Today I’m in San Francisco giving a lecture to the Society for Photographic Education. After presenting my pictures and the story of how I became a photographer, I’ll likely be asked if I have any advice for young photographers. Instead of giving just my two cents, I thought it would be cool if I could also offer some advice from my fellow photographers at Magnum. I emailed my colleagues and received 35 different responses.
Abbas
When did you first get excited about photography?
Upon birth
What advice would you give young photographers?
Get a good pair of walking shoes and...fall in love
» Abbas' Magnum Portfolio
Alec Soth
When did you first get excited about photography?
I spent most of my childhood playing with pretend friends in the forest. It wasn't called art, but it was awfully creative. Things were a little trickier outside of the forest. I was shy and awkward and started to lose my way as teenager. But in 10th grade I had and art teacher, Bill Hardy, who opened the door back on the forest. I started doing sculptures with found materials outdoors. I documented these sculptures with photography. After awhile I realized that the joy came more from finding pictures than making sculptures.
What advice would you give young photographers?
Try everything. Photojournalism, fashion, portraiture, nudes, whatever. You won't know what kind of photographer you are until you try it. During one summer vacation (in college) I worked for a born-again tabletop photographer. All day long we'd photograph socks and listen to Christian radio. That summer I learned I was neither a studio photographer nor a born-again Christian. Another year I worked for a small suburban newspaper chain and was surprised to learn that I enjoyed assignment photography. Fun is important. You should like the process and the subject. If you are bored or unhappy with your subject it will show up in the pictures. If in your heart of hearts you want to take pictures of kitties, take pictures of kitties.
» Alec Soth's Magnum Portfolio
Alex Majoli
When did you first get excited about photography?
I don't remember how I get exited but I definitely remember the first picture I took when I was 11 years old (the 2 men walking at Ravenna port). What I remember is that I was fascinated by the technical stuff of the camera my father lend me that day ... Kodak Retinette.
What advice would you give young photographers?
I would advise to read a lot of literature and look as little as possible other photographers. Work everyday even without assignments or money, work, work, work with discipline for yourself and not for editors or awards. And also collaborate with people not necessary photographers but people you admire. The key word to learn is participation!
» Alex Majoli's Magnum Portfolio
Alex Webb
When did you first get excited about photography?
I didn't get truly excited about photography (though I actually learned photographic technique from my father much earlier) during my sophomore year in high school. I had played around with making little (extremely bad) movies, using friends and family as actors, and rapidly realized that I did not want to work with lots of other people. I wanted to work alone. I began photographing in the streets of Brattleboro, Vermont, near the school that I attended, and in Boston, where my family lived. I discovered photographing in the street. I've been doing it ever since.
What advice would you give young photographers?
Photograph because you love doing it, because you absolutely have to do it, because the chief reward is going to be the process of doing it. Other rewards -- recognition, financial remuneration -- come to so few and are so fleeting. And even if you are somewhat successful, there will almost inevitably be stretches of time when you will be ignored, have little income, or -- often -- both. Certainly there are many other easier ways to make a living in this society. Take photography on as a passion, not a career.
» Alex Webb's Magnum Portfolio
Alessandra Sanguinetti
When did you first get excited about photography?
I got into photography when I was around 9 or 10 years old because of a few books my mother had on the lower shelves of her bookcase. Books by Dorothea Lange, Chim, Lartigue, and also The Family of Man, The Best of Life (around 1978..?), and Wisconsin Death Trip. They all absorbed me intensely and I know I've carried those images with me all my life, kind of like Imprinting in ducks and geese: whatever you put next to it when it's born it'll assume forever that it's its mother. Chims' photo of the polish girl - probably the same age I was then- who had grown up in a concentration camp and her drawing of home; Dorothea Lange's Migrant mother; The Best of Life book had a big effect on me. I vividly remember in the Best of Life the pleasure I had looking over and over again at Avedon's photos of Marilyn posing as different actresses (I didn't know who Avedon or Marilyn Monroe were). The photographs of war, especially McCullin's photos of Vietnam were imprinted in my brain, without knowing the politics yet. There was one page of photographs in Best of Life that I especially remember. The first row shows photography as a witness to time passing, change, the second row shows the effect of speed on a mans face - making the invisible visible and very strange...and the third row was pure fantasy and play. I think of that page as my first lesson in photography. Particularly that you're free with a camera - you can describe the world, you can invent it, there didn't seem to be any rules: a picture of a pineapple playing a cello was fine. Then Wisconsin Death Trip was responsible for my first realization of death and it's inevitability, and my defense reaction was very literal: to photograph everything I cared about so it wouldn't disappear forever and people 100 years hence would know us. That's when I asked for my first camera.
What advice would you give young photographers?
I could use some good advice myself…but first thing that springs to mind is Bob Dylan's': "keep a good head and always carry a light bulb."
» Alessandra Sanguinetti's Magnum Portfolio
Bruce Gilden
When did you first get excited about photography?
In 1966, when I printed my first picture and I saw it coming out, I got really hooked on photography... It was the picture of a cute little squirrel!
What advice would you give young photographers?
My advice: "Photograph who you are!"
» Bruce Gilden's Magnum Portfolio
Carl De Keyzer
When did you first get excited about photography?
At the age of 14 when I processed my first film and printed my first image on a 1922 Agfa enlarger of my uncle with the help of my friend next door who supplied the expertise and the chemicals needed (his uncle was a garage inventor - chemist who built rockets in his spare time). My first print showed my boxer dog named Blacky. It was one of my most magical moments of my life.
What advice would you give young photographers?
Give it all you got for at least 5 years and then decide if you got what it takes. Too many great talents give up at the very beginning; the great black hole looming after the comfortable academy or university years is the number one killer of future talent.
» Carl De Keyzer's Magnum Portfolio
Christopher Anderson
When did you first get excited about photography?
My first memory of being excited about photography was seeing HCB's "decisive moment" picture in a magazine (the picture of a man in mid stride jumping over a puddle) when I was 9 or 10 years old. I had no idea who the photographer was and I don't think I even consciously thought about the presence of a photographer being linked to the image. I was just drawn to the image itself. I even remember asking myself why I was drawn to this image, and not really having an answer. I cut the image out and inserted into the cassette tape box as a cover for a mix tape I had made of my favorite songs.
There were some other key moments (finding a book by Leonard Freed in a garage sale, for example). In high school, I worked summer jobs and bought myself a camera when I graduated. During the next several years, photography became a hobby, but I did it in total isolation. I still had no concept of "Photographer." I had no concept of a photojournalist or art or anything like that. I just thought it was fun to make pictures. If I thought about the idea as a profession, it was as distant as saying; "I want to be a rock start when I grow up." It wasn't until I was actually a professional photographer (which happened very much by accident, and I will spare you the boring story here) that it dawned on me that some people make their living making pictures. I had never pondered the question of why I take pictures or what is the role of photography or what kind of photographer I wanted to be when suddenly, I was a Professional Photojournalist. It would be another 10 years of working in that capacity before I would begin to ask myself these questions
What advice would you give young photographers?
Forget about the profession of being a photographer. First be a photographer and maybe the profession will come after. Don't be in a rush to make pay your rent with your camera. Jimi Hendrix didn't decide on the career of professional musician before he learned to play guitar. No, he loved music and and created something beautiful and that THEN became a profession. Larry Towell, for instance, was not a "professional" photographer until he was already a "famous" photographer. Make the pictures you feel compelled to make and perhaps that will lead to a career. But if you try to make the career first, you will just make shitty pictures that you don't care about.
» Christopher Anderson's Magnum Portfolio
Chris Steele-Perkins
When did you first get excited about photography?
I never had an epiphany about photography. It crept up on me. It started off as a hobby while at school, developed at a technical lever working as a photographer for the university newspaper, and has always remained a hobby too. Something I can enjoy. Creative Camera magazine, edited by Bill Jay, (I am going back a while), Life magazine, and some of the few books available at the time by people like Bill Brandt, Ansel Adams, Richard Avedon, Cartier Bresson, and Andre Kertez, to name a few, really turned me on to the idea that you could say something with photography: that you could have your own take on the world and somehow start to express it by the kinds of photographs you took.
What advice would you give young photographers?
1) Never think photography is easy. It's like poetry in that it's easy enough to make a few rhymes, but that's not a good poem.
2) Study photography, see what people have achieved, but learn from it, don't try photographically to be one of those people
3) Photograph things you really care about, things that really interest you, not things you feel you ought to do.
4) Photograph them in the way you feel is right, not they way you think you ought to
5) Be open to criticism, it can be really helpful, but stick to you core values
6) Study and theory is useful but you learn most by doing. Take photographs, lots of them, be depressed by them, take more, hone your skills and get out there in the world and interact.
» Chris Steele-Perkins' Magnum Portfolio
Constantine Manos
When did you first get excited about photography?
I first became excited about photography when I joined the junior high school camera club at the age of 13.
What advice would you give young photographers?
Try not to take pictures, which simply show what something looks like. By the way you put the elements of an image together in a frame show us something we have never seen before and will never see again. And remember that catching a moment makes the image even more unique in the stream of time. Also, try to do workshops with photographers whose work you admire, but first ask around to make sure they are good teachers as well as good photographers. Taking good pictures is easy. Making very good pictures is difficult. Making great pictures is almost impossible.
