Reconnecting With "Older" Wisdom in a World of eBooks

For years, dating back to the early 90s, a good friend of mine (a co-worker on my "day job," fellow physicist, and part-time artist) and I have enjoyed a weekly lunch followed by a short sojourn to a neighborhood Borders book store (now defunct of course) or one of a few local Barnes and Nobles. Now, unfortunately (at least for us "oldies" who were weaned on the feel and smell of a good book), the writing seems on the wall for Barnes and Nobles to follow Borders' lead: recent reports indicate that the lone remaining brick & mortar national bookstore chain is about to embark on a plan that will close 100s of its stores. 

Though hardly a surprise, with Kindles and Nooks nearly as ubiquitous as smart phones these days, I must admit a profound sadness at the prospect of living in a physical-bookstore-less world. (I can only imagine the tragic depths of melancholy Borges would have been forced to endure in this "new" bookless world, had he lived this long - though, with an inevitable touch of irony, since the great conjurer of the infinite multiverse of libraries  himself possessed only a humble little bookshelf of books). 

Oh, I know all the familiar counterarguments, from, "Mom and Pop bookstores will never die"  to "second-hand bookstores will only grow" as the market for such "relics" inevitably expands (at least for a generation, like mine, that will always need a tactile reminder or two of a bygone era). There is also the happy reality that books - as literal purveyors of information - will truly never cease to be, but be merely transformed into something magical (as is already happening with a proliferation of "Borgesian" interactive hybrids of words, images, and videos). eBooks are a kind of living, self-transforming, digital palimpsests of their older tactile, static, cousins. Still, my innate desire to finger through some old dusty, moldy copy of some first edition will never wane.

Which brings me to how these general laments and musings bear on the subject of photography, and the real subject of this blog entry. To wit: I fear that our new eBook era makes it all too easy for young photographers to at best be ignorant of, and at worst, simply ignore, the "dated and / or irrelevant" photographic wisdom of past masters. Brooks Jensen, editor of Lenswork, recently posted a sad story (sad to me) about how a recent MFA photography graduate had no idea who Edward Weston was! 

Debates aside about whether this loss of awareness is real or illusory, or about how really "important" it is for one to be aware of the history of one's craft, whatever that craft, my perception is that the photography eBooks being published nowadays are rarely reprints of "older classics" (by and /or about past masters). For example, there are no eBook versions - that I am aware of - of any of Ansel Adams' classic texts (The Camera, The Negative, The Print); or of Weston's Daybooks; or even of, say, a relatively modern biography of an old master, such as, say, Alfred Steiglitz (written by Stieglitz's grand-neice, Sue Davidson Lowe).

Still, there is hope, and some notable exceptions. One is a magnificent recent book by Andrea Stillman that provides the behind-the-scenes stories of 20 of Adams' most significant images (Stillman was Ansel Adams' assistant in the 1970s): Looking at Ansel Adams: The Photographs and the Man. Although published in hardcover (with great reproductions, including comparisons of how Adams' printing "eye" and aesthetics evolved over the years), Stillman's book is arguably even better in eBook form - available as an iBook for iPads and iPhones. The eBook provides audio, video, and links to additional material that only enhances the readers enjoyment of what is already a fine book. Kudos to Little, Brown and Company (the publishers) for bringing such a wonderful volume on Adams' work into the eBook age.

Another kudos goes to Allworth Press, which published in 2006 a wonderful collection of essays by and about "classic" photographers (already an anachronism for modern-day MFA students;-) called The Education of a Photographer; and who, more recently, released an eBook version of the book for the Kindle. I recommend it highly for students of photography (as well as to established modern photographers who want to discover or reacquaint themselves with the wisdom of past masters).

A third great book (albeit by more of a latter-day-master than a Weston or Adams era master) that now appears in both physical and iBook form is The Art of Photography: An Approach to Personal Expression by Bruce Barnbaum (one of our generation's most gifted photographers and printers). I still have a dogeared version of the book from back when its first or second version  appeared in the 80s. It is a stapled mess (I say that affectionately), contains no pictures, but is filled to the brim with timeless wisdom about the art and craft of photography. Barnbaum's deep insights into photography have now been brought more-or-less up-to-date (including a chapter or two on Photoshop, though these have the feel of "let's tag  this on for analog / darkroom veterans who want to whet their feet just a bit") and are a veritable steal at $12!

As I refocus my attention on my blog over the coming weeks and months (I have been "away" since Dec of last year completing the Russian edition of my dad's biography - multiple copies of which are on their way to the Taganrog museum in Taganrog, Russia as I type, to which my mom and I bequeathed 35 of my dad's works -  and completing my Synesthetic Landscapes portfolio, which I am happy to report will be published in the extended DVD edition of Lenswork #105 in the next month or so), I plan on devoting some time to reviewing / discussing several photography-related books that are a bit "off the beaten" path; i.e., books that are not necessarily something one would find on shelves at the the soon-to-be-closed Barnes and Noble store but which would be of interest to the dedicated photographer. Stay tuned.

New Book Published: The Art and Life of Sam Ilachinski

After nearly as long a gestation-period as my first book required (that one, published in 2001, was on a decidedly technical subject - cellular automata - and took about a decade to complete), I am delighted to announce the publication of a new book - this one very much about fine art - about my dad's life. 

"I like to paint," is how my dad - Sam ("Slava") Ilachinski - almost always answered the question, "What do you do?", along with the minor variation, "I liked to paint," if asked about what he remembered about his childhood. These simple phrases serve as perfect epitaphs to this preternaturally gifted artist, who spent virtually all of his 75 years creating magnificent works of art. 

Born in 1925 in Taganrog, Russia (birthplace of Anton Chekov), my dad's family lived in Germany before emigrating to the United States. Making homes first in Jamaica, NY, and later in Sea Cliff, Long Island, Slava became a renowned and much sought-after art restorer, and an even more gifted artist. Many expert observers have likened his more abstract work (that he focused more and more on in the waning years of his life) as an additional layer to Kandinsky's already transcendent vision of color and energy. 

Sadly, almost incomprehensibly, my dad passed away on March 30, 2002, after a very long and painful bout with several forms of cancer. Seldom has a soul so bravely fought the miseries of this disease, or faced each new setback with as profound a grace and humor. Despite his enormous physical difficulties, Slava never strayed too far from his beloved studio, even as the already brief stretches of time his poor withered legs were able to support him kept right on diminishing. 

Everyone who has known this brilliant and humble man knows that they are forever blessed with the memory of a soul who, via his art, brought all of us a step closer to God. His eye for beauty, his deep resonance with nature's sacred patterns, and his gentle humility will be missed more than words alone can possibly convey. 

Many artists have come and gone, of course, and many creative people remain in our midst, but never again will the world's beauty be quite so radiant, and the portal to the spiritual realm quite so wide and inviting, as when this quiet, visionary genius was immersed and reveling in the creative process in his studio. 

