Stealing Like An Artist
and how I stole from photographer Harry Callahan
How do we get inspired? Where do we find ideas?
In his book Steal Like An Artist, answers these questions the following way: “I steal them”.
Jim Jarmusch, an American film director and screen writer, says:
“Nothing is original. Steal from anywhere that resonates with inspiration or fuels your imagination. Devour old films, new films, music, books, paintings, photographs, poems, dreams, random conversations, architecture, bridges, street signs, trees, clouds, bodies of water, light and shadows. Select only things to steal from that speak directly to your soul. If you do this, your work (and theft) will be authentic. Authenticity is invaluable; originality is non-existent. And don’t bother concealing your thievery - celebrate it if you feel like it. In any case, always remember what Jean-Luc Godard said: “It’s not where you take things from - it’s where you take them to."
If you haven’t read Austin Kleon’s book, you should. It changed the way I look at art, it changed the way I approach my own work, and it changed my creative process. It made me feel more free and gave me permission to play and experiment and not worry too much about the result.
I think, as artists, we can become quite consumed by the idea of creating something original, something that has never been done before. But we forget that all ideas came from somewhere, were influenced by something, were taken from different sources and so on. Stealing ideas is not a problem as long as we authentically steal and bring our own vision to the game. Originality comes from each one of us, our uniqueness as a human being, our experiences and stories that shape how we see the world and how we live our lives. All we have to do is pay attention; pay attention to our surroundings, pay attention to what we read, pay attention to what we listen to, pay attention to what we watch, pay attention to conversations we have had. We pay attention to details - the flickering of candle light, the way water drops run down the window during a rainstorm, the smell of a spice, the smell of a flower, the leaves rustling in the wind. There is a lot that we miss on a busy day in our fast-paced and distracted world.
When we pay attention, we take all those influences and make space to create, experiment and practice, and we do so repeatedly. The result from that process will be an authentic piece of art, created with our own vision, inspired by many ideas.
Stealing From Harry Callahan
The other day I was asked who some of my favorite photographers were. My thoughts immediately went to Harry Callahan. He was one of the first photographers I got introduced to by a friend who owned a book about his work. I fell in love with his work and his images inspire me to this day.
Here are some of my favorite images:
Harry Callahan (1912-1999) is seen as one of the most influential photographers of the twentieth century. He discovered photography at the age of 26 and was largely self-taught. Eventually, he became an educator teaching at the Institute of Design in Chicago and the Rhode Island School of Design. His muse was his wife Eleanor, whom he was married to for 63 years until his death in 1999.
I love the simplicity and minimalism of his work, his amazing use of light and eye for composition, and his curiosity to freely experiment with different techniques. His double exposures highly influenced my own work, as you can see in this image I created several years ago, which was clearly inspired by his double exposure you can see above. Honestly, I am not sure whether I was aware of the similarities while creating this, but I believe that sometimes stealing happens subconsciously and we follow an idea intuitively even if we came across that idea years ago. Taking an idea, then experimenting and playing is how we learn and become better. When I saw his image, I had no idea how he created it. But I took the idea and experimented until I found my own way to create something similar.
Here are some other images that were inspired by his work taken in my earlier photography years:
This post is a gentle reminder to pay attention and steal like an artist. Who are some of your favorite artists your work was inspired by?
As always, thank you so much for reading!
So funny, I have been writing about Callahan the past few days. He is one of my favorites too.
along the years so many inspired me but probably the most famous are david hockney and martin parr