» Constantine Manos' Magnum Portfolio
David Alan Harvey
When did you first get excited about photography?
"Lightning struck" when I was around 12. It hit me one day and I never looked back. I KNEW it. Total certainty. I was living in a small Virginia town and my "outside influences" came from books and from magazines. The early photo essays in Life and Look magazines struck a chord. The work of Robert Frank and HCB had the strongest impact because from them I could see that "ordinary life" was their "grist for the mill". I loved the work of many other photographers too, but war photographers needed a war, fashion photographers needed a model, sports photographers needed a game, and landscape photographers needed the Grand Canyon.....HCB and Frank just needed a street corner. Anywhere, anytime. I could relate to that, because I only had my neighborhood with not much "going on". I loved immediately the idea of transforming the ordinary into the extraordinary just by "seeing" and seeing alone. At the same time I got lost in the local library with the French Impressionists, Goya, and the light of Caravaggio. That was all I needed at the time to know beyond a shadow of a doubt what I wanted to do with my life.
What advice would you give young photographers?
You must have something to "say". You must be brutally honest with yourself about this. Think about history , politics, science, literature, music, film, and anthropology. What affects does one discipline have over another? What makes "man" tick? Today , with everyone being able to easily make technically perfect photographs with a cell phone, you need to be an "author". It is all about authorship, authorship and authorship. Many young photographers come to me and tell me their motivation for being a photographer is to "travel the world" or to "make a name" for themselves. Wrong answers in my opinion. Those are collateral incidentals or perhaps even the disadvantages of being a photographer. Without having tangible ideas , thoughts, feelings, and something almost "literary" to contribute to "the discussion", today's photographer will become lost in the sea of mediocrity. Photography is now clearly a language. As with any language, knowing how to spell and write a gramatically correct "sentence" is , of course, necessary. But, more importantly, today's emerging photographers now must be "visual wordsmiths" with either a clear didactic or an esoteric imperitive. Be a poet, not a technical "writer". Perhaps more simply put, find a heartfelt personal project. Give yourself the "assignment" you might dream someone would give you. Please remember, you and only you will control your destiny. Believe it, know it, say it.
» David Alan Harvey's Magnum Portfolio
Donovan Wylie
When did you first get excited about photography?
I first became excited about photography as a boy.
What advice would you give young photographers?
Never stop enjoying it. Try and not "look" for pictures but keep yourself always open and allow yourself to be stimulated by whatever hits you. Work towards a goal…book, exhibition... but more importantly work towards finding your own voice, your subject and your application. Accept that your work is more about you than what you represent, try to bridge that balance, without resorting to photographing your feet! In other words try and translate personal experience into a collective one, it is very possible and I think the key quest of any art form...(study the book "Waffenruhe" by Michael Schmidt) - study all the great photographers and love doing it, start at the beginning, look at early American, and German, then French, then take a close look at artists using photography in the sixties, Rusha etc. Don't get bogged down in theory, but respect it, read Robert Adams on Photography, in fact embrace Robert Adams generally and you will learn a lot. Read literature, especially early Russian, French and modern American, (and Irish, Joyce), the journey literature has taken as an art form in terms of description and representation is very similar to photography. Don't rely on style for the sake of it, if you have your own subject, you can adopt other peoples styles if it helps, and visa versa, if you photograph something every one has, then adopt an style, execution, that can only be yours, eventually you will achieve both, your own voice will come through, but it can take time. Study the book 'How You Look at It'…Important essays there will help you. Always try and be honest with yourself... for example, is the idea of being a photographer more exciting to you than photography itself, if this is true think about becoming an actor.......................if you genuinely love photography don't give it up. Understand and enjoy the fact that photography is a unique medium. Respect and work within photography's limitations, you will go much further.
» Donovan Wylie's Magnum Portfolio
David Hurn
When did you first get excited about photography?
I first got excited by photography the first day I picked up a camera. However this was not until I was 20 years of age. I suddenly realized that I had an excuse to be anywhere and gaze in wonderment; the camera gave me something to hide my shyness behind. The act of pointing a camera at another human being is daunting - however clarifying what is unfolding in front of one can give one immense pleasure. I have had a blissful life.
What advice would you give young photographers?
Don't become a photographer unless its what you 'have' to do. It can't be the easy option. If you become a photographer you will do a lot of walking so buy good shoes.
» David Hurn's Magnum Portfolio
Dennis Stock
When did you first get excited about photography?
I was drawn towards photography at the age of eighteen and under the GI bill I took a course with Bernice Abbott. She sent me to W. Eugene Smith, who suggested I seek a job with Gjon Mili. I apprenticed to Mili for four years. Won first prize in "Life magazine's Young Professionals contest." Thereafter left Mili and was invited by Robert Capa to join Magnum. Modeled for the very famous picture by Andreas Feininger, called the "Photojournalist."
What advice would you give young photographers?
Young photographers should learn their craft well and don't expect to make a constant living at taking pictures. But they should FOLLOW THEIR BLISS. Find time to pursue themes that indicate their concerns, big and small. Above all when shooting, MAKE AN ARTICULATE IMAGE.
» Dennis Stock's Magnum Portfolio
Eli Reed
When did you first get excited about photography?
I first got excited about photography at the age of 10 years old when I saw the photograph of my mother in front of a Christmas tree that I had taken with a Kodak Brownie Camera. It was the first photo that I ever made. My mother died with a couple of years of making that photograph. I started looking through magazines such as Life Magazine and it was a beginning. I watched the Civil Rights movement through photographs that made me feel as if I were there.
What advice would you give young photographers?
Stop talking theory when a camera is in their your and do not over-think the image. Lose the ego and let the photograph find you. Observe the life moving like a river around you and realize that the images you make may become part of the collective history of the time that you are living in.
» Eli Reed's Magnum Portfolio
Elliott Erwitt
When did you first get excited about photography?
When I discovered the possibility of earning a living without steady employment; in a word, as a freelancer.
What advice would you give young photographers?
Learn the craft (which is not very hard). Carefully study past work of photographers and classic painters. Look and learn from movies. See where you can fit in as a "commercial" photographer. Commercial: meaning working for others and delivering a product on command. But most of all keep your personal photography as your separate hobby. If you are very good and diligent it just may pay off.
» Elliott Erwitt's Magnum Portfolio
Lise Sarfati
When did you first get excited about photography?
I was thirteen. My sister Annie-Lou was taking pictures of me all the time while my father was doing films while my other sister Mona was painted me naked while my mother was writing all day long in her bed. I decided to steal the camera of Annie-lou and to go in apartments of very old ladies around 90 years old and make portraits of them and photograph their empty bedrooms...
What advice would you give young photographers?
Read a lot and create your own universe. Learn how to construct and create a series. Do not be impressed by other works. Try to innovate or simply to be yourself.
» Lise Sarfati's Magnum Portfolio
Martine Franck
When did you first get excited about photography?
I first got excited by photography when as a post graduate student I got a visa to China, this was my first visit to the far East and even though I knew nothing about photography I felt a need to show my family and friends what I had seen. I got hooked.
What advice would you give young photographers?
My advice to photographers is to get out there in the field and take photographs but also if they are students to finish their course, learn as many languages as possible, go to movies, read books visit museums, broaden your mind.
» Martine Frank's Magnum Portfolio
Harry Gruyaert
When did you first get excited about photography?
When I had my first Rolleiflex in my hand when I was 14.
What advice would you give young photographers?
Be yourself, Don't copy anybody.
» Harry Gruyaert's Magnum Portfolio
Hiroji Kubota
When did you first get excited about photography?
Sometime in 1961 I did an assistant-like job for Elliott Erwitt. Then I was in college studying a political science. Elliott sent me a copy of Cartier-Bresson's decisive moment as a gift. I knew nothing of photography but this book changed my life.
What advice would you give young photographers?
Study the works of the greatest photographers like Henri Cartier-Bresson and Andre Kertesz. Try to travel to many parts of the world and understand what a diverse world we live in.
» Hiroji Kubota's Magnum Portfolio
John Vink
When did you first get excited about photography?
At twelve when seeing the image appear in the developer: pure magic... It's the ONLY thing I miss with digital...
What advice would you give young photographers?
Don't stop questioning yourself (it'll make you less arrogant). Push. Push, scratch, dig... Push further... And stop when you don't enjoy it anymore... But most of all respect those you photograph...
» John Vink's Magnum Portfolio
Jonas Bendiksen
When did you first get excited about photography?
I first started in photography when I was about 14 or 15. I borrowed by father's SLR camera and very quickly I was taken by the process. Together with my father, I built a rudimentary BW darkroom in the bathroom at home. Over the years in high school, I ended up spending more and more time in there, photographing everything around me, developing the film, printing it, and back out photographing. By the time I finished high school I had to ask, Ok what do I do now? Find something else, or keep doing this, and give it a shot?
What advice would you give young photographers?'
Throw yourself off a cliff. Figuratively speaking, I mean. Photography is a language. Think about what you want to use it to talk about. What are you interested in? What questions do you want to ask? Then, go for it, and throw yourself into talking about that topic, using photography. Make a body of work about that.
» Jonas Bendiksen's Magnum Portfolio
Larry Towell
When did you first get excited about photography?
