In this week’s activity I chose to briefly explore the questions of time and motion and their relation to photography.  Still photographers images record historical events; i.e. since they are not viewed in real time as they are happening they are consequently historical records.  Physics and specifically astrophysics demonstrates most clearly the time lag in an image’s recording of events. Similarly the physics of light transmission and camera design dictate a the limits of our abilities to create the perception of stopped motion when in fact virtually every subject is actually in motion (if only at the atomic level) that is beyond our level of perception.

For the week’s forum discussion we were asked find a piece of work other than a photograph that had some kind of link to our own practice or research interests, and explain why we chose it and how it relates to our own work.  I chose the items below because the relate closely to my interests and the direction I wish to pursue in my research, while at the same time serving as a bit of inspiration and explanation of why I am part of this programme.

The following paragraphs were excepted from a 19 Dec 2017 article in the online magazine Good Nature Travel; The Official Travel Blog of Natural Habitat Adventures and the WWF written by Candice Gaukel Andrews.  In it she quotes author Terry Tempest Williams 2012 book  When Women Were Birds: Fifty-Four Variations on Voice.

http://goodnature.nathab.com/bird-years-and-the-year-of-the-bird-2018/

We are all birds

In her 2012 book When Women Were Birds: Fifty-Four Variations on Voice, author and environmental activist Terry Tempest Williams wrote, “Once upon a time, when women were birds, there was the simple understanding that to sing at dawn and to sing at dusk was to heal the world through joy. The birds still remember what we have forgotten, that the world is meant to be celebrated.”

So while our birds still sing, I hope we will all join in the celebration of 2018 as the Year of the Bird. But, while we’re doing that, let’s remember that those tuneful voices that lift us in our darkest hours are the ones that we humans are actively working to silence once again, possibly for forever.

Here’s to finding your true places and natural habitats,

Candy

Terry Tempest Williams in the same book also wrote the following:

“To be read.  To be heard. To be seen. I want to be read.  I want to be heard.  I don’t need to be seen.  To write requires an ego, a belief that what you say matters.  Writing also requires an aching curiosity leading you to discover, uncover, what is gnawing at your bones.  Words have a weight to them.  How you chose to present them and to whom is a matter of style and choice.”

The follow is excepted from 15 Dec 2017 article, How Birds Bind Us, in the Audubon Society online magazine by Mark Jannot. http://www.audubon.org/news/how-birds-bind-us

The way the artists and the entire community in upper Harlem have come together around the murals (and have spread the word about the threats to birds) has been inspiring, but it really shouldn’t be seen as surprising. Not, at this point, to me anyway. In the nearly five years I’ve served as the editor-in-chief of Audubon, I’ve seen a zillion amazing and wide-ranging examples of people coming together and rallying around birds, from volunteers with New York City Audubon monitoring (and, when necessary, shutting down) the memorial 9/11 spotlights to save migrating birds, to people recreating habitats and even entire islands for their benefit, to using them as aids for bringing struggling veterans back from the brink.

I find great pleasure in birds; observing them, listening to them and photographing them.  Their presence reassures me that things are right in my little piece of the world at that moment in time.  Birds are present across the globe from pole to pole and everywhere in between.  Some have adapted to the harshest places on the planet while others have found a way to live in close proximity to humans in the most urbanized and industrialized places on Earth.  Yet for many humans, birds are nearly invisible.  There are 574 recognized species in the UK (RSPB) and 810 in North America (Sibley), and I would venture most people would not recognize more than a few species.

2018 is the 100th anniversary of the Migratory Bird Treaty Act and 2018 has been designated by National Geographic and the Audubon Society as the Year of the Bird.  Birds are a bellwether of our environment. Thomas Lovejoy, Biologist and founder of the idea of Biodiversity said “If you take care of the birds, you take care of most of the environmental problems of the world.”  Recent legislative changes in the US have served to once again put birds at risk, and the unchecked impacts of plastic pollution and climate change caused by humans is putting additional stress on bird populations.  Audubon research indicates 314 species are endangered due to climate change alone.

The focus of my work is intertwined with biology (ornithology specifically), ecology and the environment, and could conceivably contribute to discourse on the importance of preserving biodiversity and the impacts of human actions on it.  For me this represents a closing of the circle that began with my secondary school and undergraduate work as a biologist and ornithologist. 

Mrs. Williams paragraph about writers can equally apply to photographers.  Photos also carry weight and great photographers share that same aching desire for discovery with writers.  I am in this course in large measure to find my voice as a photographer, and to find a way to have my work merit being seen and “heard”, to matter.  Birds are still singing, but I fear too many people are not listening. I hope in finding my photographers voice, I will be able to use it to get a few more people to listen.

I grew up wanting to fly and I have had the privilege (albeit with some mechanical assistance) to experience the freedom of flight; to dive, to soar, to dance among the clouds and race across the treetops.  I have been a bird and wish everyone could know that joy.

I wrote the first post after watching and reading the module presentations from notes I made, but before I had read the Talis Reading list material.  Having now finished those I find my initial notions largely reinforced and am drawn to the conclusion that it is highly unlikely there is such a thing as a true “Global Image.”  While some photographs may have broader and therefore more global appeal than others is undeniable, but to paraphrase P.T. Barnum;  you can please some of the people some of the time, but you can not please all of the people all of the time.

I have the luxury in some regards of having 64 + years of life experience, and while as 20 ungraduated student I found it difficult to form and articulate my own opinions, I find no such difficulty now.  My diverse experiences as a scientist and biologist by education, a career Naval Officer and Naval Aviator by opportunity, an Aerospace Engineer and Program Manager almost by accident, a management consultant by choice, a world ranked internationally competitive amateur golfer by determination and love of the game, and lifelong passionate photographer by avocation have taught me many lessons.

Among the most important of those lessons is that there are very few absolutes in this world, and that the proper answer to nearly every question (certainly those questions of any weight) is “it depends.”  What does this have to do with “The Global Image” and my photography practice?  It seems to me while a photographer may have had an intention in capturing an image, it is quite possible those intentions may be missed in part or entirely by the consumers of the image and people in the middle of the consumption chain can entirely distort the original intention simply by where and how the image is published and around what it is portrayed. Once images leave our hands, we as photographers have little control over how they will viewed.  And so, it seems that the idea of a global image “depends” not only on the subject and the way in which it was captured, but in who is looking at it and where it is being viewed.  So as not to put too fine a point on it I offer an example in the extreme.  A photo of the internees of the Nazi Death Camps would be viewed as evidence of a horrific injustice and time in history by most people who possess even a modest amount of humanity.  However, put that identical photo on the wall of a White Nationalist meeting house and it likely is celebrated and viewed as evidence of a great period of dominance to which they would like to return.  Thus we find ourselves at the precipice of the proverbial slippery slope when we try to make objective judgements on a topic that is largely subjective.  Beauty or ugliness is ultimately inn the eye of the beholder.

What does this do to inform my own practice?  It is of course early days and I reserve the right to change my opinion as time goes on and I continue to learn more about myself and my craft as a photographer.  Nevertheless, I believe it will require that I approach my practice as I have come to approach the other aspects of my life.  I intend to pursue my practice, as much as possible, with kindness, consideration, compassion, and honesty about and for my subjects and my surroundings, and perhaps most importantly, that the results of my work please me technically and aesthetically.  If I am able to achieve these things I will consider my work a success, and if it happens that others derive some pleasure or useful information from my work it will be a bonus.