Fine art photography is such a niche, isn’t it? When people ask me what I do and I answer, “I am a photographer,” they will often ask me, “What kind?” Sometimes I dread that question.
Here are a few answers I have used in the past:
I take self-portraits.
I create conceptual images.
I create images that try to make sense of the world.
I create projects around pain and suffering and how beauty is closely connected to those experiences.
I work with vintage photographs and alter them to create new images.
I work with old family photographs and combine them with my own images.
My work consists of mostly black and white conceptual photographs, sometimes landscapes, nature, or anything that catches my eye.
I don’t know. Most of the time, I struggle to give a simple answer, so I usually stutter my way through it until people nod and say ”that’s cool.”
Is it?
The truth is that none of the answers above explain anything very well, but usually that’s ok with me. I move on.
I never expected to be where I am today. I never expected to be a photographer, or artist, or whatever I am. I struggled to call myself anything for years. “I like photography. I like taking pictures”, I used to say. Imposter syndrome is very real.
I built my photography career from scratch after I had my first baby. The first steps it took were daily walks taking photographs of anything that caught my eye while my baby slept in the sling.
Other times, it included walks to the library studying work by “real” photographers, also while my baby slept in the sling.
And with consistency, I slowly, slowly built my first portfolio. I then emailed a professor and curator at the university where my husband was studying, and I asked him if he could meet with me to take a look at my images. I never thought he would say yes, but he did. He was a kind man and a wonderful artist. And, to this day, I am thankful for that encounter. It was my first official portfolio review. The last thing he said to me before I went back home was:
“If you continue with this, good things will happen.”
This still makes me smile. I didn’t quite believe it then, but he was right. Every year, something happened that would bring me one step further to where I am today. Although, it didn’t just happen. Nothing happens to you when you want to be a photographer and also want to get paid for what you do. Nothing.
In my early years, I began to wonder how people were “discovered’, how people got exhibited, published, anything. It took a while for me to realize that no one will come to you, but instead:
You have to get out into the world, including the online world.
You have to talk to people.
You have to share your work.
You have to email people.
You have to submit, submit, submit, and submit some more.
You have to ask questions.
You have to network.
You have to accept and listen to feedback.
You have to accept that people won’t like your work.
You have to accept that people won’t like you.
You have to be willing to receive rejections, many rejections, all the time.
Oh, and, how could I forget the most important part of it?
You have to consistently create, and practice, and learn from your mistakes. In order to be a photographer, you have to make photographs, a lot of them, and you have to learn from others and study and experiment, and fail, and experiment more, and fail again. You have to invest in the creative process whether you get the result you want or not. And then when you get the one image that gives you that exhilarating satisfaction and excitement that I never can quite put into words, it is a high that makes everything else worth it.
And you have to do all this while grabbing imposter syndrome by its shoulders and pushing it into the ground as hard as you can. It’s best to bury it, but somehow it always manages to pop up. It’s your enemy. You have to be stronger than your strongest enemy.
Some people will ask me, “How did you get all these publications?” or “How did you get all these teaching opportunities?” And sometimes they will say, “You are so talented.”
I smile and I thank them.
Talent? Sure. It’s great. But what do you do with talent if you don’t implement it every day? What happens to talent if you don’t use it? What good does it do if you don’t develop it?
Talent is one thing. Consistent practice and work is another. I believe consistent practice and work is more important, because nothing would have happened if I hadn’t been putting in consistent work and effort year after year.
So, I might still not be able to say exactly what I do or what kind of photographer I am. My work consists of a variety of things, just like any job. It includes creating art, but it also includes administrative and boring tasks. It includes marketing and responding to emails. It includes things I don’t want to do. It includes sharing my work and constantly questioning and doubting myself.
But what keeps me motivated is the fact that my desire to create keeps coming back again and again.
What keeps me motivated is the fact that I strongly believe that art matters in this world.
What keeps me motivated is observing other artists and studying their work and realizing that it adds value and inspiration to my life.
What keeps me motivated is the incredible gift that artists have to turn hardship into beauty.
What keeps me motivated is the fact that art can be life changing, for the creator and the audience.
What keeps me motivated is the fact that I love the creative process more than the results, more than the worries about how it might be perceived, and more than any rejection.
What keeps me motivated is that I was close to giving up many, many times, but I didn’t.
What keeps me motivated is the fact that my first portfolio reviewer was right:
“If you keep going with this, good things will happen.”
“Making art now means working in the face of uncertainty; it means living with doubt and contradiction, doing something no one much cares whether you do, and for which there may be neither an audience nor reward. Making the work you want to make means setting aside these doubts so that you may see clearly what you have done, and thereby see where to go next. Making the work you want to make means finding nourishment within the work itself.”
David Bayles
Upcoming workshops:
Los Angeles Center of Photography (October):
SE Center of Photography (November):
Magic of Multiple Exposure With Manuela Thames (Online Learning-Six Sessions