My mom gave me her old Brownie box camera when I was 13 years old. She'd bought it for $6 with her allowance when she was 13. I took pictures of my seven brothers and sisters because that was my world. Photography was not a passion yet. It was a tool. Then in university, I was given a Pentax 35 mm camera and taught how to process black and white film. There was nothing I wanted to do more than go home and photograph my family. I was in the city, but I wanted to remind myself that I belonged on farmland. It was still a tool. Photography did not really become a passion until I began meeting victims of human rights abuses in Central America during the Reagan years. The camera allowed me to share the lives of others, to walk around in their world, to view their horizons. That's when I got excited about photography.
What advice would you give young photographers?
Be yourself and look outside of yourself.
» Larry Towell's Magnum Portfolio
Mark Power
When did you first get excited about photography?
My Grandad exchanged some loyalty stamps for my first camera when I was just eight years old. Its first outing was on a school trip through Foxton Locks, part of the extravagant Grand Union Canal in Leicestershire, in the English Midlands. My first picture was of my teacher, Miss Allen, in 1967. This is not a particularly flattering picture, and nor does it suggest the dawn of any great talent.
This, however, is not the point...Perhaps choosing Miss Allen as my first subject was a cry for help, a pact between the two of us that she would look after me. But she didn't. Craig Smalley (the school bully) had spotted the camera. All the other pictures were to be of him, and him alone.
I wonder if he still has those pictures? Of course I had to hand them all over to him after I got them back from the local chemist, or wherever it was my parents took the film. I told my Grandad; I had to explain why I had only this one picture to show him. I assume he later said something to my parents because the 'Smalley' threat began to subside. But my plan of recounting the trip aided by twelve pictures came to nothing, and felt somehow 'less real' because of it.
So photography was immediately elusive, precious, challenging and desirable. I didn't take it for granted then, and I haven't since. During a nervous, painfully shy childhood I would painstakingly caption and catalogue all my pictures. Today I imagine they lie somewhere deep in my father's loft, to be re-discovered in some painful but inevitable future.
And then, many years later... I vividly remember, in 1980, seeing an exhibition by the war photographer Don McCullin at the V&A in London. His pictures touched me deeply - you'd have had to be made of stern stuff if they didn't - and they clearly moved others. Some people were in tears. At the time I was a third year painting student who had, as yet, shown very little inclination towards photography. But now, to a young man used to working everyday in the life room, trying to tease an emotional response from a stick of charcoal, a piece of cartridge paper, and a naked model, McCullin's work was a revelation. I knew Rothko could move people, if you were of the right frame of mind and you were prepared to give his paintings time, but this - these photographs - they were so powerful. They really did communicate. I liked this democracy.
I decided to be a photographer, though I had next to no idea how.
What advice would you give young photographers?
Although there are far more people trying to 'be photographers' than there were in those heady days of 1980, there are also far more opportunities. Gone are the days, thankfully, when a commercial assignment, or even a picture in a newspaper, can damage the chance of gallery representation.
Yet what is clear is that a number of 'good pictures' are no longer enough; today it has to be about ideas, and about the intent of the work. If you have something to say, and even better you have an innovative way of saying it then opportunities are out there.
I sense that photography is concerning itself with real issues again. For some time much of photography seemed to be about itself, and while this was fine, and interesting in some cases, it's not what photography is really good at. Understand this by familiarising yourself with the rich and wonderful history of our medium. Be proud of it, what it has, and what it can, achieve. Don't try and reinvent the wheel. Be inspired. Try and copy, if you like (because no one can).
Find a subject you care about. Something that moves you. Something which stirs your rawest emotions. And then have patience.
» Mark Power's Magnum Portfolio
Martin Parr
When did you first get excited about photography?
When my Grandfather lent me a camera (he was a keen amateur) and we went out shooting together.
What advice would you give young photographers?
Find something you are passionate about, and shoot your way through this obsession with elegance and you will have potential great project.
» Martin Parr's Magnum Portfolio
Mikhael Subotzky
When did you first get excited about photography?
I first got excited about photography when I went traveling in South East Asia as an 18 year old. I bought a cheap Nikon SLR for the trip and thought that I had taken fantastic pictures. When I got back, I showed them all to my uncle (photographer Gideon Mendel), and he flipped through them quickly and nonchalantly as if they were amateur snaps (which they certainly were!) Despite this disappointment, the bug had bitten, and I was drawn to continue to photograph - I guess, in search of the kind of aliveness of interaction with the world that I started to feel through taking those early pictures.
What advice would you give young photographers?
Stick to one project for a long time. And keep working on it through many stages of learning, even if it might feel finished. Its the only way to break through what I think are some vital lessons that need to be learnt about story-telling and how to combine images.
» Mikhael Subotzky's Magnum Portfolio
Olivia Arthur
When did you first get excited about photography?
I first became excited about photography when I started working for my student newspaper. Though I was just excited by taking my own pictures and seeing them in print. It was quite a while before I made the jump to thinking about photography in the bigger picture and started looking at other photographers work.
What advice would you give young photographers?
My main piece of advice for young photographers who have just come out of college is to get away from the 'hubs' of photography like London and New York. There are so many photographers touting their portfolios round in places like this that people end up fighting to do jobs that are not what they really want, just to make ends meet. It's the kind of environment that doesn't fuel anyone's creativity (well mostly anyway...). My advice: go out and do the things they really want to before getting tied in...if they don't take the risk at the beginning they'll find it much harder to come back and take it later on.
» Olivia Arthur's Magnum Portfolio
Paolo Pellegrin
When did you first get excited about photography?
I was studying architecture in Rome and felt it wasn't right for me, so when a photography school opened in Rome that year I decided to give it a try. Quite immediately, and for the first time in my life, I realized that this medium could become the direction and expression that I had long struggled to find.
What advice would you give young photographers?
I believe photography - like many other things one does in life - is the exact expression of who one is at a given moment: every time you compose and release the shutter you give voice to your thoughts and opinions of the world around you. So other than the obvious patience (photography is a complex medium, a voice which requires time to develop) and perseverance and the necessary humility when dealing with others, I would recommend working to become a more developed and informed individual, a more knowledgeable and engaged citizen. This will translate into a deeper more complex understanding of the world around you, and ultimately into a richer and more meaningful photography.
» Paolo Pellegrin's Magnum Portfolio
Patrick Zachmann
When did you first get excited about photography?
When I was teenager my older brother who liked photography-an uncle coming from Algeria brought with him a handmade enlarger in wood called "Imperator" and a Rolleiflex and gave them to him- used to take me to a photographic club called les "30X40" (from the size of prints). Once a month, a bunch of fans of photography met in Paris to exchange their experiences, knowledge and love for photography. There was one guy, very old fashioned, living alone with his old mother who was historian in art and specialised in photography. Every month, he was preparing a lecture on a great photographer. That's the way I discovered the big names of photography-some of them were even invited. One day, he introduced to us Diane Arbus and I got a big emotion. That might be the first time I had been really excited-even "moved" would be more correct- about photography. Later, my brother gave up with photography-my parents didn't let him and wanted him to have a "real" work- while I became a photographer fighting against them.
What advice would you give young photographers?
You have to fight for beeing a photographer! More seriously, my advice for young poeple is to go to exhibitions, to see books and try to do a personal project which they feel they have a unique approach of it because they are close the subject and need to express and understand urgently things about it.
Photography has something to do for me, like with Diane Arbus, with oneself through the others and with unconsciousness (sorry for my English: I mean "l'inconscient") a psychoanalytic approach. I will answer to a third question because it's linked with above: why did you become a photographer? I became a photographer because I don't have memory. It took me quite a long time to understand that trough my personal researches ("Inquest of identity or a Jew in search of his memory", "Chile. The roads of the memory", "My father's memory," etc...), I was looking for the "missing" pictures. Making my book "Inquest of identity", I found out that my aunt-my father's sister who was a Nazi camp survivor- had at her home a picture of my grand-parents deported and killed in Auschwitz that my father never showed to us. Thanks photography, I met my father's parents that I never knew. That's what I like with photography. It helps me to understand myself and the past through the present.
» Patrick Zachmann's Magnum Portfolio
Peter Marlow
When did you first get excited about photography?
At about nine years old I was given a makeshift horizontal enlarger which seemed to be made of old tin cans and large magnifying glass, I set it up with a friend in our cellar and we made our first prints, about 2 inches square, in the complete darkness as we did not have a safelight, the cellar contained my father's home-made wine store, so the longer we stayed down there in the damp and cold, the drunker we got! I met a young German travel photographer recently in Barcelona, talking to him, I realised he had never ever used film.
What advice would you give young photographers?
Be yourself, get up early, and don't try too hard, as whatever is trying to come out will come eventually without any effort, learn to trust your instincts and don't think about what others will think or about the process too much. Work hard but enjoy it.
» Peter Marlow's Magnum Portfolio
Steve McCurry
When did you first get excited about photography?
While I was studying film in university I took a fine art photography class where I was introduced to the photography of Dorothea Lange, Henri Cartier-Bresson, and Walker Evans. My interest shifted from filmmaking to still photography.
What advice would you give young photographers?
If you want to be a photographer, you have to photograph. If you look at the photographers' work you admire, you will find that they have found a particular place or subject, and then have dug deep into it, and carved out something that is special. That takes a lot of dedication, passion, and work.
» Steve McCurry's Magnum Portfolio
Stuart Franklin
When did you first get excited about photography?
