As time of pandemic goes by, it becomes a new normal to be sure of nothing. Especially if you are an independent artist.
What our future will look like? The way we live today – is it the new normal? Is there a place for me in the new world? Questions we all spinning in our heads for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Every other night they are feeding our anxieties and fears. Well, I am not much different. We are all of a same kind when it comes to enduring the stress.
The industry that feeds me is the least protected and marked as unnecessary.
Most countries couldn’t care less for Art in any form today. What they somehow are missing out, is that exactly Art makes us different from the rest of animals. Our ability to dream, imagine and create. Art was there before we learned to speak and followed us through the wars and natural disasters. Art is an escape, Art is a way to digest and live things through, Art is communication, Art is our natural need to share, Art is a form of love.
Despite the picture of today being painted in darker colors, I have good feeling about what is coming after.
The stability we all have been relying on, in fact never existed. As a thanksgiving turkey never meant to live long, no matter what she thought of her life. I believe it is absolutely perfect time to open our eyes wider and take more responsibility for ourselves, for our choices and actions. Kindness, loyalty and support have never been more valued in the newest history on such a scale.
Why are you doing what you do?
It wouldn’t be an overstatement to say this crisis was necessary, so as many will be able to feel on their own skin the value and true cost of all we used to take for granted. I remember being asked numerous times, what would I be doing, if I wouldn’t need to think of money. Well, in these days answer comes naturally, since most of jobs, if not all, got cancelled until future notice. I still choose photography, with even more presistance and dedication and I have never been more sure of its future than I am today. Creativity have never been more explosive! Some of the results I will share in the next publication.
Humans are visual creatures, we will always be attracted by pictures, moving or still. It is a perfect and natural way of communication and so far I don’t see anything to replace it. Photography as process got seriously simplified with all the technology available and it matters less and less how picture was created, with a medium format camera or a phone. What important now is the personality behind it, the eye and mind of an artist, an emotional response the picture creates. In the days of technological perfection a human touch becomes luxury.
Among all, I also believe high-end photography will keep it’s narrow niche. Despite overall technology availability, true quality is still somehow relatively rare.
As any contemporary art, photography today lives inside the contexts. Perhaps it will be harder and harder to navigate through all the loads of information we create daily, although it have never been easier to be seen by such a massive audience. Learn the navigation, master your craft and if you have something to say – it won’t be left unnoticed.
The less we are holding on the vision of how it “should be”, the quicker and easier will be transition.
It is time to fasten your seatbelts and enjoy the ride
