Ask the Artist

So many things! I love the fresh breezes, the smell of warm sand and salty air, the glittering water, the sound of seagulls and waves breaking, and that special feeling that coastal towns have. I could go on and on!

And I always feel at home by the ocean. As soon as I set foot on a beach, everything feels right, and any worries and the rest of the world just melt away. I love how it’s so calming and joyful at the same time. Walking through the dunes and catching that first glimpse of the water never stops giving me butterflies. It doesn’t matter which time of year it is, or what the weather is doing, it’s always a burst of excitement.

Also, there is such a sense of freedom looking out over the open water and seeing nothing but the horizon. When I was a kid, I always used to wonder what was on the other side of that thin line, and imagined all kinds of magical places that I would visit one day. I still catch myself doing that sometimes.

The thrill of finally seeing what was an abstract idea in my mind come to life and materialize on paper. Regardless of whether it’s a personal project just for me, or an image that becomes a print in my store, seeing it on paper for the first time is like opening a Christmas present as a child.

Sometimes I have an image in my mind long before I ever capture it. It can come from a dream, a memory, a feeling, a sudden inspiration, or just an abstract idea that sort of shapes and grows on its own the more I let my brain work on it without me consciously interfering.

Often, it stays just an idea that I revisit from time to time; other times, things suddenly come together and the moment unfolds in front of my eyes. And if I’m lucky, I have my camera with me when that happens!

When the idea is more concrete, it’s usually more intentional than that, and I’ll return to a place again and again and wait until the light, the conditions, and the feeling is right.

So to return to the question, was it worth waiting for? Sometimes yes, sometimes no. When it wasn’t, it can be disappointing, but at least I captured it and can erase that image from my brain, or reshape the idea and save it for later. But when the image turns out exactly as I had imagined it, or even better, absolutely, and that is one of the thrills that make me love photography so much and why I never tire of the hunt for that shot!

The simple answer is that that’s what I love and am drawn to. If I were to analyze myself a bit more, I’d say it’s a hunt for a perfect world (at least what a perfect world is for me). My childhood was often a bit tumultuous, and I’m easily overwhelmed and stressed out by crowds and noise and chaos. I’m capturing images of the world I want to live in, where all is quiet, joyful and peaceful.

This kind of goes back to the previous question, it’s what I like, and I find it peaceful. I love it when I get to a beach and find that I have it all to myself, or with only a few people way off in the distance (which actually happens quite often in the off season on Cape Ann). To me, it’s a feeling of freedom, as opposed to crowded summer beaches, which I think can be quite claustrophobic.

There are of course times when I want to photograph something on a crowded beach, and in those cases, I’ll wait until the part of the beach with the image I want to capture is empty, if only for a split second, and take the picture then. If that moment never happens, I’ll try a different time of day, or come back another day.

I work on a lot of photos every year, and looking at images on a screen and on paper are two very different experiences.

I actually print a lot of images that never become art prints. Sometimes, I love an image on screen, but once I see it on paper, it just doesn’t do it for me. Other times, I sort of maybe like an image on the screen, but when I see it on paper, it’s an immediate yes.

Once I have a “yes” print, I like to live with it myself, on the wall or on a work table, for a while to make sure I like it just as much a month later, or in some cases, even a year later. The ones that still excite me and make me stop and linger after that time become prints.

Also, and I usually don’t publicly announce this, once a year I go through all my live prints and remove the ones that don’t give me quite the same thrill anymore. It doesn’t mean that they are bad or that there’s something wrong with them, but if I’m not as excited about a print as I once was, it is retired.