When I bought a second hand twin lens reflex camera in Victoria, BC and hitchhiked to Mexico and South America - aged 19.
What advice would you give young photographers?
Follow your heart and never give up.
» Stuart Franklin's Magnum Portfolio
Susan Meiselas
When did you first get excited about photography?
I think I became excited by photography when I connected with the Strippers and saw myself as a storyteller with a camera and recorder...
What advice would you give young photographers?
Dig in and follow your instincts and trust your curiosity
» Susan Meiselas's Magnum Portfolio
Thomas Dworzak
When did you first get excited about photogaphy?
As I kid when I tried to photograph grasshoppers, close-up. Later on, at 15, probably when I ran up to a cop arresting some activist who had chained himself to a newspaper building, and the same year when I ended up in a demonstration in Poland. Feeling the adrenalin; the camera was the excuse and the shield to hide behind.
What advice would you give young photographers?
Try live something intense, at home, abroad... it does not matter. It has to be passionate. And once you know the basics forget about photography.
» Thomas Dworzaks's Magnum Portfolio
Thomas Hoepker
When did you first get excited about photography?
My grandfather gave me his old 9x12 cm view camera when I was 14. I still have it. It has black bellows and a (broken) ground-glass. It was hard to work with but it had an aura of magic to it. Also it smelled nice. It took a tripod and a black cloth to focus the image and then a cassette had to be inserted with a light sensitive glass plate. It helped me to understand the basic elements of photography. Today I shoot with digital cameras like everybody else but in all their perfection they lack the magic and excitement of this old monster.
What advice would you give young photographers?
Avoid all photo schools and courses. Most will give you lofty ideas and twist your mind in one direction. Find your own way to photography, nobody will ask you later if you have a diploma. Visit as many museums as you possibly can. The images you see (painted, drawn, etched or photographed) will stay with you for the rest of your life. They will help you to discover good pictures in real life. Suppress any silly ambitions of becoming a great artist. Being a good photographer is difficult enough.
» Thomas Hoepker's Magnum Portfolio
Trent Parke
When did you first get excited about photography?
The first time I saw an image magically appear in a developing tray in my parent's laundry (makeshift darkroom) when I was 12 years old.
What advice would you give young photographers?
To photograph what is closest to you and the things that you enjoy and have an interest in. Make the whole process as fun and least difficult as possible.
» Trent Parke's Magnum Portfolio
Reader comments (92)
fascinating... always brilliant to hear about other photographers fall from normality.. erm.. rise to obscurity.. no.. motivation.. that´s the word :ø)
"Photograph because you love doing it, because you absolutely have to do it, because the chief reward is going to be the process of doing it."
A.W.
great post--- thanks
david
Comment posted by db on November 15, 2008
as an aside
-
-
what happened to the crime-and-punishment MM piece and blog entry?
cheers
d
Comment posted by db on November 15, 2008
Thank you so much everyone! Im printing it to fix it at the wall in my studio.
My grandfather was a shoesmaker and he always told me to wear good shoes and how to choose them:)
Comment posted by Luca on November 15, 2008
Thanks David. The Crime & Punishment essay was taken offline for internal reasons. We removed the blog post because we didn’t want a dead link.
Glad you like this entry. The one that I'm taping to my studio wall comes from Donovan Wylie:
"Accept that your work is more about you than what you represent, try to bridge that balance, without resorting to photographing your feet! In other words try and translate personal experience into a collective one, it is very possible and I think the key quest of any art form...Understand and enjoy the fact that photography is a unique medium. Respect and work within photography's limitations, you will go much further."
Comment posted by Alec Soth on November 15, 2008
off into the cool and rainy Toronto night to bang up against too many bodies at an outrageously large photo/art opening (carte blanche), so have enjoyed enjoyed the read....
miss seeing my buddy Dave Harvey's take on these questions (you should add his thoughts when he returns)...
off those you guys have offered, much mucho is good for the chilly november soul, but i love the advice about shoes (abbas), I second THAT!, Chris fuck the career nonsense and just make what swoons your shit (that's my mottoe), Jonas' figurative Leap, and all the rest....
and since beloved Wylie recommends Joyce (a second that ditty), for him, one of the best that if i were ever asked to offer advice to another (other than quoting my son Dima, when he was sevenx "what's so important about focusing"), JJ would be a fine place to start, so for donovan:
"One by one, they were all becoming shades. Better pass boldly into that other world, in the full glory of some passion, than fade and wither dismally with age..."jj, the dead
thanks Alec for getting this band of cats (u magnum dudes and lasses) to come back to life in the blogoshere....
running out into the damp night
b
.
Comment posted by Bob Black on November 15, 2008
Brilliant|!
Comment posted by guilherme on November 15, 2008
What a wonderful post... It's great to hear the opinions of those you respect.. And, as usual it pretty much all filters down to the same thing... find and shoot the things that move you...
Thank you
Ross
Comment posted by Ross Nolly on November 15, 2008
totally great.
Comment posted by Jackie Alpers on November 15, 2008
Alex Majoli's advice is good. Something I did five years ago when i first picked up a camera was to do a photo a day project for 15 months. It taught me to edit, and, using a digital camera, I improved very quickly.
One thing I've never done, and it has hurt, was to take Thomas Hoepker's advice about studying painters. There's a lot of lessons to be learned there without the distraction of photography (what film, what lens, etc - instead, focus on composition, light).
Malcolm Gladwell has a new book out this week about people who achieve excellence in a given area. One thing common to everyone seems to be 10,000 hours of practise. But I don't know that it is true of photography or art - there I think it takes longer. Might be an interesting question for the Magnum crew - after how many years with a camera did you finally understand what you were doing?
Comment posted by Luke on November 15, 2008
Thanks so much, Alec, for asking these questions and sharing the answers with us. I am struck by how many spoke of finding something that interests you passionately and digging deep into it for a long time. The message I would tape to my wall is from Mikhael Subotzky:
"Stick to one project for a long time. And keep working on it through many stages of learning, even if it might feel finished. Its the only way to break through what I think are some vital lessons that need to be learnt about story-telling and how to combine images."
Patricia
Comment posted by Patricia Lay-Dorsey on November 15, 2008
There’s too many things to list as to why i like this blog entry Alec…. one might be that it made me look harder at some of the magnum photographer’s work that appealed to me a little less than others; simply since the advice they gave was so insightful to my way of thinking…. and when looking again at their work, it re-enforced their thinking.
That being said, if i was to make an entire list of benefits i collected from this blog entry, they would each map to the same over-riding feeling. Lately it really seems that Magnum photographers want ‘not’ to breed better photography, it seems they would like to breed first better photographers, if that makes sense…
Thank you to all the photographers that made this effort.
What ever you’re feeding your peers Alec to get them to come out and play this way, well please keep feeding them this. ;-)
..
Comment posted by Joe on November 16, 2008
thank you
Comment posted by Alessandro on November 16, 2008
thanks for the reply on crime e and punishment.. i was surprised that more people didn´t dip into that conversation as it was a great piece - a real corker provoking thoughts which genuinely needed to be pondered carefully.
i would guess that ambition can destroy the enjoyment of photography just as much as having to take hired-eye work to survive can.
P M hits home with me as well, alex....
"Be yourself, get up early, and don't try too hard, as whatever is trying to come out will come eventually without any effort, learn to trust your instincts and don't think about what others will think or about the process too much. Work hard but enjoy it."
ALL who dig this thread..
the book "dialogue with photography" by paul hill and thomas cooper published by cornerhouse manchester is a great read.. in depth collected interviews with some of the greats.. doisneau, kertesz, ray, strand, cartier-bresson, w.e. smith.. more.. more..
amazon have one in stock here.
question - "what sort of education did you have?"
george rodger - "education! me? i was never educated"
Comment posted by david bowen on November 16, 2008
alec, of course.. not alex.. apologies.
db
Comment posted by david bowen on November 16, 2008
WOW
Thanks for the most amazing past I've ever read.
Comment posted by Paul on November 16, 2008
Wow! This post is beautiful!!! My dad bought a "hot" Minolta SRT 102 on "F" street in Fresno, CA back in1983 - I wanted to use it but never did until this year ;-) My parents never bought film for it and it looked complicated - crazy huh. The "stereotype" I had of photography when I was 11 was a guy with a mustache in those Marlboros ads and National Geographic-Cannon-giant-white-lens-with-a-handle...advertisements, which seemed like a cool thing.... But I got into cycling...
Zoom to 2003 - I discovered art galleries and such a thing as, "contemporary art." 2005: I was fascinated by these crazy pictures in a book-catalog, especially memorable was of this guy in a "batman" suit with his s-c-h-l-o-n-g sticking out!
Yes go see "ART" and read books and encourage others and especially don't forget those lonely-quiet -kids (or anyone for that matter (even) leave magazines/books laying around in random places for people to find) - what's that saying (?)"pay it forward." You might start a chain of events in some one's life....
Again, this blog post was beautiful!!!
W.
Comment posted by William Cardoza on November 16, 2008
After working in this industry for the past 27 years, ny personal advice would be, Run, RUN! as fast as you can the other way and never look back......
Comment posted by Luis Orellana on November 16, 2008
Slight variation in answer to your questions by mature photographer to himself:
Please - let me
listen to myself again
uninterrupted
until the voice speaks again
so hard to understand
like a long distance call
Let me again
be silent within me
so I can hear
this feeble voice
I so long for
for so long
again
Ernst Haas from his Notebooks - under pressure to fulfill his financial obligations,
longing to do his own projects.
