My uncle Phil Weston was the person who got me interested in serious photography in 1971.  Years later he helped run a printing company in Des Moines.  He was being a nice guy and a supportive uncle when he hired me to take some informal candid photos of their workers in January 1975. 

I did not do a good job.  My failure taught me.

I was extremely self-conscious about taking these photographs.  I didn’t know it at the time, but I was having performance anxiety.  I was a good photographer then and I knew it.  But I didn’t know why or how I was a good photographer.  So I wasn’t sure whether I could take good photographs when I had to.  Most of the time, I didn’t have to take good photos.  I could just shoot what I liked and after I developed the film see what worked.  When I had to take good photos, I didn’t know whether I could.

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I wrote those first three paragraphs above about two weeks before I’m writing this now.  Since then I’ve seen the rest of the photos from this same shoot while sorting contact sheets yet to be scanned.  Those photographs are much better than these photos.  I don’t now feel so bad.  The other photos make a better view of the printing plant.  But I still remember the feeling of inadequacy about performing photography.

If I have anything to teach about photography it is the observation that the relationship between the photographer and the photographic subject is mirrored in the relationship between the photograph and its audience.  The photographs on contact sheet 45 were taken when I felt alien and distant.  These photographs are dull and static.  I did not interact with the people I was photographing because I was shy.  They probably felt that I was cold.   These photographs are a great negative example of how to do things badly.

One of the differences between then and now is the ubiquity of cameras now.  You likely have your phone within reach and you certainly have a camera in your phone.  Taking a photo costs you nothing.  Then, few people carried around cameras and photography was expensive.  It would be unusual for anyone to take photos of any work place, including a print shop.  Had I known then what I know now I would have introduced myself, told them what I was doing, told them that if they didn’t want their photos taken to tell me, and then gotten interested in what they were doing.  Interact.  Listen observe and take pictures.

Now I don’t have performance anxiety about my photographs.  As I’ve written elsewhere I don’t feel that “I” have much at all to do with the act of taking photographs.  The more “I” that’s in the photograph, the poorer the photograph.  I trust the muse and the moment.

I am very thankful for how photography has been a tool to pry open monism.

The photographs described in this essay can be found in the gallery of photographs by number, 00045.