book proof
The proof copy of my book arrived today! More images of the new little bundle of joy can be seen on Flickr. I’ll have more details very soon.
low resolution photography by davin risk
notes
Tonight I finished spotting and colour-correcting around 118 images that will make up an on-demand photo book of images seen on this site over the last few years. Since I post here less than I used to I felt like pulling all of the shots that I thought were my best from the site together into a book would be a nice exercise and also serve as a tangible archive for myself and anyone else interested.
Over the past three and a half years I feel like I have progressed with photography and I do have a much better grasp of what I want to photograph and why. In fact, I now have the knowledge that I do want to photograph which wasn’t really on my radar back in early 2003. I still pause before calling myself a photographer half the time but I also can’t rightly just call it a hobby at the same time. Except for a couple of photos that I’ve taken “on assignment,” I take photos for myself and don’t really have any urge to become a “pro.” But as my primary mode of expression, photography means far too much to me to think of myself as a hobbyist.
But why is it that with 4 years of a Fine Arts BA distantly behind me, calling myself “an artist” also seems like the wrong title — or maybe too connected to a world that despite my education I never pursued. It’s not that I don’t think I’m good enough. I feel like there is so much more I can do and learn but I am also truly proud of some of the images I’ve made. I realize that these are sort of get-over-yourself kind of questions and their answers aren’t critical to my sanity or anything but there is still a part of me that feels a twinge of “shit or get off the pot” on occasion.
Maybe I just owe it to myself to spend the time I need to realize what is the most comfortable “next level” is for me and photography and to probably respect myself enough to call myself a photographer and an artist and worry about what those terms might mean later. Just taking the photos is the important part after all.
Okay… internal monologue over. As you were.
familiar
We finished watching Spike Lee’s When the Levees Broke yesterday. Yes, we really do know how to liven-up a New Year’s Eve… Lee’s “Requiem in Four Acts” is primarily a first-person account by those who experienced and continue to live with the results of Katrina and the New Orleans levee failures.
It’s a draining but very powerful and emotional film and Spike Lee shows restraint as a documentary director. There are heartbreaking and even horrific narratives and visuals but the on-going story of family, race, culture, and class is told wonderfully by a wide range of New Orleans natives and those who were drawn in or gave of themselves to this.
As someone so far removed from New Orleans, the culture is often mysterious but these accounts make a powerful human story wherever you happen to be. What remains very clear is that the documentary isn’t talking about a frozen history but a living story that continues to touch thousands of people today. There is a need to tell the story of the people of Louisiana and Mississippi that continues.
Some Louisiana residents like photographer William Greiner have taken it upon themselves to keep the day-to-day impact of Katrina in people’s minds. Greiner’s blog features his powerful photos, snippets of Katrina news, and his own reactions. Scott Jackson’s blog has images from his return to New Orleans (May-June 2006 archives) where he grew up and where his family’s home was lost. There is also an effort to rebuild the studio of New Orleans photographers Keith Calhoun and Chandra McCormick (both featured in When the Levees Broke). Here is a New York Times story on their work.
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© Davin Risk