Documentary wedding Photographer Steven Taylor Photography » Documentary wedding photographer, London, Lake District UK

Jardin des Tuileries, Paris 2007

Good artists copy, great artists steal…

Picasso

Photography is only 174 years old, still an infant compared to other art forms, but it’s already hard to make something truly original.

Does that matter though?

I ask because I have been guilty of making work that is derivative, probably still doing it. I work in the landscape on black and white film and make fine prints in the darkroom for God’s sake. Often my landscapes are rural, sometimes urban and frequently between the two. My subject and my methodology are tried and tested, going back almost the whole of those 174 years.

Claremont Pier, Lowestoft, 2005

Some of my prints look more familiar than others though. I know it has a lot to do with methodology. A lot to do with the fact that I am trying to sell prints and certain subjects/production methods sell better than others, but importantly, it’s to do with over thinking. I have been making photographs for 37 years in that time I have studied, sometimes formally but mostly informally, the work of hundreds of photographers. Like lots of others I look at photography I like and either follow text on how it was made or I think it through for myself. If I can facilitate and I like what I see/read, I might try it out. If the resultant image does for me what the original did it’s a success. Well maybe…

On the other hand, years ago, it was 1989, John Blakemore stayed at my house, I’d organized a workshop that he was leading. By that time he had already stopped working in the landscape but I had only been doing it a couple of years.

Wast Water, 2005

As early as 1974 I was aware of John’s landscape work from seeing it in Creative Camera magazine. When I started working in the landscape I brought all my influences to the work, The West Coast Americans, Ansel Adams, Edward Weston, Minor White and Wynn Bullock and of course John Blakemore. At some point during the weekend with my hero I brought out my work with the words, “I’m afraid these are a bit like yours”. John studied them all, made separate piles, sequenced one pile and then said, “these work best, they are not John Blakemore’s, they are Steven Taylor’s.” You could claim he was saying they were not up to his standard but he’s not that type of person. He hadn’t made his selection based on the fact that the rest were like his per se, just that his choice were the most original and worked together as a body of work.

Brushwood and Rain, Grizedale 1991

That’s important, consistency of style, and that has to be a significant motive when making a selection. Sometimes we need somebody else to do that for us. While I was planning my gallery I went through boxes of existing prints, I’ve got piles of them. At first I went for images that were “Steven Taylors”, I know they all are but some are more so than others. Then my business head stepped in and I added images that looked clever or were of recognizable places. From a business point of view I was right. Since I opened on March 11^th my best sellers have been “Wast Water, 2005”,  “Brushwood and Rain, Grizedale 1991” and “Edge of the Forest, 2010”. With the exception of the last one I don’t really think of those as “Steven Taylors”.

Edge of the Forest, 2010

I haven’t really had time to get to a good darkroom session yet. I’ve been in and made the odd print and processed some film but I haven’t had time yet to start making some good work prints from unprinted negatives and then start some editions. One image can take a week of 8 hour sessions to make work prints and the first run of 10 in each of my 3 sizes. I have around a hundred contact sheets and a similar number of unprocessed films to work through. I’ve marked up some contact sheets, I have an idea what I want to do but I need to get in there and do it.

Looking at the contacts and remembering what I think are on those unprocessed films, I believe I have some original work, probably the odd derivative image as well. I think that because most (not all) of the images I have made since 2006 are not over thought. I have worked with a very spontaneous methodology, usually with a small 35mm camera and one or two lenses, no tripod, more like a documentarist but in the landscape, rural, urban and in the space between. Of course I have my influences, Ray Moore appears often, as does Ralph Gibson and Lee Friedlander but I have not copied technique like I did when I made those earlier landscape images.

The Glebe, Bowness, 2012

What I believe will appear when I select and sequence is a coherent body of work that is more “Steven Taylor” than it is anything else…

I just have to persuade some collectors that they want to own them now.

Allegedly, the words of the Parisian painter Paul Delaroche on his first sight of the Daguerreotype in 1839. He might not have said it at all but he has been credited with the statement over the years. Whether he said it or not is not that important what is important is that was the common belief at the time.