My mom and I offer this book on the art and life of Sam Ilachinski both as a loving tribute to a beautiful soul, and as a portal for others to discover - and marvel at - the precious gifts he left behind.

The Art and Life of Sam Ilachinski by Katherine and Andy Ilachinski | Make Your Own Book

Postscript. In a bit of Jungian synchronicity (insofar as it was completely unplanned, at least consciously, by me), after nearly a decade of effort - writing, archiving, digitizing (old slides and film), restoring old pictures, and so on - the final words of the text and images for display were inserted midday on father's day, this past Sunday. My muse could not possibly have chosen any better day to mark the formal completion of this labor-of-love project.

Photographs Not Taken

Astute readers may have noticed that not too many new blog entries have appeared here in the last few weeks. The reason, as always, is due to the constraints imposed on my life outside of photography (the side that pays most of my family's bills, by far;-) The two sides rarely interact, though on occasion - and usually unexpectedly - partly intersect. Such as happened yesterday, when - while being introduced to speak at a scientific meeting (on a distinctly non-photography related subject) - the person doing the introduction turned to me and asked whether my slides will include samples of my photography? My mind was so far from photography at that moment (indeed, I was deeply immersed in my usual minute-before-giving-a-talk inner meditation ritual), that I hardly reacted at all and certainly had no idea what to say. I managed to stammer something banal like, "No, no, that's just something I do on the side." Which is, of course, both literally true (if one measures such things in terms of "time spent"), and emphatically false (if the metric is "soulful nourishment gained").

However, neither metrics nor the "scientific talk" I gave yesterday is the focus of this short (and new!) blog entry. My wish is merely to point out a wonderful little book - called Photographs Not Taken - whose subject and insights are very apropos, given the recent constraints on my ability to do photography. The book is a collection of short essays - by a wide range of photographers - about moments in space and time that never became photographs! Oh, how well I (as all photographers can, at one time or another) resonate with those moments. Maybe we've forgotten our camera, or our tripod, or filter; maybe our camera froze at an inopportune moment; maybe the subject of our gaze shifted its position, or flew away, as we were preparing to take the picture; maybe a gust of wind blew that perfectly composed image into the mists of time, or that sudden burst of sun from behind a cloud ruined the perfect exposure. Or maybe, as has been the case for me for more than a few weeks now, everything is in its proper place and perfect working order except me. Lately, my mind has been so filled - and exhausted - from day-job angst, equations, computer code, briefing slides, and more angst, that about the only images I've managed to capture have been quick-grab iPhone images of some older prints of mine I have hanging in my office to send to a friend.

So, Photographs Not Taken well summarizes my body of work over the last several weeks ;-) But it also reminds me of other genuine "Photographs Not Taken" moments I experienced in the past, when, even though I was in the right state of mind and soul, and had perfectly well functioning camera and gear by my side, the photograph I wanted to take - the photograph I needed to take - I did not take, and is now gone forever. The photograph I am thinking of - more precisely the series of photographs I could easily have taken and never did - happened between 25 and 30 years ago, when my dad (an art restorer / artist) was still in his prime and worked at home in his upstairs studio. Except for this one precious photograph, I do not have any other visual record of my dad working as an art restorer in his studio! I have written before about this being the single greatest regret in my life as a photographer (thus far); namely, that I had never trained my eye and camera on my dad while he worked in his studio. A regret that stings only deeper each year that passes since he passed away 10 years ago.

Readers interested enough to look up the essays in Photographs Not Taken will be treated to many stories similar to mine, that range from whimsical, to personal, to tragic. Of course, the book contains no photographs (at least of the conventional variety ;-) and even the typesetting is kept to a bare minimum, the focus being squarely on the stories themselves. Collectively, these wonderful stories teach us what we must do to become better photographers. They remind us that we are - in each and every moment of our lives - immersed in an infinite field of ever-changing extraordinary and timeless images; and the fact that we have or have not a camera, or want or do not want or cannot use it, hardly even matters. Just look, revel in what you feel, and remember.

Wynn Bullock: Color Light Abstractions

"Light to me is perhaps the most profound truth in the universe. My thinking has been deeply affected by the belief that everything is some form of radiant energy." - Wynn Bullock (1905 - 1975)

Wynn  Bullock is arguably one of the greatest fine-art photographers to have graced our world with his soulful mind, heart, and eye. He is also one of three photographers (of a bygone generation, relative to mine) that I deeply lament not having had the opportunity to meet and get to know personally (the other two being Ansel Adams and Minor White). Though I was certainly alive when Bullock passed away (and I was already "taking pictures"), I was but a young lad of 15, and had yet to appreciate the Buddhist transience of life and everything precious in it. Plenty of time to "get to know the greats..." (or so I thought)

How would my creative life have been different - what alternative paths would I have taken - had there been a chance to learn - and possibly muse with - such extraordinary artists; whose work I have learned to respect and resonate with on ever deeper levels as I grow into the late summer of my own life? Adams first showed me how nature can be seen as its own transcendent reality. And White how the best photographs are those whose "outer appearance" reflect one's "inner perceptions." But it was Bullock, whose work I came to know and admire deeply a few years after studying Adams and White, who (continues to) pave the way for my own creative journey; one that strives to combine - and transcend - the (nominally pseudo-orthogonal) aesthetic, spiritual, and intellectual dimensions of experience, thought, and reality.

Apart from living in slightly different times (I was born 55 years after Bullock) and different places (he on the west coast, I on the east), and apart from the fact that Bullock's work is well-known to almost all photographers and mine to almost none (outside of family, friends, and an occasional tip-of-the-hat from a kind reader of my blog), our respective histories and creative predilections share a few traits; I therefore feel an especially close affinity towards him. For starters, both of us were married twice, the first time rather unsuccessfully in what was more of a "trial" (in both literal and figurative senses), and not-at-all conducive to producing any kind of art - in Bullock's case, I was saddened to learn that his first wife thought his photography was a waste of time (mine was more understanding); she'd sometimes enter his darkroom to tear up his prints in fits of anger! In both cases, our second marriage found us soul-mates and muses.  Bullock's second marriage led to two girls; mine, to two boys.

The most important traits we share have to do with our photography: (1) we are both opportunistic, taking advantage of family trips and outings more than Ansel-Adams-like dedicated month-long trips away from home (reveling primarily in finding and revealing the transcendent nature of everyday reality), (2) we both incessantly experiment with new modes of visual expression (perpetually seeking that extra "spark" to ignite a new line of aesthetic inquiry), and (3) we both heavily ground our photography in intellectual - sometimes deeply metaphysical - musings (invoking images of time, space, reality, illusion, ...); a fact that should be obvious (on my side, at least) to anyone who has perused just the topics of my blog entries, much less their substance ;-) Bullock's musings may be sampled on his website (lovingly crafted and kept up-to-date by his eldest daughter, Barbara Bullock-Wilson) and in a few of his books that are still available: (1) Wynn Bullock: The Enchanted Landscape, Photographs 1940-1975, (2) Wynn Bullock: Photography a Way of Life, and (3) Wynn Bullock (Aperture Masters of Photography). (Links to other references are provided below).

