Validating Your Vision?
March 25, 2010 4 Comments
It is important for artists to take risks and put their work “out there” in some form. I haven’t pursued gallery exhibitions or had shows of my work very often because my time as a single parent/entrepreneur is very limited…but every once in a while I enter a competition to seek validation from others that my way of seeing the world is appreciated. This week, this image of a bleeding heart, grown in my garden, received a first place award in the plants category. I also took first place in the people category for an image of a homeless man which I posted to this site a few weeks ago.
Many photographers see the world at a level of detail that others often don’t comprehend. Beauty is everywhere…and I collect evidence of beauty and, in the case of the homeless man, evidence of sadness that stirs me. I can’t turn on the wipers in the car until I photograph the droplet patterns on my windshield. I can’t shovel the snow until I first take a picture of its soft drifts. At times, it is hard to STOP seeing these details and get about the business of life. But seeing is what I bring to the world and it is why I love my job as a photographer and graphic designer.
About jocelyncanfield
congratulations on your award. great image and moving thoughts
way to go jocelyn…but, i don’t remember signing a release for the ‘homeless’ man image!
Don’t listen to Ellery – he loves having his picture taken! I can’t agree with you more…being a mom of two very young children (gosh, I’m still changing diapers!), and an entrepreneur myself, it’s nice to know I’m not in that boat alone. The draw/need of wanting to shoot and process, much less share, my work is huge, and the amount of time I have to actually pull it off is miniscule. Hence all the unprocessed images sitting on my computer. You wish for more time, yet realize that the time you have with the little ones is so fleeting. Add in the demands of work and the responsibilities you shoulder as a daughter, wife and homemaker, and it’s a constant internal battle. At the end of the day though, I guess I wouldn’t change a thing. All in all, it’s a pretty good life..
Lovely image, Jocelyn and congratulations!!! And, when we stop seeing those details in our everyday life, is when we need to worry!