another year goes by

I turned 28 yesterday. I've officially been photographing for half my life.

My father's gift to me when I turned 14 was the Canon Rebel. It was among the first of this model and hawked by Andre Agassi (what is it with tennis players and cameras?). I used it on and off until about July of 1994. We were moving from Australia to Thailand the next month, and I wanted to photograph everything about my life before I left. We got to Bangkok in August, and that camera was my saving grace. Even though I was half Thai, I was completely unprepared for the cultural shock of living there. I enrolled in the basic photography course at my school, and was addicted. Didn't stop shooting, ever. Except for one time when I tried to photograph the school musical production Hair (PG version)- I was a freshman, and a senior who happened to be working on her IB Art thesis in photography, was there shooting and gave me and my camera the evil eye. In hindsight, I should have defied the high school power chain and stayed to photograph, but whatever. I digress. The next year, 10th grade, I enrolled in Advanced Photo. I still love the work I created back then - in fact, one of my images from India (1995) is hanging at Artomatic this year. By then I had exhausted all the photo course offerings, and I wasn't enrolled in the IB program.

I put down my camera and stopped shooting until 1999, my second year at AU. I shot non-stop for two years, completely immersing myself. But, again, after finishing undergrad I put my camera down and stopped regularly shooting until late 2007.

At this point you must be wondering, where is this going? Well, I see a trend. I get bored. Very bored. And right now, I'm feeling bored with photography. I see the same images, same style of images, and little deviation. But even the deviants get stuck in a style. Quite honestly, I don't fit into either mainstream or deviance. I never have. I am told my work is great and that I'm great to work with. Why isn't this enough for me?

It's distressing because photography is how I define myself. Now, how do I define myself by something that doesn't challenge me anymore? It's either complete immersion or nothing. I find myself thinking, for so long I stood as an observer. For me the camera served(s) as a fence. I saw over it, but I didn't stepp over it. But I've changed and grown; I want to participate, I want to be involved. I've moved past that fence.

So what to do now? I don't know. I continue to be fascinated by images, and even more so by artist biographies. I love to create, I love to make things. Maybe I'll explore other media and find my way back. Maybe it's something I'll keep as a personal tool, rather than a career. I don't know, but I have faith. This isn't the end of this blog, but the end of a phase of observation. From my now on, this blog is going to be about other photogs' projects that I consider as different, and my new projects and how I find they challenge me. It's time to figure out how to participate and capture.