And so we come to the point of this blog, which is to introduce interested readers to an extraordinary new book of Bullock's color abstracts - Wynn Bullock: Color Light Abstractions - which also serves as a catalog of a traveling exhibition that premiered on May 15, 2010 at the Center for Photographic Art in Carmel,California. I label this book "new" not only because it has only recently been published (in 2010), but because it contains over 50 color light abstractions that have rarely before been seen in public! Though Bullock was primarily a black-and-white photographer (another trait we share), he had experimented heavily, in the late 50s and early 60s, with color. Unsatisfied with the color printing at the time, few outside his family and circle of friends ever saw samples of this work, and even then mostly via slide presentations. Inspired and helped by a close family friend (John Hong Hall, to whom the traveling exhibition is dedicated and whose moving story appears in an afterword to the book), the heirs to (and caretakers of) Bullock's work undertook the prodigious task of organizing, restoring, scanning, and printing 50+ year-old Kodachrome color slides.

I will spare readers a "description" of these images, since whatever pale words I may attach to my "experience" of them will so distort their essence - inevitably altering the meaning the images would convey on their own if viewed by your eyes only - that to do so would be an aesthetic injustice on my part. Suffice to say that this collection of color light abstracts is nothing short of breathtaking! Were one not told of how these surrealistic, other-wordly images came to be (a word or two on that in a second), but was simply presented with the finished portfolio, with only the implicit understanding that the images were obviously produced by a prodigiously gifted photographer, one would be forgiven for believing that it was all "some Photoshop trick," albeit an astoundingly creative - indeed, visionary - one! The fact that these images were produced c.1960 using everyday objects like broken shards of thick colored glass, beads, jewelry, polarizing filters, and both artificial and natural light, makes this already exquisite portfolio all the more remarkable. A short description of his method appears here, and also in a superb 30 min documentary on his life and work, Wynn Bullock: Photographer.

I have written before of heretofore having only three epiphanous reactions to photography monographs, to which I simply went "Wow!" upon seeing, and which fundamentally altered my perceptions of the creative potential of photography as an art form: (1) Bruce Barnbaum's Visual Symphony (in the 1970s), (2) Fay Godwin's Land  (middle 1980s), and (3) John Sexton's Recollections (in 2006). To this short list I must now add a fourth, Wynn Bullock's Color Light Abstractions. This work is, in a word, a masterpiece! 

Additional references: Wynn Bullock's biography appears here, and a sampling of color abstracts that appear in the book appear on this page. A 3-min video may be seen here. A portfolio of some of Bullock's black-and-white images appears in Lenswork Issue #55, available in Adobe pdf). A few books may also be ordered directly from Bullock's website. Other include: Wynn Bullock (Phaidon Press), Wynn Bullock (Scrimshaw Press), Wynn Bullock Photographing the Nude: The Beginnings of a Quest for Meaning, and The Photograph as Symbol. As of this writing, copies of Photography and Philosophy of Wynn Bullock (by Clyde Dilley, published in 1984) are also still available.

Postscript: I stumbled across Bullock's color abstractions somewhat synchronistically (at an age close to Bullock's when he first started experimenting with color), insofar as I have recently also embarked on what has turned out to be a multiyear "color experiment" in (what in my case, I call) "Synesthetic Landscapes" (and that I have discussed before). Though the specifics of our methods differ, like Bullock, I am essentially driven to photograph light itself, not the physical forms that light makes visible or otherwise gives shape and texture to. My "color abstract sources" (thus far, at least) have been impromptu / makeshift "in the field" mini studios consisting of doors or bottles of rum (among many, many other everyday "things"); the best results are eerily reminiscent of the hyperreal dimensions discovered first by Bullock: realms of fluidic time and space, ineffably infused with mysterious luminescent protoforms of life and consciousness ;-)

How Many Unknown / Undiscovered Artists Walk Among Us?

History is replete with lists of names and memorable biographies of the many gifted and talented artists that have graced our world. Indeed, these lists are so long and voluminous (and only growing ever more so), we may sometimes wonder if there are perhaps too many names already on them! But, of course, though not every artist is a Picasso, and not every photographer a Cartier-Bresson, each of us has our own story to tell. Still, very few of us who have - publically at least - accomplished "little" - will ever get mentioned on learned lists that include such names as Picasso and Cartier-Bresson. But what of the "Picassos" that share in Picasso's pool of talent but who no one knows by name, because the output of their creative life was / is confined but to a handful of family and friends? What of the prodigiously talented but utterly unrecognized Uber-geniuses that walk among us? As history also attests, the only real difference between "known" and "unknown" is luck.

I recently ran across a remarkable story about a nanny - and prodigiously talented but utterly unrecognized (until very recently) street photographer from the 1950s - named Vivian Maier. In 2007, real estate agent John Maloof bought a box of 30,000 of Maier's negatives for $400. Having soon realized what a "find" that box was, he has, by now, acquired over 100,000 of Maier's photographs! (only a thousand or so of which have so far been made public; see here and here for a sampling of her images). An exhibit of her work opened at the Chicago Cultural Center earlier this month. Sadly, Vivian Maier did not live to see her day; she died at age 83 in 2009.

It is hard to do justice to the quiet, soulful, graceful, and poignant (and sometimes spontaneous, funny) images that flowed from Maier's eye (and "I"). Using a Rolleiflex camera, Maier would head out into the Chicago streets on her days off as a nanny for rich North Shore clients. What she captured was nothing short of extraordinary! Her best work - IMHO (after sampling the images from the links I gave above) - approaches that of some of the "best known" street photographers of the 20th century. Her images (and overall approach) remind me of (in no particular order) Lisette Model, Walker Evans, Harry Callahan, Dorothea Lange, Robert Doisneau, Andre Kertesz, and - the more humorous ones, at least - Elliott Erwitt. I should emphasize that its not just that her images remind me of the best works by these great photographers; it's that her best work is just as good as theirs!

One image (of two boys standing side-by-side on a cobble-stone road) could arguably be inserted into a Diane Arbus portfolio with no one being the wiser. Another, of a vagabond curled up on a street, is a surrealistic fusion of human pathos and Weston's famous Pepper #30. Another (one of many!) exudes a Cartier-Bresson-like "decisive moment" feel. Still another echoes Kertesz's geometric meloncholy. One could go on and on, comparing this image to that, and illustrating how certain parts of her portfolio are similar to this photographer or that (Jacques Philippe has posted an interesting analysis of Maier's work); in the end, Maier's work is uniquely hers, and hers alone, and it is astounding in its breadth, depth, and meaning! The photo-history books, I suspect, are already being appended - and amended - with Vivian Maier's story!

