[Leica] Susan Meiselas - photographer known to use Leicas on occassion - speaks at Wellesley

["B. D. Colen" <bdcolen@earthlink.net>]

Took my MIT class on a roadtrip out to Wellesley last night for a slide
show, talk, by Susan Meiselas, she of "Carnival Stripper" and "Nicaragua"
fame, in particular.

Needless to say many of the images, some of which are by now iconic, were
quite wonderful, but in addition to showing many examples of her work from
the past 30 years, she made the following interesting remarks/points:

Of the strippers with whom she hang out and photographed for three summers:
"They didn't think it was interesting to see the pictures of themselves."

On the subject of posing/setting up photos, which reared its ugly head from
the uglier Salgado thread:

"I either saw it, got it, and captured it in that instant, or I didn't get
it: that's the way I work."

On her Nicaragua work:

"I don't do a lot of street photography here, in New York or elsewhere. But
there that was all you had." Her point being that when you are in a totally
foreign environment, particularly with a war/revolution going on, don't
speak the language, etc., what you are really doing is SP.

"We (documentary photographers/PJs) could be facing a very difficult
situation in the world in the next five years as image makers," as more and
more people being photographed angrily demand, "what are you taking this
for?" i.e. - Who do you represent? Why are you photographing? Where will it
be used and for what purpose? Or, to put it in simpler terms, Whose side are
you on?

On DIGITAL:

"If everything becomes easier to get, what do we think about what we're
getting, and what we're going to do with it? Is there more opportunity for
authorship, or less? Is there going to be more decontexualizing of images?"

Speaking with her afterwards about the digital revolution in
photojournalism - which she saw as bringing about radical changes, I made
the observation that it is no more, or less, radical than the introduction
of the 35 mm miniature camera - (ON TOPIC!;-) ) - which allowed
photographers to shoot in situations and places to which they had never
before had access, or at least unobtrusive access.

Meiselas allowed as how that was probably the case, but suggested that that
kind of change can have enormous impact.

Finally - and this is a Kylism - she observed that:

"FARWAY IS NOT NECESSARILLY A PLACE" - meaning look around you for things
that are unobserved and unphotographed. You don't have to go any farther
than next door to find them.

Food for thought.

Now, back to Bimmers, Beemers, Pateks, Rollexes, and other inane triva and
drivel utterly unrelated in any way to Leicas or Photography...:-)

B. D.



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