Inge Bondi Nov. 16 2008
Comment posted by Inge Bondi on November 16, 2008
Just what I have been waiting to hear.
This is great.
Comment posted by Andri Irawan on November 16, 2008
Thank you so much for the pieces of advice and for your lecture yesterday- my entire party really enjoyed you.
Comment posted by jess on November 16, 2008
Wow, what a manifest. Thank you all for sharing this.
Comment posted by Ulrich on November 16, 2008
Hi Alec,
I saw you speak yesterday at the SPE West conference and I learned so much. Thank you so much for making this page for us. It is so helpful and motivating to get advice from my favorite photographers.
Thank you!
Comment posted by Alicia on November 16, 2008
Great post, a lot of good ideas... espeicially the shoes. That said, Hoepker's advice to avoid all photo schools and courses seems a little generalized. Granted, I went to art school (more fun than a state school, I imagine), so I'm rather more invested in the idea of it. I learned a lot. Forgot a lot, too... but no one there"flled my head with lofty ideas." They kept me busy shooting and printing. Have things changed so much since my time there?
We're all on a different journey, and not everyone can take the same road.. and it's not a race. The ocasional course or class may prove well worth it, or a waste of time if you allow it to be. I never have, and I took as much from my education as I could.. still do, when I take the occasional course.
Comment posted by Suzanne on November 16, 2008
Great stuff ladies and gentlemen!
Comment posted by David Axelbank on November 16, 2008
Suzanne, indeed...
I went to a fine arts school inspired by the Bauhaus and its interdisciplinarity (can I use that word?). Didn't learn much about photography- the teacher was a disaster-, but I learned a LOT about painting, sculpture, architecture, stage design, graphic arts. It still stays with me and is extremely valuable.
Comment posted by John Vink on November 16, 2008
So many great inspiring stories. I feel revived!
Comment posted by Chris Minnick on November 16, 2008
Nice to have the gods of Mount Olympus come down from their clouds and speak to us mere mortals! Looks like democracy is coming to Magnum as well as the USA. Keep it up Alex. What you're doing could revolutionize the whole business.
Comment posted by nigel amies on November 16, 2008
enjoyable, enthralling, inspiring...grateful.
Comment posted by ian on November 16, 2008
exactly what i wanted to hear, better yet, what i NEEDED to hear.... thank you!
Comment posted by amanda on November 17, 2008
Very interesting answers, thank you!
Comment posted by Valery Titievsky on November 17, 2008
Wow! Fantastic post. It's great seeing so many different perspectives in one place. Certainly a must read for new photographers.
Comment posted by Eric Hamilton on November 17, 2008
a lot of obvious things... I prefer photographers who talks with their photos and no captions
Comment posted by Daniel on November 17, 2008
a great collection of answers to a familiar question, So How Did You Get Hooked? Loved the most Mark Power's recollections of his earliest photos being of the school bully, who insisted on being his sole subject...
and very encouraged to read all of these great see-ers (is that how you spell that?) exhorting a lifetime of not just looking, but of reading. too many art students that i encountered were happy to be in art school because they thought it meant they didn't have to read...or write.
Comment posted by stacy oborn on November 17, 2008
I love this. A number of reoccurring themes, here. I must take heed.
Comment posted by Justin Hackworth on November 17, 2008
There are some really great insights here. I especially like Donovan's.
Thanks.
Jason.
Comment posted by Jason Hobbs on November 17, 2008
coming here i felt like somebody heard my wishes and decided to put that post online. one of the most valuable posts i've come across so far, because many echo my own thoughts, and many tell me what to do in order to make it (e.g. shootshootshoot). the only thing i dont know now, is how to finance getting on the road again. i guess i have to find out on my own. thanks for this Alec.
Comment posted by fr. on November 17, 2008
Glad to see one photo still beats all those countless stupid words above, including and below mine.
Comment posted by Stupid Photographer on November 17, 2008
Hey Stupid Photographer, why not take up a different hobby? Surely there is a stamp collecting blog somewhere that will appreciate your unconstructive bitterness.
Comment posted by Christopher Anderson on November 17, 2008
Chris,
I'm sure you have read Stupid's writings before on Lighststalkers. They are usually far from being as stupid as his name (not that there are no exceptions). Their tone might be disturbing or irritating to some but I believe their content is mostly OK as he has contributed many interesting mind openers on LS in the past. As for me he is welcome here. But maybe that is because I'm stupid.
Comment posted by John Vink on November 17, 2008
Chris,
I'm sure you have read Stupid's writings before on Lighststalkers. They are usually far from being as stupid as his name (not that there are no exceptions). Their tone might be disturbing or irritating to some but I believe their content is mostly OK as he has contributed many interesting mind openers on LS in the past. As for me he is welcome here. But maybe that is because I'm stupid.
Comment posted by John Vink on November 17, 2008
Inspiring and beautiful post.
This comment by Patrick Zachmann hit me with the force of a flaming brick:
"I became a photographer because I don't have memory".
I don't know why this struck me so powerfully. Am trying to work it through my head, but I suspect I won't be able to intellectualise it.
I do know that my approach to photography is intuitive. Maybe too intuitive - I rarely think about what I'm doing once I start shooting. And I rarely remember what I feel like while I'm shooting. So perhaps the photography is my only perception of the moment of the shot, because I don't know what it was or felt like.
Comment posted by Alex Weltlinger on November 17, 2008
Such a poignant, timely post for a young photographer trying to find his way. Thank you!
rob
Comment posted by rob c on November 17, 2008
Have a friend drive you out anywhere they choose, before you get in the car set your camera to the conditions at hand then have them blindfold you. When you get to where they are taking you have them help you only so you don't fall off a cliff or something. Then shoot about 40 or fifty pictures.
No talking! Your friend cannot coach you in any way, but they can laugh, that's okay.
Your first inclination will be to put the camera to your eye, but wait, you're blindfolded. And there's the rub!
This exercise should get you through almost anything that will come down in your life. Be prepared to never be prepared -enough.
Comment posted by otto phokuz on November 17, 2008
Shoes, dignity, waffenruhe/michael schmidt, reading, bullshit, believing, atheism, anarchy, mothers, parody and after these words about photographs comes the word "elegance" from Martin Parr. excuse me like you european island brutes say but god damn. how fucking stupid is this? The most inelegant photographer of us all speaking about elegance. Parr understands everything about photography and because of that is entitled to say the shit he wants to say. parrs elegance is there with richardson. martin/terry, jackass/80's england, what's the difference. fuck your elegance just like you fucked poor, poor people (but not like with billinghams honesty) and people who lived in brighton beach, you liar. photography is definitely shimmering with possibilities but not your empty parking spaces you lying fascist and look at your rich, and then look at your poor and then you speak about elegance. up yours you cunt! boring couples in my arse, it's about your inelegant and boring photographers I watches. it's sad that you're never serious. sad for magnum. just sad. elegance in my finnished arse
Comment posted by James Ames on November 17, 2008
Could we remain polite please?
Comment posted by John Vink on November 17, 2008
No offence John, but live by the sword, die by the sword….. if you safeguard one person’s barbed opinion based on ‘past performance’ you don’t just open the door for more loose manners, you actually offer the bravado of more.
I guess i just don’t think the latitude James just took is purely incidental John.
I’ve seen this before and it’s a slippery slope….. good manners should still prevail over strong opinions… just my opinion of course John.
James, there might be merit in your feelings, but your approach is a bit self-defeating don’t you think? It comes across a bit more like a tantrum than a message..
..
Comment posted by Joe on November 17, 2008
Are you 'a European island brute'?? A painted barbarian from the outer-limits of the empire?? I am.
And empty car parks speak volumes to me. I don't forget growing up in Thatcher's Britain, and an empty car park 'elegantly', and 'eloquently' provokes memory. I look at some of Martin Parr's images and I can smell the tarmac (or the vinegar vapourizing off the chips)....as for Billingham's 'poor, poor people', as you call them, they're his own family. How couldn't they be intimate in the way they are?? 'Liking' Parr's work really seems to miss the 'point', if there is any point, you obviously despise it, A-ha!! (it's caused a reaction...)...but, as you've so eloquently (and elegantly) 'pointed out', it certainly has an inner life of its own. And photography with an inner-life of its own, an expression of one man's vision of the world he lives in, (whether you 'agree' with that vision or not, and that's not the point either) is - excuse my language - tip-f-g-top photography! Oh, and on top of all that, it evidently 'provokes'. As you've proven by your post. But maybe that's not the point either. But, I'm now wondering, what's your point???
That photographic works 'you don't like' are made by fascists??? That they're dishonest??
Interesting point!!!!!!!!! Peace
Comment posted by O.P on November 17, 2008
Further more, I just want to ask you if you 'despise' Sebastian Selgado for depicting 'economic anomie' in an 'elegant' - almost heroic - way?? We may not like the reality he is describing as a photographer, we may even be stirred by what we see, but we don't dislike the photographer for attempting to show it. Don't get too confused between the visual messages and Messenger.