I wonder, just how many other gifted artists are quietly walking - and creating extraordinary works of art - among us, unknown to all but a few lucky friends and family members?

Postscript: Click here for info about a feature-length documentary film about Vivian Maier that is in the works (for a 2012 release); the producers - John Maloof, Anthony Rydzon, and award-winning Danish documentary film maker, Lars Mortensen - are asking for pledges on Kickstarter.

A Great New Book on "Great Images"

About 35 years ago, the late great curator of photography at the Museum of Modern Art (MOMA) in NY, John Szarkowski, published a landmark book called Looking at Photographs. Intended as "... a picture book, and its ...purpose ...to provide the material for simple delectation" (according to Szarkowski, from his own introduction to that book), it was, and is, considerably more, giving life to Szarkowski's always thoughtful ruminations about 100 pictures from MOMA's collection and food-for-thought for all aspiring photographers. Also around the same time (in 1983, shortly before his death), Ansel Adams published his Examples: The Making of 40 Photographs, in which the master provides narratives about 40 of his favorite photographs, engaging readers in the technical and aesthetic dimensions of photography. These two books are almost always found (typically, and notably, in excruciating dog-eared form!) on the bookshelves of virtually every photographer who has bought at least two books on photography! And now - a mere 30 or so years later - comes another destined-to-be classic in the same mold, George Barr's Why Photographs Work: 52 Great Images Who Made Them, What Makes Them Special and Why. 

This is not to say that there have not been similar "picture books" published in the intervening years. In truth, one could argue that there are too many, as the quality seldom approaches Szarkowski's and Adams' volumes. Certainly, very few books in this genre approach the simple, understated elegance of Barr's new book; fewer still share the same attention to detail. And seldom have I seen such a magically diverse and exquisite collection of photographs that just sing. In what must have been a logistical nightmare of solicitation and coordination (done entirely by email), George has assembled a veritable What's What of great images (52 of them, and taken by a veritable Who's Who of today's photographers, though not all assembled here are well known; though they all will be now that the book is out!) The idea behind the book is not to discuss "selected images" (as representative "snapshots" used to illustrate a discourse on some photographer's life's oeuvre); rather the single focus is on simply presenting - in Szarkowski's "picture book" book fashion - great images and musings about what makes them so great. And they all are! (great, that is; Kudos to George for his selective eye). The book contains exactly one image each by 52 photographers; some famous, some becoming so, some obscure (but clearly on the rise, given the artistry of images). 

As George states a number of times (and makes an eloquent case for), there is something about great images that is immediately clear, without further exposition. Why this is so, a question that is often asked by those deeply interested interested in photography but who have not yet spent half-a-lifetime looking at and creating images, is where this book shines, first with George Barr's inspired commentary, followed by the photographer's own story about how his or her selected image came to be, what their creative approach consisted of, what technical and/or aesthetic difficulties they had to overcome, and so on. A brief bio of each photographer is also provided, along with email addresses and website links for interested readers to continue exploring. 

 The most important part of the book, apart from the commentary - namely its images - are all nicely presented on the left hand page as you open to a given photographer's "section" and are reproduced in as large a size as the book size permits (maximum of about 9 inches longest side), with about an inch margin along the sides. Indeed, with the typical ~30% Amazon discount over the official list price, it is tempting to purchase two copies, so that the images from one can be taken out and framed to hang on the wall! Some of the photographers are familiar to me, either because I've seen their work in magazines and journals, or - in some cases - I already own a book or two of their photographs; though, in some cases, I had not seen the particular images displayed in the book. Other photographers I am less familiar with or have not heard of at all; though, in all such cases, and as a testament to George's aesthetic tastes (in selecting images for his book) and skills as a photography critic-commentator, I now intend to look up more of their works! 

All types of images appear: landscapes, portraits, abstracts, formally arranged, manipulations. Most are in color, but there is a generous sampling of exquisite black and white images as well. So, are there one or two "universal" truths that emerge after reading this wonderful book? Having read the book twice, and perused it a few more, flipping back and forth, and rereading various sections, two things stand out (though perhaps somewhat implicitly; the gestalt having been assembled by me rather than as an explicit "lessons learned" that appears in the book...if I have one minor complaint, it is that I would have liked to read George's take on the "whole" in a concluding chapter; but his introduction serves the essential purpose): (1) image simplicity (one or at most a few "main" elements and/or colors) coupled with a mastery of the complex technical skills necessary for proper presentation (the camera, lens, darkroom, Photoshop, printer, etc all become "automatic" extensions of the mind/soul of photographer), and (2) mystery (the best images tend to be the ones we want to return to again and again, and those that we feel that way about tend to be the ones for which the most open - and interesting - questions remain lingering in our mind long after we last saw the image). 

Certainly the book itself qualifies on both counts (albeit on a slightly "meta" level); I know I will return to it again and again, sure to be rewarded with fresh insights, new stepping-stones for my own aesthetic journeys and the simple pleasure of viewing some exquisite photographs. I can see a series of "Why great photographs work" books appearing in the coming years, as new images - and new talents - emerge. We can only hope that the publishers, should they decide to launch such a series (I would encourage them to do so), would see fit to have none other than George Barr behind the helm. George is uniquely gifted both as a practicing photographer (with over 35 years experience) and as a teacher/author. There are as many great photographers (who have a hard time explaining how to set a proper f-stop to a novice) as there are great authors (who are hard-pressed to capture even a "not so great" photo), but very, very few who are truly great at both. George, with countless images and portfolios published, and now with three expository books behind him, is in a rarefied class indeed! I believe that George's new book - Why Photographs Work: 52 Great Images Who Made Them, What Makes Them Special and Why - will become a "classic" (along the lines of Szarkowski's and Adams' earlier collections. Anyone interested in why photographs work - and what they can do to improve their own "eye" and completed images - should have a copy (or two!) on their shelf! Nicely done George!

Another "Light of an Enlightened Eye" Extinguished :-(

Although I have never met Loori, a few years ago I stumbled across an extraordinary book of his called The Zen of Creativity, and have been admiring - and following - his work ever since. This book (which I've had to purchase a second copy of because my first copy is riddled with creased page corners bookmarking its veritable storehouse of distilled wisdom) turned out to be but one of many, many spiritually rich books he has authored - on Zen, photography, and the creative life in general - and illustrated with his own deeply soulful images. It should come as no surprise that Loori's spiritual / photographic journey started sometime in the early 70s when he attended a workshop conducted by Minor White, who was himself - arguably - the finest "spiritual leader" of photography of his era. Loori not only continued on with his own masterful photography, but eventually became one of the West's leading Zen masters. He was also the founder and spiritual leader of the Mountains and Rivers Order and abbot of Zen Mountain Monastery in New York's Catskill mountains.

Another book of Loori's that I own and treasure, and which perfectly illustrates his basic philosophy of nonseperability between art and spiritual practice, is Hearing with the Eye. This book - ostensibly a collection of images that Loori captured around Point Lobos, California (fused with a quiet but illuminating prose) - is a gentle, graceful meditation on the illusory boundaries between inner and outer realities. Much the same, and more, can be found in another, and even more recent, of Loori's books, called Making Love with Light.

