Personal Fine Art Photography
Whenever I hear someone refer to me as " fine art photographer " I feel uncomfortable and unworthy of the term. I recall Einstein's words: "Whoever undertakes to set himself up as a judge of Truth and Knowledge is shipwrecked by the laughter of the gods." I have not done landscape and flora photography for very long and it only came about as a fluke. So there are those photographers more worth of the term than myself.
Instead of "fine art photography" I am more comfortable with the term "directed impulse response”. It is how I scratch my itch. I had wanted to travel the dirt roads of California's Owens Valley and the Pacific North West so on an impulse I chose those places to travel to for the last three years. I have a strong impulse to wander through nature seeking mystery and wonder and these images represent what I wonder at and my desire to wander in the mystery. Some people choose comfort I choose wonder.
When I was a boy traveling by bus to the Sierra Nevadas via Highway 395, I would wonder would see dirt roads in the distance and wonder "where do those dirt roads go?" and one day with time on our hands and the our dog in tow my family and I went to discover where the roads went. We kris-crossed Highway 395 through desert and the Eastern Sierras without plans, and I found my mystery. Pretty cool getting to share it with my family. I feel privileged that they were game.
Next we traveled along the coast to the Pacific North West to see what we could see. and we found more wonder. Although I do not see my work as fine art photography, it satiates my need to create and wander.
Most of the photography I do is driven by my client’s needs but these landscape and flora photographs satisfy my personal needs to create. As a colleague of mine put it, "Your whole life is spent draining the well of well of your creativity for your clients. Sometimes you need to replenish the well." It is the one area of my life where I am beholden to no one and am free to follow my impulses without boundaries. No approval necessary.