Peace
Comment posted by Op' on November 18, 2008
Dear James Ames,
I'd ask you to review our Blog Policy. Every constructive comment is more then welcome, may it be positive or negative. Comments in which persons are directly insulted or attacked are not welcome. You furthermore promoted a website as "your" URL that is a search engine for various downloads. This is clearly not your personal website and we do not allow to promote commercial content in comments on our blog. Please keep this in mind.
Best regards,
Martin Fuchs
Magnum Blog Editor
Comment posted by Martin Fuchs on November 18, 2008
Great stuff. And good to have you back blogging again Alec - we missed you.
Comment posted by Guy Batey on November 18, 2008
Good read, thanks
Comment posted by Baris Ilktac on November 18, 2008
A side from James thinking with his mouth in place of his brain... As one basic ethic of a documentary photographer, "to photograph with as much authenticity as possible"... How do you blend into your assignment? On most assignments people know I'm there, they know I'm photographing them and sometimes people will just show-off for me. But I don't make things up or rearrange or pre-arrange a situation. I have my view point of composition to tell a visual story but my involvement in the situation I'm photographing ends there.
I like the comment from Op' - "Don't get too confused between the visual messages and Messenger. "
Comment posted by Chris Minnick on November 18, 2008
Thanks so much. I will pass this link around.
I'd love to see this format (many answers to one question) used again.
BOB, did you miss it? DAH IS included here.
Comment posted by cathyscholl on November 18, 2008
This is a gorgeous list. Fantastic. Thanks
Comment posted by Ramsay on November 18, 2008
I think this toppic was already covered here:
http://alecsothblog.wordpress.com/2007/09/06/charles-h-traubs-dos-and-don’ts-of-graduate-studies/
and the post before
http://alecsothblog.wordpress.com/2007/09/04/canshould-art-be-taught/
seems like all this post has done now started to make photographers into pundits. I was pointed to this Malcom Gladwell article by the We Can't Paint Blog and mr. Gladwell reminded me that the best advice I have received is from my old Creative Director Alex Bogusky "work harder then everyone else around you" I think Gladwell would agree.
ps sorry for that last post I his send accidentally.
Comment posted by Harlan Erskine on November 18, 2008
My thanks for this, to everyone involved. Sappy as these things are, they help the dumb kids in the crowd.
Comment posted by mrfb on November 18, 2008
Love what Abbas says....tells it as it is.....'upon birth'....
Comment posted by Op on November 19, 2008
CATHY :)))
good god, i am an idiot ;))...i totally missed it on the first read, or rather, i didnt read the names the first time, read the list through and then scanned the names...i'll blame my current mood/state, since it's been almost no sun for almost 4 weeks here in Toronto and my eyes/mind/spirit/awareness goes into havoc without vitaminD sun....
i can't imagine any good adivce without David's strong, supportive and hit-the-targets words :)))...
thanks
sun lamps anyone??
cheers
b
Comment posted by Bob Black on November 19, 2008
What is this - advice from Planet Trust Fund or what?
Comment posted by Chris George on November 19, 2008
Thank you Magnum for sharing your wisdom, it is very inspiring.
Also, extra thanks to Chris for the advice in Toronto and for signing my Stories book 'even though you're not in it;' thanks to Larry for talking about our shared Becher heritage; and especially to David for running an excellent week at the workshop!
Nothing compares to learning from the absolute best.
Comment posted by Andrew Spearin on November 19, 2008
God there are some cynical people out there .. you don't give your life over to your art unless at some point your art took you over and I would expect that is something in common with all the great photographers inside and outside of Magnum.
It was good to hear about where some of those first sparks flew. God knows we've warmed ourselves on the fires, some of which burned these photographer
Benjamin
Comment posted by Benjamin on November 19, 2008
Chris George....
Oh how I WISH I had a trust fund!!! Better stop by when you are next in my neighborhood (you are quite seriously most welcomed) and check out my digs...The photographers I know are certainly not working off their trust funds, but from a concerted effort to cut their material lifestyles down to a point where their work becomes most important. You can always figure out a way to do serious work. If not, you are not serious enough.
Cheers, David
Comment posted by david alan harvey on November 19, 2008
amazing. it makes me happy and sad to read these things.
happy that there are so many extraordinarily creative people out there to represent this great medium with such beautifully expressive advice. so many different stories, so many directions.
sad, because although I have loved photography all my life, i am terminally non-creative and will never hold a candle to the masters of this art. is it in our dna to want for that which we can never have?
and happy again, that i will always have something to strive for, to practice and great people to look up to. oh, and I love good walking shoes.
thanks for the inspiration, great post Alec.
Moto
Comment posted by Moto on November 19, 2008
Chris George:
ok, I aint a rich guy with expensive digital cameras...im a working stiff...working photographer, writer, teacher trying like hell to support my wife (also a photographer) and son and we're literally live from paycheck to paycheck (i aint cryin, believe me, just givin' some background) and i can tell u that i have had to great fortune to meet in person and to drink and talk with 2 of those "trust fund" babbies at the top: both Dave Harvey and Chris Anderson. Let me tell you this simply: less pretentious more open folk you'd be hard pressed to meet. I say that not 'cause they're magnum dudes (which i dont really care that much about) but because they are real people.
And let me also say that if Dave Harvey invites you to his pad, take him up on that! He's gotta be the kindest, most frickin' generous dude on the god damn planet...i'm serious. That guy has literally an OPEN DOOR policy and and David doesn't live like a Magnum dude/famous photographer, but like an older brother/surfer...which i guess is exactly what he is....
David (and i have seen this personally) would drop many a pretty penny to help out anyone anyone who needed it....and that aint the kind of mentality that a trust fund nibbler feeds upon...
these folk dont need me to defend them, but i will say this:
the mentality that fosters contempt (your comment) seems to be of the ilk that you seem to loathe to begin with?...odd irony....
anyway, forget the cynicism...go visit Harvey: you will not forget it, and by the way: ask for a camera bag: they rock! :
ok, back to work
b
Comment posted by Bob Black on November 19, 2008
thanks so much for posting this wonderful article!
Comment posted by Eirik Tan on November 19, 2008
james ames... and misses.
mrfb... what you doing wasting your valuable time with nonsense like this, aimed purely at us dimwitts?
chris george... eyes privaleged with talent do not need privileged financial roots.. if it were a one hundred meter race, trustafairians might have a head start, but i think us common folk have much more stamina towards the end of the race..
would someone with constant flow of income bother to join an agency?
chris minnik.. interesting..
as much as we pretend to be invisible, we are always there.. effecting the situation around us..
i think immediately of zoriah (today, that is) and the tv documentary about him which he posted onto lightstalkers recently..
being filmed by 16 members of a t.v. crew.. working in Israel and gaza...
the border protest he was photographing, (which has apparently gone on every friday for many years), turns sour.. and i wonder... could it be a case of the situation becoming more volatile because of the mass presence of t.v. and associated crew, as well as two photographers?
a friend and journalist i spoke to yesterday (ciara leeming) who recently covered one of the same friday demos had a completely different impression.. and witnessed a completely different protest..
she is a writer though, without the cumbersome and all too visual equipment trappings of a photographer... and as such was perhaps much less antagonistic to the already volatile situation.
i guess that the idea of photographer as completely independent and sterile addition to a situation could be tucked away on a shelf alongside the idea of an objective perspective.. dusted off on occasion for discussion.
having said that though, in many far more mundane situations, once we truly tuck into a subject and immerse ourselves visually into what we are seeing, people view us simply as ´the man/woman with a camera¨, and carry on doing as they were doing.. making it highly possible to take photos of ´real´moments, in between the perhaps more contrived posturing which some subjects may think they are helping us with.
i guess that working within the real world, our work will end up entailing a mixture of ´real´and ´contrived´moments.. and i´m not sure it matters much, since a decent snap is a decent snap...,
Comment posted by david bowen on November 20, 2008
DAVID BOWEN...
you got it right...
cheers, david
Comment posted by david alan harvey on November 20, 2008
David Bowen,
It was very disconcerting to read two of the comments above in this forum. Where do those attitudes come from?
You have touched on that much better than I could...
I live and work in Indiana. My clients are Philanthropic organizations that give money away for a living. (No pun intended and I
don't have a trust fund.) The responsibility I have as a photographer to those clients is huge. Above all, my responsibly is to
enhance and reinforce the integrity of my subjects and clients with photography. I don't want and they don't want images that are
pre-conceptual. And as you said, in those "mundane situations", you do blend in and subjects do accept you very quickly as being
part of them. Although having some personable qualities goes a long way and I'm constantly working on mine.
But I agree with your end comment; "real and contrived moments.. and i´m not sure it matters much, since a decent snap is a decent snap..."
Again- for the topic; So many great inspiring stories from photographers who I admire most. I feel revived reading their stories and have new
motivation reflecting on my own humble beginnings many moons ago.
Comment posted by Chris Minnick on November 20, 2008
Alec,
You could easily put this post into a book à la the David Hurn series 'On Being a Photographer' and 'On Looking at Photographs'--a nice little thin paperback that fits in your pocket maybe A5 size.
Davin
Comment posted by Davin Ellicson on November 20, 2008
Interesting musings regarding the state of the photo world:
http://www.sportsshooter.com/news/2014
http://blog.vincentlaforet.com/2008/11/17/the-perfect-storm-has-arrived/
Comment posted by Davin Ellicson on November 20, 2008
I've seen a few interviews of Magnum photographers on YouTube. It seems like these two questions are always on the set list. Seeing all the responses in one place is very charming. I agree with Davin that there's a diamond mine of material developing here.