A detailed account of his life and philosophy (including links to YouTube videos and a portfolio of his photography) can be found on the Mountains and Rivers Order site by following this link.

There are a total 24 books in all listed on Amazon's Loori page. The aspiring Zen student wondering about what creativity has to say about life, and/or the aspiring (or seasoned) photographer wondering about what Zen practice has to say about taking pictures - and even the stray physicist or two who may secretly wonder about whether there is more to the universe than what equations alone reveal - can have no better companion to start exploring these "wonderings" with than Loori, via his writings and photographs.

Though I may never have been graced by Loori's physical presence as a "teacher," I - and therefore my own work and vision - have nonetheless been deeply touched by the lessons and wisdom of this graceful soul. And, although there obviously remain plenty of souls left on this planet who can communicate to the rest of us beautiful and delicate eternal truths with their cameras (and "gifted seers" are - luckily for the world - born every day), this one preternaturally enlightened "eye" is - mournfully - no more (but only so far as corporeal existence goes).

"To know objects only through dissecting and cataloguing them is to miss their full reality. It is to fall asleep amidst the mystery and to become numb to the wonder of this great Earth." - John Daido Loori

A Fine-Art Photographer's Must-Have New Book on B&W Printing!

George Dewolfe - photographer, teacher, workshop instructor and author - has just published one of the best books I have run across in a long, long time on the art and craft of fine-art B&W printing; called, naturally enough, B&W Printing.

Generally speaking, there are three basic types of digital-photography-related books on the market: (1) the beginner's guides, that walk the aspiring photographer / "camera user" through the steps necessary to take a picture, how to operate her camera, and how to download images to the computer and print them out on a small ink-jet printer; (2) the intermediate guides, that assume readers are already familiar with their camera but want to learn more about how to process their images for the web or prints; and are tailored to readers who are serious about their photography (certainly more so than casual "point and shooters," but do not invest more than a few hours on a weekend, say, or as "designated photographers" at family get-togethers and vacations; and (3) the advanced guides for affirmed afficionados of photography (who want to learn all of what Adobe's Photoshop has to offer, for example) and professional photographers (who may want to learn additional techniques or, if they are film-photographers, want to boot-strap themselves into digital photography). Each type of book is well represented on the market, of course, and there are many excellent books - classics even (the "advanced guides" by Martin Evening, Katrin Easemann, and Scott Kelby all come to mind).

But, thus far at least, the digital photography world has lacked a particular kind of voice that film photography has enjoyed for decades, simply because film photography has been around for so long. Namely, the voice of a seasoned fine-art photographer / printer writing about and dispensing with his years of experience as a photographer applied to the new, emerging digital imaging technologies. How many times have I picked up a book with a titles like, "Advanced Fine-Art Digital Imaging" by so and so, intrigued by the title and number of pages/examples, only to be disappointed to find either that the images in the book are at best serviceable as "fine art photographs" or, at worst, dismal examples of what "fine art" ought to be, or that the images are wonderful - perhaps even gallery-like in their presence - but that what I had hoped to learn by way of "digital craft" is nowhere to be seen, since the author is a fine photographer but less-than-gifted writer or Photoshop technician. The rarest kind of book of all is a book on fine-art photography - particularly black and white fine-art photography - that combines great pictures, great technical skill, and great writing. I have seen no finer example of this rare breed of book than B&W Printing, by George Dewolfe, published this month by Lark Books as part of their Digital Masters series.

As one can glean from his website, Mr. Dewolfe has been a photographer since 1964 and holds an MFA in Photography from the Rochester Institute of Technology. He studied photography with both Ansel Adams and Minor White in the 1970s. He also studied perception with Dr. Richard Zakia (a fact I mention because Dr. Zakia's book, Perception and Imaging, is among my all-time favorite books on the subject). Mr. Dewolfe has taught photography at several universities (and continues to teach photography and master print classes), and conducts workshops throughout the country. His works have appeared in numerous one-man shows and galleries. He was part of the development team behind Adobe's Lightroom software. He also authored one of the first (and best) "advanced" books on the craft of digital printing I purchased for my personal library (and still frequently refer to): George DeWolfe's Digital Fine Print Workshop.

And so we get to Mr. Dewolfe's new book, B&W Printing. What immediately sets it apart from 95% of related books on the market is immediately apparent after even a quick perusal of its 200+ pages: its subtle, almost understated, elegance. It oozes with quality, and attention to detail.

The images - all examples of one technique or another (except for a small portfolio toward the end that exhibits some wonderful "final" prints) - are each carefully arranged to highlight a specific approach, and are all expertly crafted and presented. Indeed, I suspect many a reader will look at the first such example that a chapter starts with - an out-of-camera image that Mr. Dewolfe displays to show the "before" part of a specific workflow, and wonder, "What can one possibly do to improve such a beautiful image?" ("Beautiful" both as a technically brilliant print, and as a fine-art photograph). The answer to which, of course, after reading Mr. Dewolfe's elegant prose - full of finely honed and expertly distilled advice on why something needs to be done, when and how to do it, and how to tell when its "done" - is "quite a bit." As the "final" image is revealed at the end of most chapters, the reader marvels both at its innate, shear beauty - Mr. Dewolfe's images all have a preternatural "glow" to them; they are carefully crafted in such a way that their ostensibly two-dimensional forms leak into a third "magical" dimension - and the relatively "simple" steps by which the original image was converted into it. Of course, it is precisely Mr. Dewolfe's gifted ability to describe what goes into these "relatively simple" steps - done in such a way that even a novice Photoshop user (albeit one who is well versed with the basic of aesthetics and photographic "seeing") can easily follow them and apply them to her own workflow - that sets this apart from most others and elevates it to the level of an instant classic.

The book consists of three main sections, and a portfolio at the end. A glossary and index are also provided. The first section discusses fine-art black and white photography in broad - but philosophically deep - terms. Great attention is given to the nature of "seeing" (by both camera and photographer), and the most important qualities that make up a photograph (tone, luminosity, luminance, sharpness, and so on). Though this may sound like so many other dry incantations of "obvious" material, perhaps done to death in other volumes, even here, in only the introductory parts of the book, Mr. Dewolfe provides something special. Using the way in which humans process visual information, Mr. Dewolfe astutely distinguishes between "luminance" (a combination of reflection and illumination, and which is essentially what both camera and retina "see" in any image) and "luminosity" (which is what we, as observers, "see" - or the way in which we interpret - luminance. It is the apparent luminosity of an image that gives the images its strength, its character, and ultimately, if the image is to express the artist's vision, its meaning. The best photographers are those that are able to expertly manipulate the raw luminance of their images into something that communicates how they "see" (and feel about) the world. This is a deep discussion of fundamental truths of the art of photography; but is not overbearing in any way; the typical reader will probably not even recognize that she has been treated to a master discussion of the very core of what defines fine-art photography. Needless to say, few if any books provide half the wisdom waiting to be plumbed in the first 60 pages of this magnificent book.

