The Mississippi - An Interview with Alec Soth
Seesaw, the online photography magazine published an interview with Alec Soth. I've detailed the link below for anyone else to read and enjoy:
I've detailed below my thoughts around the interview based on the exchange between hom and the interview and the very interesting points he made or at least thoughts that struck a chord with me
Like many successful photographers, a career photography was not Soth's first choice. Interestingly Soth claims photography is not really capable of having a story even though it may have narrative. As interviewer points often the narrative in a photograph is ambiguity and this is something my Landscape tutor has also pointed out to me. Perhaps this way that story in the photograph is different for each viewer and for a variety of reasons. Could this be like picking up a story book but there are big gaps or empty pages so you make some of the story up?
However Soth's work in his first book "Sleeping by the Mississippi" his work is described as fragments of a dream with no clear connectivity or viewing order. Soth through self experienced story claims that many great photographs are not necessarily created by great photographers but by luck, being in the right place at the right time, or perhaps the right place and the right time to capture the right moment. However I think he claims the more difficult element is putting together the images so that they become a collection and are stronger as a collection than their individual worth.
This is quite an interesting point, whilst i have produced "sets" of images as part of my earlier modules I suspect these sets of images are in fact images linked by a specific theme but remaining very rigid to the original brief and I've developed my intention sufficiently.
Soth's reasons for selecting the MidWest as the location for his images is because he feels an affinity with the area. This is important perhaps when trying to but a piece of yourself into the images, they take on a new level and the images have an emotional attachment for you.
Its an interesting concept that each image have a loose connection with the previous and the next image, however loose or vague that may be.
Looking through the images shown in the magazine I see there is a story of some kind waiting to be discovered or elaborated within what he has captured.
Looking through these images you can see how Soth really does like to create a story within his images. Whilst i do find the images very static there is a lot in the image to entertain my mind; there is something to discover, something to contemplate, something to imagine.
Earlier in the interview he speaks about his work being like poetry, the images having a repeatable rhythm. he also talks about photography being almost investigative, discovering something.
I find this interview, particularly Soth's way of describing his work, his vision etc very interesting. His images in this set also align with some feedback from my tutor for Assignment.....include or create some ambiguity within the images. Soth would say create a story, make a set that has a rhythm but don't make it too obvious to obvious.
What I take mostly from this article is to be observant and use what is there to enable a story to be started, to have a flow within the images. It will be interesting to see how I can do this and how close I come to what reaching what I aspire to.
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