Painting, and drawing, was seen by many as the way to illustrate the World. Before photography the most accurate way of describing a person, object, landscape or event was by the hand of painter or draughtsman.  Many believed that the advent of photography would make their skills redundant.

We know, with the benefit of hindsight, that the fact was only their agenda changed. It was no longer necessary to “accurately” portray, although many still did, instead the painter was released to interpret, to leave their own mark and to put something of themselves into the image. Painting didn’t die with the invention of photography, it was elevated to the state of Art, with a capital “A”.

In the same way many believed with the advancement in digital photography, film photography would die. The fact is, as with painting, the agenda of film photographers changed.

Since 1839 photography has been seen as a truth, “the camera never lies”. We have given the photograph a credibility  no longer afforded to “hand-made” illustration. Clearly, anyone with any knowledge of the photographer’s craft understands that it has always been possible to manipulate that truth, in the darkroom, with an airbrush, with filters or even just in terms of where the photographer stands and when he releases the shutter. Lately, Photoshop (I use the term generically) has had quite an impact on the credibility of photography. We no longer necessarily see the photograph as the absolute truth, we are much wiser than that.

Digital photography has made photography, as an activity, accessible to all. Some have made careers  from photography that would have struggled in an analogue world. Mistakes can be corrected after the event, images can be made to “look” more interesting at the click of a mouse. Content is still king,

“…there is nothing worse than a sharp image of a fuzzy concept…” Ansel Adams,

but digital photography has made it easier. Importantly, it’s instant, well if the photographer shoots Jpeg and does nothing to the camera image, even a photographer shooting RAW can get an image to it’s audience at a speed analogue press photographers would have given a years’ salary  to achieve.

So, with all that advancement why bother to still shoot film?

It’s not the same medium as digital. It is different,  it looks different, it handles differently, it requires different skills (some similar ones as well). Importantly though, it is more tactile than any form of computer based photography. An analogue photographer starts with some similar looking hardware but then loads the film. There is no way of making a visual check on how good or not the image is before making the next,

“…Every time I shoot film I’m looking for my next photo. Every time I shoot digital I’m looking at my last photo…”  Someone on Twitter via Zack Arias.

It takes time. Some analogue photographers load single sheets into big camera that can change the shape and depth of field of an image by independently adjusting front and rear standards, but even a 35mm SLR needs more consideration than the digital approach, if for no other reason than there is no instant check.

In the darkroom there are formulas and procedures that can be tweaked or adjusted to suit the look of the image pre visualised. Once the negatives have dried the photographer becomes a print maker creating, with his hands, eyes, experience and skill an object of beauty. No two prints will ever be identical, it’s not a precisely repeatable  process. I have  3 or 4 prints from the same negative in my gallery that I made at different times in my life, often, you can judge my mood at the time I made the print by the way they look. For a commercial photographer who wants to make multiple copies of an image that was a disadvantage, for an artist who puts something of himself into his work, that is the charm.

Film is far from dead, digital photography has allowed the film photographer to find the art.

I’ve made a couple of references on here about my new project. It’s a new project centred on old technology. It’s about my roots in film photography and my passion for black and white darkroom printing. It’s called the Alchemist’s Workshop because it is like magic.

Located at The Visitor’s Centre in Grizedale Forest, in the heart of the English Lake District, it is a gallery of my “fine art” photography, the prints are for sale. I am also selling some very rare photographic books, a lot are signed, as well as refurbished, guaranteed, re styled Olympus Trips. The gallery is in one of 5 old stables at the centre, next door is my darkroom. There are 6 enlargers that allow us to print negatives from 35mm to 5×4 and make prints up to 20×16. I will make my own work in the darkroom but I am also offering a series of workshops and, in the Autumn, 2 evening classes a week. The darkroom is available for hire, individually or in groups of up to 5. I would be delighted to talk to groups and schools about bespoke workshops.

… And, I had a chat about this yesterday, you heard it here first, I’ve got Ilford (Harman Technology) right behind me.

Here’s the first of the workshops…