Selling Ourselves.

I am going to take this step by step. So bare with me, this has the potential to get interesting.

First, we need to care about where the state of photography is because photojournalism derived from fine art photography. Social Documentary came first, then photojournalism. I think to not care about state of photography is quite lazy. Having read “A Quarter Century of Photography” and having the inability to take a stand is even worse.

Photojournalism, since its beginning, has been based on the same design principals as Fine Art photography, which is actually based on the drawing principals of Leonardo di Vinci and other famous painters. These principals have been passed on through different art mediums. The principals and elements — positive and negative space, the rule of thirds, a visual center in the frame — in photography are the same. Therefore there should be a mutual respect for each, not a great divide that separates them.

The reality is photography is everywhere and its not going anywhere – anytime soon. From the early days of camera obscura photography has evolved making it easier for everyone to become a photographer. Amateurs at the right place and right time have taken some of the most recent spot news photographs. Photographers with significant experience and educational backgrounds are not as necessary today. The most famous images from the London bombings were taken by mobile phones within the tube after the explosion and distributed all over the world. This makes photojournalists with “real” cameras insignificant.

What can we do?

Young photojournalists like myself should perfect our craft. Stop making mediocre work that has been done repeatedly over and over and over. Vicki Goldberg writes, ” There are a lot of photographers out there trying hard to look as unprofessional as they can. Many succeed. They fall in peculiar vogue for uninteresting, uninflected pictures of chain-link fences or skuzzy backyards, pictures even amateurs might be tempeted to throw away.” The same goes for photojournalists today. Most people can take a photograph with their mobile phones — the idea of capturing moments and reality is not as difficult as it use to be…. So what do we do. We perfect it, we study our masters, the principals and elements that make photography what it is… and once we perfect that, we then can adapt it to make it our own. We adapt and use all the tools that challenge photography and use them to our advantage. We master photography and audio and video. An in the end we master our art.

Then.

We put ourselves on the line. We stand in front of big time editors and art directors like prostitutes looking for a job because without we have no money. We sell our work, which means we sell a little bit of ourselves. And when we do not sell our work we even lose alittle bit of ourselves. Photography, whether it fine art, fashion, or photojournalism is a cut throat business — those that are mediocre make ends meet, those who have craft, class, and talent are remembered in the history books like Adams, Capa, and Avedon.