When the question was thrown back at me, I stumbled. Even though I had spent countless hours and drop millions of "what if!" bombs on my boyfriend and patient family, I had never put all my ingredients into one concept. I quickly responded with what rolled most fluently off my tongue: "I love photography."
Long silence.
He asked me what it was that made me love photography.
Long silence again, interrupted with, "You must love it because it freezes time!" A quick gag reflex came over as this response seemed to be the new artistic cliche. "Not really." I responded. I drifted into my usual thought zone and quickly compiled a sentence that described my love affair with images. "Without photographers, I would live without seeing a significant amount of life."
The first example I could think of to better clarify this was the Eiffle Tower. Yes, you can go to www.google.com and type in E-I-F-L-E and it will say, DID YOU MEAN EIFFEL? And you will click yes! And then you will be directed to a page where you can view hundreds of images of the Eiffel Tower. 99% of these will be historical or modern cropped views of the Parisian tower with the surrounding landscapes, and some pretty lights. What makes a view that is unexpected, maybe unobtainable, and often wrapped in an underlying meaning, is a true photographer's perspective. Without these people and the raw pixels they produce, we would simply overlook the art of life.
Another case in point: Surfing. The basics and what a human sees from land versus the art of knowing an angle that is special and having the capability to introduce an object or human in a way otherwise invisible.
Photo by Morgan Maassen
Back to this cookie thing: You can pile in all the ingredients you want and stir that shit until your face goes prune and a day in the life of _____ becomes full of should-haves. The only way to create the taste you are after is to know the recipe that makes you become passionate. Go on... google it. You probably won't get too far as this sort of forte isn't found on Facebook.
