“All photographs - not only those that are so called ‘documentary’… can be fortified by words.”
-Dorothea Lange
Continued from On Words, Part One
Well first I have to say that I didn’t intend for part two to take this long for me to get out. To be honest, I sat down and started writing it several times, but kept feeling like I was falling short in communicating what I really wanted, and so I would scrap it and start over.
And see that’s the thing about words, and my relationship with them. I love the English language and all of the nuance that each word carries. I have a hard time setting words free into this world (particularly the written ones) if I don't feel like they convey exactly the thing I’m striving for. And when it comes to photography, as Robert Adams pointed out in the essay quoted in part one, photographs are, for me, often the most truthful expression of what I want to say.
With all of that said though, I don’t believe that words should never accompany a photograph. On the contrary some of my very favorite photographers write; sometimes about their work, and sometimes about life. But I love it, and I find that in those cases the images gain extended, and often more personal, meaning. A most perfect example of this can be found in the amazing blog of my friend Donna Hopkins; she is an incredibly talented photographer who not only creates beautiful, soulful images, but always manages to find just the right words to pair with them. Like Dorothea Lange suggested, her images are fortified by words she gives them.
And that’s where I believe I sometimes struggle. While I think that words can fortify an image, it doesn’t mean that all words do fortify an image. And I’m beginning to realize just how much it means to me to make sure that I stick to the ones that do. That if words accompany an image they strengthen the relationship that the viewer may have with it, and more importantly that they not stand in the way of what the image says on its own.
But it’s a tough thing to do, to lay an image out with no explanation and hope that it stands on its own; to have the courage and conviction that your vision is enough.
So while some images just beg for stories and commentary, background and insight, I believe others need no fortification. Or perhaps rather I feel that I don’t always have the words to strengthen them. My hope is that those images are the ones you will find, if you listen closely, are already speaking.
Also, I promise no more images of a single peony. Well, for a while anyway.