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Chris Murray Photography - https://chrismurrayphotography.com/

Chris Murray Photography - https://chrismurrayphotography.com/

Creative Doubt

May 24, 2018 by Brian Fay in Writing

My friend is a fine art photographer of the natural world, leading classes, publishing, writing about photography, and whatever the hell else photographers do. I'm a words guy and my photos on this blog show I've not developed much skill in composition or technique. He's the images person, but I like when he goes into words and talks about being. Today, he posted about doubt:

Much is written about how for the artist the creative process is more important than the product. Specifically, for the landscape photographer the experience of being in the natural world and exploring one’s relationship with nature matters more than the resulting images. I agree with this. However, as someone seeking to further establish myself as a full-time nature/landscape photographer I have always found it difficult not to feel that results are the priority. I feel a pressure (imaginary or otherwise) to produce a consistent stream of high quality images. To that end I admit to willingly enduring less than Zen-like experiences to “get the shot” at times. And if an outing results in no images I often feel frustrated, regardless of how beautiful the morning or location may have been.

That I experience such feelings despite knowing better leads me to wonder, do the acknowledged preeminent photographers really have it all figured out? Are they able to always live their creative lives according to these ideals? Do they not have moments where they succumb to their self-doubts and insecurities? Do they not sometimes sacrifice their ideals to get the shot? I am left to ponder such things because personal self-doubt and questioning are topics about which they rarely seem to write. Why is that? Are they afraid admitting such vulnerabilities would weaken their standing as master instructors and mentors? I for one would find it refreshing and encouraging to know that they suffer similar doubts and frustrations from time to time. It would make them seem more relatable and honest. 

I've written about the process of writing and where it can take us, but I haven't talked as much about product because I make my daily bread from teaching rather than writing. Also, I've been known to fear my product. This site meant to push me to create and publish more product, but weeks of regular production are followed by weeks of writing almost nothing. Such as this week. Each time I write, it's all drivel. Chris feels frustrated after an outing with no good images; I tear up pages and wonder where my talent has gone.  

Chris knows that preeminent photographers don't have it all figured out. He wants them to talk about their doubts. When I write about writing, I can come off as a know it all. I'm tearing up pages this week and haven't published anything. I'd feel worse, but J.K. Rowling, who is better at writing thing than I ever hope to be, tweeted the following today: 

Screenshot 2018-05-24 at 5.25.45 PM.png

If she struggles, then I bet all my money the rest of us do too and anyone who says otherwise is lying more than the president. 

What do I do when it's going nowhere, when doubt overwhelms, when I feel too vulnerable to put down the next word? That's easy; write the next word and the next until the pages get better. While acknowledging that I'm producing steaming piles, I tell myself I know how to do this and it will come back to me. Chris, I'm sure, shoots more photos until he finds himself again. 

Creativity is tough because there are so many incentives to stop. It's good to enjoy this work we do while acknowledging that it often leaves us feeling like a sixth-grader sitting alone at lunch looking down at the Spam on white bread with Miracle Whip that we've just noticed has a touch of mold.

This week has been Spam and mold sandwiches on my computer screen, coming out of my typewriter, and somehow worming out the end of my pen. I've felt lousy and hungry for something good which just won't come. Still, I keep going. I mean, what the hell else am I going to do? What else could be this good? 

May 24, 2018 /Brian Fay
Chris Murray Photography, Writing, Photography
Writing
Chris Murray Photography

Chris Murray Photography

Extra Ordinary

February 03, 2018 by Brian Fay in Whatever Else, Writing

Yesterday I had an idea for a short essay about school. I scratched a note on a post-it and went back to teaching. At lunch, I took fifteen minutes to knock out a rough 850-word draft, then began editing and revising down toward 600. Halfway through, I was called to a meeting which lasted an hour. Back from that, I picked up where I had left off and made it through to the end. I read it through again and posted 560 words to the world. 

No big deal. I write like this all the time. It's the most ordinary of things. 

Last night, I was at a party where one of the hosts played electric guitar in a four-piece band. They played a tight instrumental rendition of Steely Dan's "Peg" which I love. I watched him as the song wound toward the solo and wondered how he would handle something Becker and Fagen tried with dozens of guitar players. He hit the first note and moved into a solo that nodded at the recorded version but which he made his own. 

I love watching musicians perform and studied him. It seemed extraordinary to me, as musical performance often does, but when we talked about it, he shrugged like he had just written a short essay and posted it to his blog. No big deal. He does this all the time. 

Earlier that day I tweeted that "I can't be the only one who has this feeling that anything I'm able to do can't possibly be extraordinary." I was thinking then about my writing. I could have written it of my friend's work with the guitar. So many things are extraordinary until we do them. 

One thing that remains extraordinary for me is the prose poem. I wrote one this week, February Fifth, and it surprises me. It began with a line in my head and the approaching anniversary of my dad's unexpected death. "It always snows on the fifth of February even when it doesn't." That stuck with me for a day before I typed it and let the other words come through me. I revised the hell out of it and posted it, waiting for reactions. There weren't many.

My wife says that it's tough to know what to say about poetry. At first this wasn't enough for me. Then I thought of my friend Chris's photography. 

Chris began as a nature/landscape photographer. (Actually, he began as a fertilized egg, but I'll skip ahead.) He has moved on to fine art photography. He'll forgive me for saying that he produces fewer pretty pictures and iconic shots of obvious majesty. He's onto something far less ordinary, a world in which he largely has to decide what is good because fewer people can follow him there. A shot of pine needles on snow confuses many because it is extraordinary. 

I say that word in exploded fashion: extra ordinary. Out of and beyond the ordinary. 

There is something to be said for going beyond what we are used to, for reaching toward the extraordinary. There is a lot to be said too for the things that we have made ordinary: my friend on guitar, Chris creating photographs, me writing essays. Taking on the extraordinary and coming to feel them as natural doesn't diminish them, but it does leave me wanting to reach beyond. I love writing essays such as this and enjoy the comfort with which I can compose and polish them. I also love reaching for something more even when I don't yet know what it is.

I came into this not knowing what I wanted to say. I come to the end not knowing much more of what it's all about, but feeling sure that this is the way to go, the ideas to ponder. I'm creating something. What it is, I don't know. And that, in and of itself, feels extraordinary. 

February 03, 2018 /Brian Fay
Chris Murray Photography, Creating, Work, Photography
Whatever Else, Writing

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