Excerpt from a previous post in this series (Homage to Roy Pt. 4):
“As I dug seriously into his body of work I immediately began to understand how he played a role in shaping my vision. Roy DeCarava’s eloquent narrative of African American life in New York is made all the more poetic by the way that he crafted his images. He is famous for the rich, complex nature of shadow in his photograph. As if each image was metaphor for an unrecognized complexity of African American life and humanity….

Two things I think will always be at the core of my creative vision as a photographer are a love of rich and complex shadows and an abiding desire to explore and express the complex realities of African American life. Even as digital has made it possible to explore so many visual possibilities, in my personal work I have been consumed with how to make my images look and feel like the black and white images that I fell in love with as a child.

Now as I revisit DeCarava’s work, my early work and what endures in my recent work I am moved to recognize him as a giant in my creative life.”

Roy DeCarava (December 9, 1919 – October 27, 2009)

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COMMENTARY:
I have been thinking a lot about Roy Decarava lately. In the wake of his passing I have been spending a lot of time revisiting his work. The Sound I Saw is one of the most cherished books in my entire collection. It has been quite a revelation realizing just how influential he was in shaping my sensibilities as a photographer. Long before I was aware of him as a photographer, I was familiar with several of his works as individual photographs. I’d been collecting photographs on postcards, from magazines and other places for at least 8 years before I actually picked up a camera to pursue photography on my own. In that time I had managed to make several of his images a part of my informal collection. It wasn’t until the mid to late nineties, several years into my quest as a photographer, that I became familiar with him as a part of my study of early and mid 20th century photographers.

As I dug seriously into his body of work I immediately began to understand how he played a role in shaping my vision. Roy DeCarava’s eloquent narrative of African American life in New York is made all the more poetic by the way that he crafted his images. He is famous for the rich, complex nature of shadow in his photograph. As if each image was metaphor for an unrecognized complexity of African American life and humanity.

I was born into and weaned on mid 20th Century black and white photography. The photographers I admired has a strong sense of social commentary and clearly saw their work as an integral part of the vitality of the communities they lived in. When I took up photography I set out on that path. Working with black and white film allowed me to emulate the work of photographers I admired technically, aesthetically and socially.

By the year 2000 I had seven years of my own photographic work to reflect on; years during which I was incredibly productive, inquisitive, intuitive and uninhibited in what and how I shot. Two years later made ‘The Sound I Saw” a centerpiece in my library.

In the intervening years my photographic life evolved in new and exciting ways. I began to work more as an portrait and editorial photographer and photojournalist. Like just about everyone else, I took the digital plunge and enthusiastically pursued many of the possibilities offered by the medium. Gradually I shot less and less black and white, and ultimately less and less film. With these new professional, technical and creative forces my work changed, not entirely, but it did change. What is amazing now, as I reflect on DeCarava’s influence on my work is what has endured.

Two things I think will always be at the core of my creative vision as a photographer are a love of rich and complex shadows and an abiding desire to explore and express the complex realities of African American life. Even as digital has made it possible to explore so many visual possibilities, in my personal work I have been consumed with how to make my images look and feel like the black and white images that I fell in love with as a child.

Now as I revisit DeCarava’s work, my early work and what endures in my recent work I am moved to recognize as a giant in my creative life.

Roy DeCarava (December 9, 1919 – October 27, 2009)

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COMMENTARY:
The third offering in a series of images that I am calling ‘Homage to Roy’.

Excerpt from the original post:
“I had the pleasure recently to take some photos of some of my favorite local musicians at jazz club here in Seattle. The most of the images that I favored are of ‘The Teaching’, featuring Evan Flory-Barnes (Upright Acoustic Bass), Josh Rawlings (Fender Rhodes/Piano/Percussion) and Jeremy Jones (Drum Set/Percussion).  I don’t know who was sitting in with them on trumpet….

