my journey as a photographer

The world that exists behind the concept of ”being an artist” is so vast and great and ceaselessly fascinating that I’ll never live a life long enough to even come close to figure it out. It’s a simple dream: You’re younger, you find something that makes you forget about time and place, pressure and responsibilities, & you make the decision that this is what I want to do. Some people find it early, others go looking all over the world for years. There is no right way, there is only your way.

I was young when I found mine, but still older than my age because they called me ”an old soul”. I’d already tried out many versions of myself - loved some, hated some. But when I discovered art - when I discovered the craft of capturing a feeling - my being fell into place. The possibility of taking something as simple & complicated as unspoken feelings, thoughts, hurt, joy, and lessons, and turning it into a photography, a drawing,... I let go of everything else, and dedicated my whole identity to this new-found skill. Because that’s what it is - a skill. Something you need to learn, practice, figure out and always keep practicing. And that’s what I’d like to write about today. The craft and skill behind being an artist, a photographer.

I'm a photographer: a feeling capturer. A storyteller. An engineer of sort, crafting and puzzling together otherworldly things like feelings and crafting them into something thicker. Something you almost can touch and hold, but never really, because isn’t that the case with a photography? Think about your favourite photo. That image that is showed in the photo you’ve hung on your wall and you see over and over, and that you always will have a certain feeling of ”home” in. Doesn’t it feel like you can touch it? Like you can hold it? Like the image you are seeing it’s a real, physical thing that you own & know and that you carry with you, even if only in your heart and mind? But still, it feels like something so much bigger than just a thing to hold … so much more and vaster than just another tool, like a phone or a knife or a bottle. It’s precious and fragile, but still robust because it exists merely inside you & so no one and nothing can ever take it away from you because it’s yours to keep.

This is what drew me towards the concept of being an artist, a photographer. The crafting of something that is so real, but not really; so vast & grand, but even sometimes it still doesn’t really exist. Something of so much more value than any money, praise, or diploma can ever be worth.

When I first started to take photos I was proud & excited about just having taken any kind of photo. A view, a place, a landscape,... As I studied more about photography, more photographers and took more and more photos, that feeling of excitement for just anything grew into wanting to perfect it. A few hundred shots later you notice & learn that a photo is not just a photo: it contains a universe depending on the perspective, the vibe, the feeling, & you delve deeper and deeper into the possibilities. I'm a photography lover & there is nothing more fascinating to me than studying how other photographers take their photos.

I’ve been taking photos around 15 years by now, resulting in a catalogue of shots that takes up way too much space on my computer. I've always been drawn to capturing landscapes, the standard compositions. The light, the colors, the subjects. But lately, I sense a shift happening within me. It might be something about the weather. It might be this loneliness, that I’ve never felt before, but still don’t want to pull myself out of. It might be just me, this somehow peaceful sense of calm I have found in my chest. I’m not worried. I’m not stressed. I’m quietly taking my time, doing whatever I might be doing. I can feel a shift in mind and thoughts and it’s affecting the art I intend to create.

Or rather, the art I will create doesn’t concern me as much as the process of creating it—the process in itself. I press a shutter on the camera and let it capture. I focus on my breathing, the air sipping through my nostrils feeding every vein in my body. I think about the books I’ve read, the poets I’ve studied, the people I’ve loved. I think about the roads I’ve walked, the darkness that befalls earlier each night. I think about my family. My sister. And I think about myself. Then I start creating.