“If you’re walking around looking for something, then you have an idea in your head, and what is that? That’s your imagination! You’re imagining something. You don’t photograph imagination! You photograph the physical world. So, if I’m walking around trying to find something that I’m imagining, that doesn’t make any sense to me. But if I have nothing in my mind, if I just clear my mind and I’m not looking for anything, then something stops me. By its own nature, it stops me or turns my head. It gets my attention. And if it gets my attention, I photograph it. So, the soft eyes, is that I’m not looking for anything. I’m just sensing everything in a very democratic fashion and then something catches me and it turns my head. And if I was looking for something, I would have missed that thing that turned my head because it wouldn’t be what my imagination told me I should be looking for”.
H.W. (October, 2016)
Henry Wessel discussing one of his books and his process...
https://vimeo.com/187028231
One thing these quotes share, is the idea that the process of photography is primarily one of discovery. That the camera has an ability to reveal. It’s a different starting point than going at it with the notion of using the camera to illustrate some preexisting idea or vision the photographer hopes to communicate. Photography is a tool for exploration. To my mind Winogrand must have been the purest adherent to this approach, even stating bluntly, “I have nothing to say in my photographs”, but all the photographs I find most interesting seem to come from this recognition.
John, Yes, I have read the Papageorge book. If I like someone’s photographs, I am always interested to hear what they have to say. Robert Adams, Frank Gohlke, Lewis Baltz, Luigi Ghirri, and others have written similar books. Rubinfien has written many excellent things as well, including one of the best essays on Winogrand.