Alec and others, are there questions that really get on your nerves? I imagine there are some like "how do you develop a project?" that would take a week to explain, or the classic and sometimes veiled "how do you do what you do so well?"
Comment posted by Ian on November 21, 2008
can someone get rid of XYfloyd and his post?
i'd hate to see too much of this crap clogging up the forum...
ian - the question which i get asked the most is HOW to start out... as though there is a secret formula ...
Comment posted by david b on November 22, 2008
i love reading this sort of thing all the while hating reading this sort of thing. one thing that is apparent, no one path and certainly no easy path to being an artist. not being an accomplished shooter, but still having conducted a local arts photo workshop or three, you get these questions a lot. i also played in a noisy punk band for a while and you would get a similar set of questions and another one as well, "how would you describe your music?" the best, most succinct answer i could ever muster was "loud rock." i wittled my "advice to young photographers" question down to "shoot more of what you care about." and i have tried to take my own advice. not the best answer for someone seeking fame or fortune but hell, at the very least you end up with a lot of images that you actually "care" about.
alec, btw, totally bummed i missed you in Lexington, Kentucky. work pulled me out of town for a couple days and missing your talk was a kick in the crotch.
Comment posted by tread on November 22, 2008
I just wanted to clarify what I meant when I commented about 'Trust Funds'. Read between the lines of the Magnum photographers biographies and you can see that the majority (and of course there are exceptions) came from privileged backgrounds - Cartier Bresson obviously did not have to work hard on earning a living did he?.
My comments are in no way critical of the work of the Magnum photographer which I think is sublime and quite obviously all the photographers within the Magnum group work extremely hard to achieve such great art. However the advice they should have offered should be along the lines of 'Be Born into a rich family' as doing great work requires very significant resources indeed especially in the early stages of a photographers career and it can take many years before a regular income can be earned - especially as the traditional sponsors (editorial) no long pay anywhere near what is required to even enjoy a basic quality of life without additional funding.
Comment posted by Chris George on November 25, 2008
"You can always figure out a way to do serious work. If not, you are not serious enough." - David Allen Harvey
To me, that little side was worth more than the whole post.
Comment posted by Kirk Teetzel on November 26, 2008
Kirk I sincerely wish you the best luck in the world - but personally I believe this attitude perpetuates the lie that it's a meritocracy.
Becoming an established artist (for all fields of art) is equally about been a great business man as been talented. So rarely do I hear established artists talk about the ability to survive in this highly competitive field. It's no great secret that getting good at been a photographer demands a huge amount of taking pictures and practicing until it becomes second nature - that's taken as obvious! The really useful stuff is learning about marketing. pricing, copyright issues etc and also the amount of capital involved - and this is stuff that is rarely talked about my educational establishments and also by established artists.
Comment posted by Chris George on November 26, 2008
No George, the really useful stuff is learning about your own photographic voice. Learning to follow that, have faith in that, to struggle with it, & to get your 'exorcisms' out there, and yes, trying to survive doing the least harm possible - whilst simultaneously always being engaged with your vision. It;s more necessity than choice. You mention Henri Cartier Bresson coming from a wealthy family, (as if that's really important) - please don't forget Robert Capa, who I believe was the brain child behind this strange co-operative....'co-operative' (pls note)....wasn't he an Hungarian jew in exile?? No stranger to poverty, and his advice, which is infamous, 'if your pictures aren't good enough, you're not close enough'....what did he mean by 'close'? Part of what he meant, I guess, was empathy and understanding above spatial physicality. 'Close' meaning, he knew, in many ways, because he'd suffered. And that made his photographs that much more emotive. Not that that is a prerequisite to emotive photography. Don't get me wrong. He didn't mean to say 'go out there, live on the streets, then you'll know what close is all about' - but for me, I think it's really quite simple, 'close' means insight, understanding, feeling. Of course Bresson is sublime, as you describe him, but I really don't see the relevance of his background when his photography is also intensely 'close'.
In short, I just think it's a myth that successful artists/photographers, whatever, need to come from 'wealthy backgrounds' in order to become successful, you find your way, as all the other posts above have mentioned, and as everyone who preceded us did in reality, because you NEED to. To be frank with you, I doubt many of the Magnumites have a trust fund, and really, it doesn't interest me if they did or not, I'm more interested in being stirred by potent imagery. The survival thing (and I've never had a trust fund) is about survival. You find your way, right? Without having to compromise too much of your own voice, if at all. This is about advice to young photographers, in terms of photography and everything else, if they need advice on how to survive, can't they get that from their local careers advice bureau?
One of the reasons I enjoyed Abbas' statement so much, is it got beyond the limitations of time, class, race, place of birth, culture, class, materialism, conditioning...and embraced the concept of evolution, 'upon birth'. It's meant to be. Adapt to it. Grow with it.
Comment posted by Op' on November 27, 2008
Meant to call you Chris, not George. No offence meant. Peace
Comment posted by Op on November 27, 2008
One more thing, I reckon Cartier-Bresson worked ultra-damned hard - more than most to earn a living, to produce, look at the output of imagery!! Jesus! Talk about prolific!! What an incredible contribution to the world!! Not sure what, why, and how his 'background' has anything to do with it
Comment posted by Op on November 27, 2008
Being born into a rich family or poor family, as you call it, has sweet F.A to do with it. No more ranting from me. Goodbye.
Comment posted by Op on November 27, 2008
With the greatest respect Total B*llocks!
The point is that if you are wealthy or an astute businessman then you can afford to support yourself whilst building a portfolio - pictures that you want to take without compromises. If not then how the hell can you pay the telephone bills, the rent/mortgage, food, council tax, car tax, and alll the other important things that need to be paid that you so quickly dismiss as unimportant! Frankly vague comments (I'm sure well meant) about your idealism will find a way are not particularly helpful
I'm sure a lot of young photographers would like the luxury of flying off somewhere for a year or three to make pictures without having to self fund; read this biography of a young Magnum photographer and try and work out how he could afford to do this? Perhaps he did pay for it all himself who knows?
http://www.magnumphotos.com/Archive/C.aspx?VP=XSpecific_MAG.Biography_VPage&AID=2K7O3R14RLA1
However the reality is different for the vast majority of most young photographers leaving college with aspirations to become established artists - many I'm sure these people would welcome better advice about charging for work, negotiating copyright issues, getting grants, finding the best paid photographic work etc etc.
i.e. rather than just the vague advice offered by the Magnum Photographers who are already established. What I'd really like to know (and I'm sure many others would ) is how they funded their careers rich or poor backgrounds alike - especially the younger ones who developed their art in a world that provided little editorial funding!
Comment posted by Chris George on November 27, 2008
There are some ‘sporting’ pursuits….. say polo, where time and funding can be a constraint to greatness….there are some ‘artistic’ pursuits where time and funding can be a constraint to greatness….. say sculpting marble. But a camera now in the hands of creative talent has the same availability that a football has always offered athletic talent.
This is the beauty of photography, you don’t necessary have to quit your day job to develop it. It’s an art of precognition then implementation, and the implementation does not take that long, and the precognition can be done in the space in between. I wonder how much of Roger Ballen’s precognition happened when he worked on his Ph.D. in mineral economics at Colorado? I wonder how much more of it happened when he moved to Johannesburg to become a mining entrepreneur? I wonder what he would have done if he had just ‘quit working’ and pursued only photography.
There’s a list of people that realised that photographic greatness didn’t mean you had to give up your day job, actually as i type this i know someone that has made this point way better than anyone else could….
back in a second…
Ok… 22 months ago Hin Chua wrote this, I find it pretty repeatable:
********
We all know the stories of the wunderkind (e.g. Stephen Shore sold prints to the MoMA at 14, worked with Andy Warhol at 17 and had a one-man show at the Met by 24) or the photographer who was preternaturally destined for this path. I once talked to a photographer who told me that when he was 17, God came to him in a dream and told him to be a photographer (and lo, so it came to pass and within a decade he was invited into Magnum).
But what always strikes me is how so many photographers, including many of my favourites, find their way via a more circuitous path. Photography seems to be a discipline that's able to entice (or addict) those who are initially far beyond its sphere.
Sebastiao Salgado was an economist, Larry Towell a music teacher, Josef Koudelka an aeronautical engineer, Jeff Jacobson a civil rights lawyer, Diane Arbus and Rosalind Solomon were housewives. Harry Callahan worked for Chrysler in Detroit and discovered photography by joining the company's camera club. Ralph Eugene Meatyard was an optician in Kentucky, together with being a great, great photographer, he also ran the Parent Teachers Association at his children's school and coached little league baseball. One of the best, most committed photographers i know stacked shelves in a department store and drove a delivery van for years. I remember walking down a street with him in Covent Garden one night, carrying his heavy tripod for him as he lugged around his 4x5 field camera. He suddenly stopped at a corner, gazed around, smiled wistfully and said "I used to park the van here outside this store, every morning... delivering bread… it wasn’t even good bread".
The point being, if you want to jump in head first, it's not too late. "All" you have to do is ensure you're ready from a commitment and a creative perspective. Just make sure that you don't suck, that you can bring something to the table. Like people have said above, you'll probably know when you're ready.