The heart of the book lies in the second section, and spans about 130 pages. Here you will read about designing a workflow, how to choose and setup your software, how to input your images (the author uses Adobe's Lightroom), how to make global and local adjustments to an image, how to fine-tune an image, and, finally, how to make the best use of your printing tools and methods. Each example is meticulously and lovingly presented, with each step described in both words and illustrated with screenshots (of workflow) and the effects interim steps have on a particular image. As a bonus, each chapter also includes sample workflows by featured artists (some of whose work I knew about before, but others were new to me and compel me to look up their work).

The third section contains some musings on the nature of photography, how to hone your skills as a photographer, and the art of mindfulness in art in general. The small, self-contained section on mindfulness perfectly illustrates Mr. Dwewolfe's best gifts as a teacher. In what amounts to no more than a page, Mr. Dewolfe provides - in sparse but artful, Haiku-like prose - a natural gateway toward applying meditation techniques to creating meaningful photographs; punctuated, in the end, by yet another beautiful, luminous image.

Mr. DeWolfe begins his book with the question, "What is a masterpiece?" By the end of the book, the reader will have seen a fair share of masterpieces created and crafted by Mr. Dewolfe's refined eye and skill. And the reader will leave the book behind (though no-doubt leaving it within easy reach to refer back to when necessary) knowing that she is now prepared to craft masterpieces of her own. Mr. Dewolfe has written a truly sensational book on the art of B&W printing, and one that is destined to become a classic in its class.

The only mild criticism I can make with regard to the book - though not of the material that appears in it per se - is that Mr. Dewolfe does not provide a discount code for readers of his book to use to purchase his PercepTool plug-in for Photoshop (which is an integral part of the workflow described in the book, and encapsulates much of what Mr. Dewolfe has learned during a lifetime of "seeing" as a photographer and as a student of human perception). I have seen other authors provide discounts for software in their books, but for software nowhere near as rich and far-reaching as PercepTool. I would encourage Mr. Dewolfe to do the same. But I make this criticism only in hopes of getting Mr. Dewolfe to reach an even larger audience with his teachings. Perhaps in the second edition?

Learning to See from the Blind

Fine-art photography is first-and-foremost a visual language by which otherwise hidden truths and meanings - of the world and self - are revealed by the observer / artist. As such, it is rarely the case that what a photograph shows on its surface is the complete "message" that the photographer wishes to communicate. Indeed, philosophically speaking, one can say that fine-art photographers use images to provide glimpses of a reality that lies behind (and beyond) what the images represent, as things-in-themselves. Just as letters and words provide the basic units of grammar for literary artists to communicate essential truths that have nothing to do with letters and words, so too do light and form provide the visual grammar by which photographers reveal fundamental truths of nature (and our relationship with it) that have nothing to do with light and form. Art transforms the abject banality of sterile rules, internalized through years of rote memorization and practice, into an intimate expression of the ineffable.

So it should come as no great surprise (though, undoubtedly it will) that the blind - yes, the blind (!) - have much to teach those of us who are sighted about what real "sight" means. The image at the top of this blog entry is of the cover of an extraordinary book called Seeing Beyond Sight, lovingly put together by visual artist, Tony Deifell, and published by Chronicle Books in 2007. The book collects the works of visually impaired children during a five-year program of teaching photography to students at Governor Morehead School for the Blind in Raleigh, North Carolina, from 1992 to 1997. The book has a dedicated website; and an interview with the author has recently been posted on YouTube.

Mr. Deifell quickly addresses the most obvious question: "How can you teach photography to the blind?" On a practical level, even though most of the students involved could not see light, all of them were able to feel the heat due to light. Moreover, blindness does not preclude anyone from achieving a technical understanding of how a camera works, nor of learning the rudiments of good imaging technique. The more difficult question to answer - and what the book so beautifully explains by showing - is "How can the blind take pictures?" In a conventional sense, of course, they cannot; but only if by "taking pictures" we mean using the camera to record what they see visually. However, photography, in its purest form, is so much more than that.

Alfred Steiglitz, Henri Cartier-Bresson, and Minor White - among many other great "photographic seers" - teach us that the finest photography occurs when we are able to (recognize and) capture that special sliver of time during which the boundary between inner and outer experiences vanishes. Steiglitz called such photographs equivalents; Cartier-Bresson referred to the sliver of time as the decisive moment; and Minor White talked often of the profound role that spirit plays in photography:

"Be still with yourself until the object of your attention affirms your presence." - Minor White (1908 - 1976)

But whatever one chooses to call it, the underlying process - for the photographer - is always the same: the camera is merely a mechanical device (and certainly not the only such mechanical device, nor even necessarily the best one to use for this purpose!) that serves to focus our attention (to pressing the shutter) at precisely the right moment when our inner and external experiences align.

"I was thinking that it would be sort of hard for a blind person to take pictures, but it's not very hard. You've just got to listen." (John V., student, quoted on page 48 of Seeing Beyond Sight).

When the "feel is right" - when everything is in its place, when all the compositional elements have snapped into their positions, the shadows and forms are just where they all must be, and when, for the blind, the warmth of the sunlight on the wall is just so, the wind has quieted down, and is no longer heard, the reverberations of distant footsteps are no longer felt, and the texture of the floor is just the right mix of smooth and rugged against the palm of the hand, then we hit the shutter.

In truth, the sighted photographer responds no more to purely visual stimuli than does the blind photographer. All photographers, whether they do so consciously or not (and whether they are aware of it or not) depend on all of their senses to reach that wonderful instant when the shutter goes "click." One can argue that blind photographers, precisely because they do not respond directly to visual stimuli, are actually closer to the core truths and realities that lie beyond the light than photographers who must work their way through to truth (by brute force, so to speak).

Anyone can take a picture of a tree; because that is what is in front of the camera. It takes an artist to use the image of the tree to show you something else about the tree, or something else entirely that has nothing do with the tree per se. Since the visually impaired photographer has difficulty seeing the tree as a tree - indeed, the blind photographer does not see a tree at all - other associations and meanings must necessarily arise that, ultimately, result in some inner train of thought / intuition that concludes with the photographer making the camera go click.

Just as I consider color a "distraction" to the purity of forms and tonalities I try to reveal with my black and white photographs, I can see how light itself can be a distraction if what I am really after is illumination of what light reveals to me (but which I cannot take a picture of directly). It is a great irony - paradox even (!) - of photography that it so deeply but mechanically depends on something (i.e., light) that is, in fact, rarely the focus of its intended message. Even if the light itself is the message (as exemplified by, say, Galen Rowell's lifelong artistic pursuits), the photograph can only capture the effect that light has on whatever environment the photographer has selected to take a picture in, not the light in situ.

