Category: Blog
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Technological change is ecological
From the ever-insightful Convivial Society newsletter, an essay about the new AI image generation tools that are doing the rounds now, including the image posted above, which won an art prize and made everyone very hot and bothered. Lonely Surfaces: On AI-generated Images – by L. M. Sacasas It’s interesting not just because it points […]
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l’ve absolutely no idea what I’m doing anymore
A recurring theme here – I mean the title could apply to life in general, but that’s another story – unlearning the things that accrete over time, to give yourself the freedom to act with freedom. If photography is an art of choice – choosing where to stand, what to frame, when to press the […]
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What picture is worth taking?
This is a tricky idea to articulate, so bear with me… I think there is an interesting question of when it is worth making a photograph. (Perhaps the same is true of making a painting, or some other kind of representational art. I’m thinking of those kinds of practices, rather than those that relay on […]
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Family photography
Since photography was invented, people have been photographing family for all the reasons photographs are taken: money; love; the desire to document what’s important or fleeting; to capture a snapshot in time; to tell a fiction or fantasy; to construct an identity, or produce propaganda. We all do it, whether we call it art, commerce, […]
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A day. This present day.
If I look back at the things I note when reading they fall into maybe two piles. Firstly, things about photography. Secondly, things about doing creative work. So maybe right now this blog is a blog about doing photography. I recently read 4000 Weeks by Oliver Burkeman (Amazon, Bookshop.org – £), which bills itself as […]
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Photography Cliques
For a long time I’ve been baffled by the invisible lines that are drawn by those in the business of art theory and criticism between different types of photography. And in particular the status of those types, the people who make them, and who gets to call themselves an ‘artist’.
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One sheet zines
Another format idea – what’s the minimum viable zine? A single sheet of paper. This format has ben around for a long time; I saw it used most recently to promote the Looking for Spiders show at Brighton Photo Fringe. Austin Keon has a good write-up.
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The details
I was thinking about details as I walked the dog this morning, and reflecting on my zine project, especially the finishing of that project. It’s easy to get to 90% in a project. The last 10% is the hardest, and it’s all about details. The minor details of sequencing and layout; testing out different types […]
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Towards a mission
I spend far to long trying to figure out why I do what I do – or how to optimise what I do to create biggest impact. Here’s a brief interlude in that spirit – why am I picking up blogging again? OK, that’s all very fragmentary; let’s leave it to sit for a while.
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Documenting learning
One of the unexpected things I learned from Fab Academy was the importance and value of documentation. Fab Academy is assessed on documentation – not what you make, but how well you evidence what you’ve done, explain what you discovered, and describe the process of learning and solving problems. This is valuable not just for […]