I recently read a series of posts on The Online Photographer blog asserting that photographs should be based on “ideas” and that disparaged photography that was the result of just going out wandering and snapping “whatever catches the photographer’s eye”. The contention was that in order to have meaning, a photograph has to be based on an idea that the photographer has and then makes a photograph to represent. I take exception to that.
The majority of my work is not based on 'ideas'. I once did a series of cemetery angels*, but I tired of looking for a specific subject matter that fit the idea. I explore my environment like the old ditty about the bear that went over the mountain to see what he could see. I found that looking for specific subjects that fit a preconceived idea distracted me from being open to what was right in front of me.
I call myself a visual omnivore because I photograph a variety of things I am attracted to. I go out for a drive, a walk, or a hike and I take my camera, just in case I see something. What 'catches my eye' as the blogger says. It could be the way light falls on something, its color, reflections, and the way it is situated to make a well-composed image. Some aspect of my immediate environment that asks to be noticed and photographed.
Yesterday I was walking for exercise in the field house of a local college and at one point walking around the track I spotted a ball on the floor inside the netting that separated the track from the basketball courts in the center. The skin of the ball was torn and the netting was partly lifted in an inverted V that framed the ball. I didn't have a camera but did have my cell phone and made a photo with that. No 'idea', just looking... being present without preconceptions.
Ideas are a fine basis for commercial work but I feel curiosity is a better basis for meaningful images without an agenda. Many of the early ‘greats’ of photography worked intuitively, capturing moments as they encountered them. Gretchen Garner called it photography as witness in her book “Disappearing Witness” to chronicle the shift from discovery to conceptual photography.
I have a video of conversations with Jay Maisel** whose personal work approach is much the same. It is more about curiosity and wonder than 'an idea'. The world around us is full of things that are visually interesting if we make a habit of being open and noticing them. The photographs you make may give rise to ideas you hadn’t considered before making them. There are times I will make no photographs for days or weeks but it because I am distracted and not being curious. You don't need an idea or a prompt to make photographs. You just need to 'be curious', and have a camera handy even if it is just your phone.
*https://jimbullard.zenfolio.com/p311862634
**Jay Maisel was a commercial/stock photographer for many years. He authored two books on his approach to photography, “It’s Not About the F-Stop” and “Light, Gesture & Color”. I have both in paperback. Both are still available on Amazon. I recommend them.
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