There is a touching - or, better, an illuminating - story about a blind student named Leuwynda, who captured a series of wonderful "abstract" photos of cracks in the sidewalk; which she clearly "saw" with her walking cane but which most people are oblivious to. She used her photographs as documentary "proof" of the danger that blind students face in what most would consider uneventfully "short walks" to class, and sent her images along with a letter containing a plea for help to the superintendent. Mr. Deifell muses, on behalf of the rest of us "sighted" photographers, about how many "cracks" there are in the world that we are essentially all blind to?

"If the lights are off, I can see what I'm doing." (Dain, student, quoted on page 138 of Seeing Beyond Sight).

Another student, Josh, produced some soulful photographs of dark, blurry stairs that he used to communicate - via metaphor - a dream he had about being lost and wandering aimlessly in a snowstorm. Other students started using their growing collections of photographs as a means to develop otherwise under-developed communication skills. Merlett, for example, was both blind and learning disabled, and found reading and writing akin to torture. Photography provided a new - and joyous - language in which she could express herself and, as it turned out, tell all the stories she had always wanted to tell others but could not do so in a conventional way.

The book contains a short introduction by the author (and teacher), followed by a selection of student photographs organized into five sections: (1) distortion, (2) refraction, (3) reflection, (4) transparence, and (5) illuminance. It concludes with an afterward, a short FAQ, and a summary of where the students who participated in the project are today.

"How do you not cut people's heads off in a photo? Just ask the person where they are." (Frances, student, quoted on page 112 of Seeing Beyond Sight).

For me, the book (and the project on which it is based) is a revelation. Were it not for the context in which the images in this book were captured, and the accompanying stories of how individual images came to be, one would be tempted to "dismiss" many of the photographs as "amateurish" and merit-less as fine-art. And that would be sadly unfortunate; for these images go to the heart of human experience and artistic expression. They show us what lies beyond the light that illuminates what we take pictures of, and what all photographers - with and without the gift of sight - are trying to reveal with their photography.

Anybody with a decent camera can take a picture of a crack in the sidewalk - and have the image met with blank stares and mutterings of "Yeah, it's a crack in the sidewalk., so what?" It takes a blind photographer to so effortlessly use a physical symbol - i.e., a photograph of some "thing" - to represent the deeper, inner experience of how "difficult it is to walk to class" on a campus built by people who can see. By not being able to see things, the blind photographer naturally focuses on using the things that the camera is able to capture to show what else things are. And that is what the very best photography has always been about.

While I have focused mainly on the philosophical end of the spectrum in this short commentary, I would be remiss in not mentioning that I was just as struck about how powerful a general learning tool - about self, about world, about learning (!) - the project was for the students involved. In some ways, though not quite as "obviously" dramatic - the results of the project remind me of Oliver Sacks' Awakenings (though here the "awakenings" are more spiritual than physical).

The blind obviously have much to teach us sighted photographers how to really see. They teach us to pay attention to all of the little "invisible cracks" in the world, and to not rely exclusively on our eyes in doing so. There is no better place to begin the first lesson on this journey of illumination - which takes the form of a gentle admonition to just "close your eyes" - than to savor the examples in this magnificent book, Seeing Beyond Sight. Highly recommended.

Postscript #1: There is recent evidence that suggests that "blindsight" - i.e., the ability "see" even if completely blind to visual stimuli - is real (and is due to previously unknown ancient evolutionary sensory pathways). See Blind Man Navigates Maze.

Postscript #2: A few days after posting my blog entry, I ran across another review of Seeing Beyond Sight very much in the spirit of mine; which is to say, philosophically infused and considerably more about "seeing" than seeing.

Postscript #3: There is a similar, but unrelated, book about photography by visually impaired photographers, called Shooting Blind, published by Aperture. An associated website also contains some extraordinarily haunting photographs.

George Barr's Stunning New Book on the Creative Process in Photography

George Barr's stunning new book - Take Your Photography to the Next Level - is an impressive debut for George in the world of art instruction in book form, and a "must-read" book for photographers at all skill levels. George is already quite an accomplished master of photography in traditional print and Blog forms. Indeed, according to his Blog, the idea for this book, and a bit of its substance (though markedly enhanced and expanded) came about partly from the many insightful entries he's posted on his Blog over the years.

Apart from his obvious writing skill, one of George's great strengths as an artist/communicator is his ability to articulate some of the core - and often mysterious - qualities that describe the process of art in general; and photography in particular. Though he doesn't shy away from philosophical issues (and addresses such questions as "What is a fine-art photograph?" head-on), he has a veritable wellspring of practical advice to impart photographers, ranging from complete novices to seasoned professionals.

That this book is special is immediately obvious. It is neither an all too common "How To.." instruction manual on what f-stop to choose or what lens to put on your camera, nor is it yet another "This is how it is done in Photoshop..." guidebook (though some allusions to both sets of "problems" are sprinkled throughout). What this book does, and does exceedingly well, is address the much more difficult subjective components of fine-art photography: the nature of creativity in the photographic process, where to "look for" images, and what to do when you find them (and when you cannot!), how to compose your shots and why, how to assess your imagery, and to learn to develop your own "style," and the differences between purely technical acumen and aesthetic vision.

Such matters are rarely if ever are given the attention they deserve, and if they do appear in other books - typically as short side-bars or quick asides - do so more as after-thoughts than substantive discussions. In fact, I know of only perhaps three or four other books (none of which are as well-written as this one, by the way) that similarly delve deeply into the creative and aesthetic parts of photography. It is thus a book that is long-overdue; and I am delighted that a photographer of George's unique blend of artistic skill and expository ability has taken up the challenge.

I am also impressed by the utmost care and attention that has been put into the design and content of the book. The image selection is excellent throughout; and (in another rarity for books in this admittedly small genre) include many "don't quite work" photographs simply because George wants to show what works, what does not, and why. Even the captions to the photos show a consistent deliberate attention. Each tells a succinct story about what is being shown, and makes a point all its own that compliments the accompanying text. If all one did was to skim the book reading its captions, and nothing else, one would arguably still learn a great deal of the subject. Another nice feature is that many of the sections include simple but marvelously effective sketches to illustrate the finer points of, say, cropping and composition. While most authors would have contented themselves to include an image example or two and leave it at that, George goes that extra step for the reader. Finally, there is also a generous selection of "portfolio" images, each accompanied by its own "story" of how it came to be, in two-page spreads that appear throughout the book. My personal favorite (and one that, as George reveals, turns out to be among George's all-time popular images) is Windowpane, that appears on page 193. Indeed, it is this particular image, that I first saw in Focus magazine a few years ago, that introduced me to George's photography, and compelled me to become an avid reader of his Blog.

