Tuesday reads: Eudora Welty
© Shane Lavalette.
“We come to terms as well as we can with our lifelong exposure to the world, and we use whatever devices we may need to survive. But […] if exposure is essential, still more so is the reflection. Insight doesn’t happen often on the click of the moment, like a lucky snapshot, but comes in its own time and more slowly and from nowhere but within. The sharpest recognition is surely that which is charged with sympathy as well as with shock — it is a form of human vision. And that is of course a gift. We struggle through any pain or darkness in nothing but hope that we may receive it, and through any term of work in the prayer to keep it. […] My wish, indeed my continuing passion, would be not to point the finger in judgment but to part a curtain, that invisible shadow that falls between people, the veil of indifference to each other’s presence, each other’s wonder, each other’s human plight.”
What differentiates a great visionary from a person that photographs? They both have a camera. They both see the world around them. They both interact with that world. They both aspire to narrate stories and build a dialogue. However, few eyes prove to successfully capture and translate that something which moves people and shapes the upcoming generations’ way of seeing. Why is that the case?
© Lesia Maruschak.
Deep down, humans have the awareness that their struggles are mirrored in every other individual around them. They do know that, beyond the superficially different incidents peculiar to each person’s life, the emotions they feel are quite the same. They recognise how similar the motives behind their actions and the ones that move their counterparts might be… deep down. Deep down. An attentive observation of our daily interactions, however, reveals that when crossing paths with other individuals we often do not manage to reach beyond the boundary of our common needs. We entertain each other until we get what we expect out of the conversation (or more accurately, the exchange): information, affection, encouragement, submission, favours.
Though trade is naturally rooted in our nature, interactions modelled on the trading model often involve judgement, be it conscious or unconscious: the point lies, rather than in an exploration and discovery of the other, in foreseeing what the person can give us and how much effort it will cost us. Our minds, programmed to obtain te object of their desire through the most efficient course of action possible, exploit past interaction to predict the meaning of upcoming ones. The outcome, therefore, is that of stamping a preconception on the other party even before initiating a conversation.
Photography, especially intended as a documentary tool, becomes an invitation for a potentially different approach: similarly to the learning process of a child, the eye behind a camera is invited to a pristine observation. Through quirky curiosity, the photographer has the possibility to explore everyday incidents with the same open-mindedness she would show before an extraterrestrial reality. And who does not dream of experiencing that naïveté once again?
© Zanele Muholi.
Precisely for our genetical inability to be constantly bewildered by our reality, an eye that manages to capture reality through such childish amazement somehow captures our attention. And not only that. Bewilderment is often tied to genuine open-mindedness, a trait necessary to create the environment for empathic conversations. And after all, photographs passed on from one generation to another are the fruit of an empathic conversation, either inside the photographer’s mind or with her surroundings. Photographs that shape our history are the ones that remind us of the veil between ourselves and the people around us, encouraging us to take the leap and break through it. Encouraging us to find the courage and embrace bewilderment at each other’s presence, each other’s wonder, each other’s human plight.