As for fitting photography into a 9-5 job, Joost is spot on... it's all about cutting things back. This, to a degree, is going to be determined by what you want to photograph. If you want to photograph Amazonian Indians, skyscraper construction in Dubai or Russian supermodels, there's nothing much you can do. But if you're fortunate enough to have found a more accessible subject, there's many hours in the day.
It's like that scene in 'The Untouchables' when a dying Sean Connery asks of Kevin Costner "what are you prepared to do?". If you wake by six, you have 2-3 hours before work starts. You might have an hour or two during lunch. You can have 5-6 hours after work: you can break that down into 1-2 hours photography, 1 hour maintenance (food, chores) and 2-3 hours miscellaneous creative (editing, developing negs, photoshopping, making prints, networking, reading books and otherwise getting inspiration). If natural light is an important part of your work, you can use weather forecasts to decide when to try and put a "full day" (in the summer, a full day for me was about five hours of taking pictures). On weekends, you have at least 18 hours of decent light over those two days: you can "sleep in" and be out by 9 in the morning, you can have a heavy breakfast and skip lunch, buying you 1-2 extra hours over two days. Of course, there's no way anyone can keep this up, you're going to burn yourself out. But numbers are numbers.
If you have a full-time job in the UK, you should have four weeks of paid leave. Judiciously arranged with public holidays, that should buy you five weeks: 35 days of potential photography. And we're not even talking about "sick" days or unpaid leave. If you're a freelancer, then you should be making enough money to take as much time off as you need; you can photograph between contracts. If you're living in the UK, you can spend two hours in a train and be in a new city or town bursting with new opportunities. Hell, if you want to destroy the planet, in two hours and for less than a hundred quid you could be in a new country.
I'm not comfortable using myself as an example for anything though; I'm not sure if I'm typical of anything.
I don't call my parents any near as often as I should. Most of my friends are used to my taking ages to get back to them, most of them I only see when it's dark or raining (I got called a vampire for that once and another time a reverse vampire for always running out when it was sunny). Recently I spent almost two weeks trying to get one shot, standing in a single one location for an hour every day. I got talking with this guy who used to see me there all the time as he was heading home and eventually he told me "You don't have a girlfriend do you? Because there's no way any normal woman would let you get away with what you're doing".
I have a job that pays well enough that I don't have to spend any of my time worrying about money. I have a financial services company providing me with accountants, lawyers and tax minimisation experts so my annual financial housework involves signing some papers they send me. I spend nowhere near as much time as I should thinking about how to invest my savings: which stocks to buy, which investment funds to explore, if I should be buying real estate and where. I haven't owned a TV for more than two years, I have six months of photos to process or scan, a dozen unread books and twice as many unanswered emails. My apartment is in constant need of cleaning. I can tell you exactly what I'll be doing around 1 pm on a weekend (the answer is: trying to find a cafe, ditch, bush or alleyway to pee in because I've wandered into yet another strange part of London I have no experience of). My portfolio is badly in need of editing, I do next to no networking, I only photograph what I want and I usually never bother to chase up job opportunities.
And despite all these sacrifices, I look through my body of work and I realise that it's nowhere near the level of where I want it to be, and I wonder if it's all worth it. Mind you I'm not stupid enough to be complaining…..
******
Comment posted by Joe on November 27, 2008
Many thanks for this- what a great post. A lot more useful than any other stuff I've seen so far. Thoroughly enjoyed it and I'm sure many other people will as well.
Comment posted by Chris George on November 27, 2008
chris - humbly
http://bophoto-mumblings.blogspot.com/2008/08/going-back-to-my-roots-yeah.html
Comment posted by db on November 27, 2008
Hi David - many thanks very interesting. I'm now subscribed to your blog via RSS. Congratulations on becoming a father :-)
Comment posted by Chris George on November 28, 2008
thanks chris - it is incredible.
i think i feel where you are coming from, especially since fatherhood and wanting / needing the best for Tor.. that means money..
in the past i have managed to minimize my income to the point where i had to choose would i add mushrooms to a pizza or save them for an omlette tomorrow.. lived in my studio for a long while.. took the photos i wanted to and still had to do the cooperate thing - luckily only food photography - to pay my way.
i´ve taken the past year away from freelancing to concentrate on my archive.. nearly at the end of that year and looking forward to january.. what i have found though, while away from the magazine people, is that on my way into collage to teach i can take 20 photos or more.. the light is great.. on the way home too.. if i get the chance i take photos in collage as well.. always practicing.. despite having no money to do so :ø)
JOE posting on hin chua was gratefully received here as well.. we´re all doing our thing as best we can i think.. enjoying our photography wether it be for clients commercially or for ourselves..
loving the way this blog is going.
Comment posted by david bowen on November 28, 2008
I'm finding this to be a nice place to invest thought as well. Cheers David.
Comment posted by Joe on November 28, 2008
This is a great post for any young photographers who think that doing good work is enough to establish themselves http://artandperception.com/2006/11/surviving-as-an-artist.html
Comment posted by Chris George on December 2, 2008
Okay, I'm coming back to this a little late. What I took from DAH's quote, Chris, was not necessarily literal; I take it more as motivation - it's a kick-me-in-the-ass type statement that I need from time to time.
At 37 with 3 young kids and a job that take more time than I'd like (@ a GM plant so you can imagine the panic) I have a difficult time to shoot more than family snapshots, but DAH's quote tells me to get serious; weather it be to define a project, or edit my photos, or find a way to market myself - any of it is getting serious to me.
But first, I gotta get some shootin done. :)
Great comments here.
Much respect
Kirk
Comment posted by KirkT on December 3, 2008
Discovered this post via del.icio.us - bookmarked it for this post.
Thanks for the thoughts.
M.
Comment posted by Michael Warf on December 10, 2008
to Chris George and anyone else interested in using others trust funds to short list themselves into failure.
I picked up the camera late but found inspiration in Galen Rowell, whom didn't pick up th camera until age 30, coincidentally the same age I picked up the camera. I also started college just out of high-school, quit and then re-started college again 9 years later. Both of these delayed decisions still bother me now and then and definitely have had an impact on how much money I have in my "trust fund" (which is zero), but the reality is what I was doing before - living. So how have I survived as a professional photographer (which started before I even finished my degree in Geography with a year in Photojournalism)? The first 4 months I lived in my truck, the next couple months after the weather started to get way to cold and a friend suggested I sleep on his couch, I couch surfed, all the while promoting myself with prints around town, a website, talking with people, and just BEING as a photographer with a camera around town. I talked with all the pros in town and they were all great and accepting which pushed me even further. Then I moved to the NW to be in a bigger city, lived in my truck for a couple weeks until I found a place to live (this is all with my dog btw, no I do not have kids but I've managed to keep, care for, and love my dog during this whole transition : ) and made my way into freelancing for one of the largest newspapers in the NW. How? I emailed, then called, ask to have a meeting, sat down showed my work, and then after they gave me a chance on my first assignment I never ever turned down an assignment after that. In other words I was available...and when Christmas time came around did I go home? Fuck no..I stayed cause I knew that all the staffers would be leaving for holiday and so I made it a point to be available during that time. Now, just to refer back to the days when I was living in my truck, I had a friend, my best friend at the time, who DID have a trust fund and whom was playing with fancy new and old cameras all the time, buying and trading off of ebay, and having low self-esteem...I wanted to knock him aside the head and say "do you know what an effort I have to make just to keep going, to take a shower in the woods, to stay positive and your complaining about being "busy" with your art projects?"...and the funny thing is he is a very good photographer...but he was good before the trust fund. But I digress. Anyhow, eventually I had a body of work that got me to a newspaper, then I went back to freelance and have been happily struggling but maintaining my "professional" status as it applies to solely making my income from photographer ever since. AND as I write this I'm in a hotel in the Midwest spending my own money on room, board, and flight (for the 5th time with a few thousand dollars invested), to do my own project which gives me high anxiety from an economic standpoint but has produced a super high impact on my portfolio and authorship in my photography.
Davids post is right on. Those with money may, keyword MAY, have it easier but those with money also have a very easy choice when it comes to quitting and moving on. And every moment spent by someone without money (trust fund), thinking about how they will never make it is a moment wasted. The photography world is HUGE. Photo-j and what Magnum does is soooooo small in the larger picture of the photo world.
Yes of course it helps to learn some business skills, yes schools should teach more business in the photo programs and yes the photo industry itself is mostly to blame for its low rates and state of affairs BUT there are places to get the info you need if you dig deep. And if you cannot find it - make it happen! We all can use a little help. So I'm starting to ramble a bit but one more thing about making money in photography and getting rid of the self-defeating attitude of "how am I supposed to do it if I don't have a trust fund" or "Magnum photogs have trust funds so they were able to succeed", what?, anyway...something my dad said to me about being successful in business - "people like to work with people they like". Be easy (not to be confused with being free or a push over when taking a stand) to work with and just do it. Also for full disclosure on where my $ come from - my first 4 years was solely newspaper, magazine, and newswire assignment photographer, the last couple years has been that plus weddings, and I love it...and that is the key - I LOVE it.
Comment posted by not JUST a guy with a camera on December 13, 2008
thanks for the funny travel into all these photographers stories...it's nice to check the approach of each one...and yes, photography is definitely about searching, exploring, and often walking!
Comment posted by Gabriele Lopez on June 2, 2009