how I stay creative. maybe.
{the composite is titled “Don’t Touch Your Face”}
I don’t take photos for myself or of myself very often.
Breathe Images is a company dedicated to getting the very best product to our clients. SO. That means I spend a lot of time taking pictures for and of other people. I’m so incredibly fortunate for that to be the case. It is an a-c-t-u-a-l dream come true.
However, in the first bit of this year, as the business goes through some MAJOR restructuring (read: growing pains) I find myself reminiscing and looking back at the deep photo archive.
These images I made in the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic in March of 2020. Yes, 6 years ago people. Holy heck.
I remember what it felt like to make these.
What I was trying to capture was the feeling of being engulfed. Of being on the verge of suffocating. Of trying to find some sort of equilibrium in the chaos I found myself in. Without leaving my house or having any sort of models or fancy lights or concept boards.
Like many people during those crazy first days, I was home a lot and didn’t have a ton of things to do. I didn’t take up a new hobby or binge shop on the dreaded consumer apps. This was also before my Isolated Artists of Atlanta project which may have quite literally saved my life.
{go check that out if you want a deep dive into the Atlanta artist scene in those early years. I worked real hard on it}
I had never done self portraits. Let alone naked.
My husband was certainly concerned when I started propping part of my tripod into the bathwater and praying to all the photography gods that the quick release on my Bendro tripod was going to hold. I didn’t even have a monitor to line up the shots. I had a self timer, a steamy bathroom, and a dream.
I’ve always loved the water. The ocean. The pool. The bathtub. The shower is my total happy place. But I have the most severe fear of drowning. Mostly with the whole not breathing part.
So for the spot I was in at this time in my life, feeling like I could lose my ability to breathe physically but certainly feeling as if I had lost my ability to breathe creatively, these seem rather to perfectly capture my feelings.
Nothing is quite right about these pictures. They aren’t winning any photography awards.
But nothing is perfect. I even resubmerge.
But I’m not drowning. Not yet.
I made it out of that disaster scathed but certainly still breathing. Maybe breathing more deeply and gratefully then I ever had.
So as we come to 6 years since the pandemic first hit our shores, 6 years since these photos were taken, in this season of huge growth for the business, I’m focusing on the emergence. On the rebirth. On the bringing myself up for air.
As I was polishing this blog post up today I found this post from the good people of Adorama and, although it is labeled as 7 tricks to help improve your photography, it itself is a trick. It isn’t a guide to gear that will make your stuff look like Pete Coco, Lindsay Adler or David Goddard {photographers I think are freaking killing it}. It is advice that underlines what I’ve been talking about this whole time; get away from the noise and focus on what you like.
That question at the top of the post stuck with me: What would you photograph if no one ever saw your work?
I wouldn’t say I would take more bathtub selfies (get off of this website you goons!) but I would experiment with more things.
I get real dedicated to making sure my clients have the most consistent quality of product which leads me to repeating the same techniques over and over again. But what will lead me to being a better photographer, which has ALREADY led me time and time again to be more proficient at my job, is experimenting and being answerable to myself.
Don’t worry, you will still get great pictures while we work together but I’m becoming more invested in making time for my own creative process. Like I did then. Like I will do again.
Because at the end of the day, that is how we breathe.
