Brief Apology for My Photography

There is an older sense of "apology" which denotes a defense of some idea, perspective, or action. This older use, less common today, does not necessarily carry the notion of regret for an idea, perspective, or action. It may simply indicate a defense of something against skeptics or critics. The word "apologia" -- for example, John Cardinal Newman's "Apologia Pro Vita Sua"-- serves this meaning and clearly does not suggest regret. As it happens, though, I think I use the word "apology" in reference to my photography in both senses: defense and regret. I find that, in any given photographic excursion and in such excursions over time, I tend to take similar photographs. For example, this mid April day I took a long walk in the early morning to the Potomac River in Loudoun County just above Rowser's Ford. I love this walk and make it frequently. It involves trespassing on a private golf course to get to the river, but I usually do it early in the day and do no harm to the property. I transgress benignly. Along the way I often find many birds, a fox or two, flora in all stages depending on the season, smells and sounds, and the river as the destination. There and back, I take photographs. Almost by definition I take similar photographs repeatedly. I know that, and any who look at my photographs would know it. But -- and here is the defense -- the experiences are similar yet new every time. The same things -- herons, foxes, trees, river banks, the Seneca Acqueduct across the river, moving and still water, reflections -- change by the hour, the month, the season. Precipitation or its lack changes how things look. The season changes how things look. Light in particular changes how things look. And the light changes moment to moment, day to day, month to month. In only a short time on the same day the water or the trees or the acqueduct takes on new qualities of color and form as the light changes. How much more do qualities change and manifest over weeks and seasons? I find the colors and forms fascinating. I find the play of light on all things wondrously and endlessly interesting. So I iterate similar photographs each excursion and over time, always with the urge to express new nuances of what can be seen. But -- and here is the regret -- I know that some of my repetition of photographic subjects owes to lacks in imagination and discipline in the exercise. In terms of imagination or vision, I tend to seek the same experiences repeatedly. I do not push myself to extend my range of photographic subjects. In terms of discipline, I tend to photograph without sufficient intention and effort. Greater purpose and attention in the act of photography would yield better results. Also, I tend to keep and show too many photographs rather than paring those of lesser quality. Editing in photography, as in writing, requires a certain asceticism, especially with respect to what to possess. And so I offer an apology for my photography with the desire that the photographs -- to the extent they succeed, with regret where they fail -- will please and enhance the lives of any who view them. I pray that I do not make and show them to put myself on display, at least not primarily or finally. Rather, I hope the viewer will see what I see, which is a world of wonder and beauty in myriad forms, in things small and large, in things broken and perfected.

Visiting the Shrine of the Immaculate Conception

Karen and I spent several hours early on Saturday exploring the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, inside and outside, in northeast Washington. It is a magnificent edifice. The works of sacred art in the Great Upper Church and in the lower Crypt Church instantiate a panoply of theological ideas, human experiences, colors, and forms in great beauty. It was a splendid visit. We look forward to returning to the basilica to absorb more of that which cannot be fully, humanly absorbed.

Some Thoughts on Art and Existence

The trouble with existence is that it’s too much. The soul wishes that God had given us, shall we say, a less detailed world—a world of less overgrowth. For example, when my mind really gets going, when I really start thinking, it works like history. The more it goes, the more detail there is, and the less any sense can be seen in it. Detail begets detail, which obscures and chokes out the shape we seek, as honeysuckle increases and tangles while the shed wallows and goes under the burgeoning mass. The same happens when I write, as even now. Word begets word; sentence begets sentence. Writing becomes a vain attempt to catch up with and bring to a satisfactory completion the verbal profligacy. Writing sometimes seems like an arithmetic model attempting to solve an exponential process. It isn’t even so much that word begets word. It’s more like word begets twins, or quadruplets, or worse. Even now I can’t stop, satisfactorily. Oh, I can stop, and I will. But I can’t stop by having brought it to a satisfactory completion. That’s the real trouble with it. I utterly long to pursue words, sentences, existence; I long to pursue until all comes to perfect completion under one grand shape, and nothing is left to pursue. Yet I can’t do it. The more I pursue, the more I get lost; it’s all too much. I wallow and go under. There are always more words.

Here is where art comes in, though it’s a toss up whether art is more than a gloriously brave and orderly retreat against the overwhelming. As Frost said in the character of Job, “The artist in me cries out for design.” And elsewhere he wrote,

"The present

Is too much for the senses,

Too crowding, too confusing—

Too present to imagine."

As an example, the art of telling history is knowing what to include and what to leave out. Indeed, the art of every explanation is knowing when to stop.

Compare an example in another vein.

I saw a lovely ink drawing of a tree at the Sarah Scaife gallery of the Carnegie Institute in Pittsburgh. I thought to myself, “It’s quite lovely and poignant, but it’s so ordinary a subject—a sketch of a tree. Why draw it? Why look at it?” And then it occurred to me. The drawing stops the tree in a very particular way; it stops the tree, and now gives it to us to examine. And here we have a tree, which in a forest or a meadow or a yard is far too much for us to take in. If we see a tree in any of those places, we see, as it were, but a glimpse of the tree, the barest fraction of what it was and is now and shall become. So when we see it we want to hold it still so we can get a good look at it and see it all. But the tree is in a jetstream of time; it never holds still long enough to satisfy our looking. And we have not the power to hold it still. Except in art. The drawing holds the tree still, and while I know in my mind that I’m still not going to satisfy my looking, I somehow feel that at least I’ve got a chance to look enough to see it all, or even to see all of a fraction. I feel I’ve got the time to look satisfactorily, or I would if I also could hold still. The soul sometimes longs for an Artist to hold it still.

Art then works to redeem the trouble with existence. Art takes life (actually, the barest fraction thereof), holds it still, and gives it to us to examine. Art takes all this unmanageable begetting and puts a kind of stop to it so we can try to make some sense of it. Or we could say that Art takes hold of this profusive begetting and tries to direct it to a satisfactory completion. The trouble with existence is that it’s too much: art perfects by reducing to essence. Then things have a chance at making sense. Art is a gardener. It clips the honeysuckle where necessary; the shed emerges, to be seen again.