in amongst the best of them.
And with the camera, our tool, our channel, our pen we’re able to….
Access worlds and moments otherwise inaccessible
Travel across time
Speak across language barriers
Remind us of forgotten moments
Reassure us of what we have done and what we can achieve
Fill gaps of memory
Sell an idea or a lifestyle
Educate and support in ways words can not
Inform us of life and nuance in other parts of the world
Frame the world in a new way
Bring those who left us back into sight
The currency of our craft may be momentarily shifting, once again, however the depth and strength of it will always remain.
We’re a resilient lot, you know
And if you’re feeling the wobble, live by the words of Oprah Winfrey:
‘Become so skilled
So vigilient
So flat out fantastic
At what you do that your talent can not be dismissed.’
Look to the light,
CW x