There are about five or six images from the evening that I think I will share publicly and add to my portfolio. I am calling this series of images ‘Homage to Roy’ in honor of the life and work of one of my favorite and most influential photographers, Roy DeCarava (December 9, 1919 – October 27, 2009). While I don’t have the hubris to compare these images to anything produced by DeCarava, I will say that I definitely had him in mind as I was thinking about how I wanted to see as an end product.”

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COMMENTARY:
The second offering in a series of images that I am calling ‘Homage to Roy’.

Excerpt from the original post:
“I had the pleasure recently to take some photos of some of my favorite local musicians at jazz club here in Seattle. The most of the images that I favored are of ‘The Teaching’, featuring Evan Flory-Barnes (Upright Acoustic Bass), Josh Rawlings (Fender Rhodes/Piano/Percussion) and Jeremy Jones (Drum Set/Percussion).  I don’t know who was sitting in with them on trumpet….

There are about five or six images from the evening that I think I will share publicly and add to my portfolio. I am calling this series of images ‘Homage to Roy’ in honor of the life and work of one of my favorite and most influential photographers, Roy DeCarava (December 9, 1919 – October 27, 2009). While I don’t have the hubris to compare these images to anything produced by DeCarava, I will say that I definitely had him in mind as I was thinking about how I wanted to see as an end product.”

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I didn’t know what to expect since I had not been to the club before although I was prepared to shoot in a low light situation. I was a bit surprise at exactly how low little light there was… like, virtually none. To be truthful I hadn’t shot any real low light images in years. for the past decade I have been in the mode of exerting a lot of control when I am shooting. This took me back to the 1990’s and my pre-digital days. I hadn’t tested my Canon 5D this way in the 4 years that I’ve had it so I was excited to see how these images would turn out.

I’m pretty happy with the results. The images vaguely feel like work I used to produce with my Canon AE-1 and A2-E shooting Ilford HP400 (my favorite back in day) When converted to b&w the noise the 5D produces is reminiscent of HP400 grain, albeit not quite as soft.

There are about five or six images from the evening that I think I will share publicly and add to my portfolio. I am calling this series of images ‘Homage to Roy’ in honor of the life and work of one of my favorite and most influential photographers, Roy DeCarava (December 9, 1919 – October 27, 2009). While I don’t have the hubris to compare these images to anything produced by DeCarava, I will say that I definitely had him in mind as I was thinking about how I wanted to see as an end product.

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She is very strong willed. She is very clear and articulate about what she wants. She was like that from the moment she was born. She was born with her eyes open. She was born silent, intent and aware. She didn’t cry until the attending nurse put her on the metal scale to be weighed. She stopped crying almost instantly after she was removed from the device. She has always been this clear and purposeful.

It is an amazing thing to behold.

Her purposeful is a thing unto itself. I often feel that she is inside her body waiting for it to catch up with her and what she feel she needs to be about the business of. As her father it is my responsibility to see that she grows into her full self in a healthy way.

I see all of these things in this photo. I took it when she was about five months old. I think I was looking for a way to express these things in a simple image.

My daughter Ama-Ibi at 5 months

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COMMENTARY:
I’m trying to make sure I keep up with this blogging thing in the midst of everything else I am doing. I’ve selected a random image today and I’ll share the first thoughts that it triggers in me.

I’ve walked this earth without religion for nearly my entire life. You frequently hear people who don’t profess a particular religion say that they are ’spiritual’.  I have been known to say this myself, though I must admit I cringe a little bit every time I’ve said it. It is such a nebulous statement. I am always left with more questions when someone says ‘I’m not religious, but I’m spiritual’ to me. I can only imagine what runs through people’s heads when I utter those words. None the less, barring a fairly long and intimate conversation, there is no way of accurately expressing the nature of my spiritual life.