If you are either a budding photographer who wants to learn about the "art" in fine-art photography, or a long-practicing photographer (perhaps even a pro), and are wondering where to look for advice to improve your own vision; or your skill level is anywhere in-between, know that there is no better place to learn, and no better guide to turn to for guidance, than George's superb new book. On the basis of this book alone, I'd say George is about to embark on yet another career track (in addition to already being a physician and photographer); namely that of well-known, accomplished teacher of fine-art photography. Well done George.

Amazing New Resource for Photographers & Students of Photography

Focal Press (i.e., the Media Technology component of Elsevier Publishing) has just published a "book" (a pristine copy of which I have been happily browsing through after it had - literally - landed on my doorstep with a loud THUD!; I put the word "book" in quotes because, as I will describe below, to call this massive cinder-block of a reference work a "book" is roughly equivalent to calling a fresh uneaten loaf of bread a "crumb";-) that has all the tell-tale signs of being a classic scholarly reference for photographers and students of photography for years to come: The Focal Encyclopedia of Photography, Fourth Edition, edited by Michael R. Peres (also available from Amazon).

The encyclopedia is a significant update of its predecessor volumes, with a massive amount of new material. The first edition, a classic in its time when it was published in 1956, has been long out of print and is obviously extremely dated given all of the advances in photographic science, engineering and art that have occurred since then. The third edition (edited by Richard D. Zakia and Leslie Stroebel), which I own and love, is only a decade old but has very little on the burgeoning field of digital photography. However, it still contains a veritable storehouse of useful information and, though it is also out of print, is available in some used book stores (given the hefty price of the new volume, some students on a budget may want to instead consider the third edition).

The new fourth edition has 880 pages in all, over 400 images, covers all major (and minor) areas of photography (ranging from photography and art / society / commerce, museums, the science of photography, galleries, workshops, education, publishing, history, theory, practice, criticism, and short biographies of selected photographers in the 20th Century), and comes with a CD-ROM that contains the entire (and fully searchable) text + images in the book (this one surprising, and most welcome, addition is alone worth the "price of admission").

The book is very handsomely produced, with strong, thick covers and thick, semi-glossy pages that give the volume a "classy feel" and give the overall impression that the editors designed it to be well thumbed and used, and to last a long, long while (which I pray it does since most of my photo books, particularly reference works, tend to become tattered and grow nested dog-ears in no time, as I repeatedly dive in for the shear pleasure of discovering some morsel of photographic delight).

The encyclopedia does have one unfortunate, but arguably unavoidable, drawback: it is so big and heavy that it is impossible to just "whip it out" on your lap and sink into (a flimsy chair) for some leisurely reading; you have to plan on when and where you will be reading this monster! ... and, God forbid, don't even think of taking it to an upstairs room to read in bed: if the staircase doesn't collapse from the weight before you get there, your bed surely will! ;-)

Kudos to Focal Press' editorial board for producing such a fine masterwork. It will likely become the "standard" such reference for all current and future generations of students of photography (and, I suspect, quite a few working professionals as well).

Fleeting Glimpse of Uber-Genius

Every once in a while, one runs across a work that is so powerfully moving, so visionary, that it is as though the spiritual cosmos itself has briefly transformed into (or, with a wink to itself, escaped into) corporeal existence; the artist that serves as channel for this wondrous interpenetration of spirit and matter can only be described as an Uber-artist, or more simply, an Uber genius. Allow me to introduce you to a candidate for such an honor...

"...Humanity owes its progress to geniuses...[but] humanity is not want to deal kindly with its geniuses..." (Stanislaw Lem, "Odysseus of Ithaca", Non Servium)

In the April 2007 issue of the fine-art B&W photography magazine (issue #50), I ran across the work of photographer Jerry Wolfe, the front cover of whose extraordinary book - Beginner's Mind - is reproduced at the top of this Blog entry; and was awe-struck by the intensity of spiritual depth captured, and radiated, by his mesmerizing images. The last image of the published series, in particular, titled Cave Detail (page 99, B&W issue #50), triggered a spiritual odyssey - in me - with echoes of visions my youthful self had of what was possible with photography (when in the right eyes and hands) when I first glanced at Minor White's visionary Capitol Reef.

"...First come your run-of-the-mill and middling geniuses, that is of the third order, whose minds are unable to go much beyond the horizon of their times. These, relatively speaking, are threatened the least; they are often recognized and even come into money and fame..." (Stanislaw Lem, "Odysseus of Ithaca", Non Servium)

Mr. Wolfe has been a photographer for over 30 years, gracefully combining his preturnaturally gifted eye for beauty with his lifelong spiritual practice of mindfulness and Buddhist meditation. All of his images are subtlety charged with a quiet grace; as though they are earthly imprints of a mysterious, ethereal spiritual grammar. Their meaning shifts, even as you observe them; and observe them you will, for while, objectively speaking, they are (as are all prints) nothing more than "flat, two-dimensional worlds", they reveal worlds - and worlds of meaning - far beyond the limitations of the page they live on, and sometimes point to even vaster, more mysterious worlds within.

"...The geniuses of the second order are already too difficult for their contemporaries and therefore fare worse...recognition awaits the geniuses of the second order, in the form of a triumph beyond the grave..." (Stanislaw Lem, "Odysseus of Ithaca", Non Servium)

Mr. Wolfe's Beginner's Mind is an extraordinary work of art, with an emphasis on extra-ordinary, for it transcends even (otherwise conventionally) symbolic levels of meaning, achieving visual/spiritual tones rarely attained by even the most "gifted" of artists. How does he do this? I have no idea, nor could I, except to embrace the idea that all of us are humble channels for nature's own creative powers.

"...The intermediate types [beyond second but below first order] are discovered either by the succeeding generation or by some later one..." (Stanislaw Lem, "Odysseus of Ithaca", Non Servium)

Condider just one small part of Mr. Wolfe's Opus, his Buddhist Expressions Series (#1 - #12, pages 20-43 in Beginner's Mind), which Mr. Wolfe (humbly, poetically and very appropriately) opens with ...

Each Moment
Fresh and original.
Where's the "I"
Experiencing this?

To which, after seeing these wondrous prints, I can only say that they are among the finest abstracts I have ever seen. Not because they are merely "beautiful abstracts" (which they surely are), but because they embody the core Kandinsky-like essence of what a true "abstract" represents: a portal to other, higher, worlds and realities.

"...the geniuses of the first order are never known - not by anyone, not in life, not after death. For they are creators of truth so unprecedented, purveyors of proposals so revolutionary, that not a soul is capable of making head or tail of them..." (Stanislaw Lem, "Odysseus of Ithaca", Non Servium)

Mr. Wolfe is certainly not threatened by obscurity, for he is already a well known artist, teacher and author. But he represents a small class of profoundly gifted visionaries that - for whatever reason (perhaps simply the vagaries of life's currents) - are not much better known than they are!

I urge all fine-art photographers, particularly those with a penchant for using their art for spiritual exploration, to experience Mr. Wolfe's Beginner's Mind for themselves (you can also order it from Amazon). Who knows what paths a simple click of a mouse might take you?