Maybe this punctuates the dominance of organized religions in our culture. They take up so much of our conceptual space when it comes to spirituality that we have not developed the language to articulate other modes of practice and being.  Maybe it says something about my own personal brand of spirituality. Perhaps there is some inherent truth embedded in the overwhelming presence of religious institutions. Perhaps their presence speaks to a fundamental need for structure when it comes to human spirituality. Maybe there is a bit of validity in both. I tend to lean toward the former since, despite the deficits of language, I am very clear about the nature of my spirituality. My spiritual center is as much about inquiry, experience and discovery as it is about belief, practice and surrender. In the end it is a very individual thing that may not be translatable to anyone else. I don’t know.

When I look at this photo I am in awe of those who have a devout faith in a prescribed religion and have found a way to make it a truly transcendent experience. Perhaps it is my general disdain for prescription and convention when it comes to spiritual matters. I have had such rich, lucid and instructive experiences from such an early age that I somtimes think that it is difficult for me to understand how large institutions can truly respond and be accountable to their dynamic nature.

I am not a cynic. Well, to be honest, I should probably say that I am not a complete cynic. I would be lying if I did not admit to just a little bit of cynicism about organized religion. Nevertheless I find awe inspiring beauty in all religions and spiritual traditions not so much for the doctrine, but for the human element. The striving, the pursuit of something greater, the willingness to reshape oneself according to ideals that are greater than the calling of daily life and survival is, to me, a supremely beautiful thing.

I have been on this path as well, albeit without the aid of a specific doctrine. I freely pull from principles embedded in various religions without reservation. Not in an airy, purely self-affirming way either, I hope. I frequently wrestle with ideas that are uncomfortable for me but seem necessary when I feel that I need guidance in order to avoid the pitfalls of self-congratulation or moral expediency.  I can do this because from an ‘outsider’s’ point of view all system are speaking to the same essential truth.

I have found way to be shaped by my internal and existential experiences. It is a very visceral and immediate spirituality the sees each and every moment in life as a learning opportunity; a chance to reflect on my essential nature and grow.  I rely equally on the rigors and fruits of science and the transcendence of my own subjective experiences. I am intrigued by all of the popular ideas about the nature of consciousness of born out of recent studies in quantum physics, but I draw no premature conclusions from them. For me they present as many new questions as they might purport to answer. I find the possibility of new avenues of inquiry thrilling.

Somewhere in the mix of what is certain and what is subjective, between discipline doctrinal adherence and the liberating nature spontaneous spiritual experiences, between the proscribed and the explorative I find a beautiful solace in the fundamental human desire to reach for the transcendent.

It is in this desire that I find a reflection of me.

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COMMENTARY:
Last Friday, June 5, President Obama appointed Alexia Kelley, co-founder of Catholics in Alliance for he Common Good (CACG), as Director of Faith-based and Community Partnerships at the Department of Human Services. The move is in line with President Obama’s diplomatic temperament and philosophical approach to hot button issues. As pro-life advocates go Kelley is decidedly middle of the road. The fact that she formerly served as the head of explicitly anti-abortion organizations has generated a fair amount of criticism from hard-line pro-choice Obama supporters. At the same time her embrace of “abortion reduction” as a holistic way to resolving the cultural and political war over the issue is drawing fire from staunch pro-life advocates. Abortion reduction essentially posits that pro-life advocates can best address their concerns about increasing abortion rates by addressing related issues like poverty that seem to be key drivers. The reduction approach is anathema to those who oppose abortion purely on moral grounds and seek to win a broader cultural victory by codifying a federal ban on the practice base on that premise alone.

By appointing Kelley as Director of Faith-based and Community Partnerships at HHS President Obama is sending a clear message that he intends on moving right down the middle in his response to the abortion issue. The middle, in this case, is probably the most dangerous place be to since he runs the risk of alienating a significant portion of his pro-choice base while entrenching hardliners in the pro-life camp. It is perhaps exactly what he should be doing however.

Building on my last post about framing the conversation around abortion, I believe the president is setting the stage for a broader conversation not just about abortion, but also how it relates to and is influenced by other social issues like poverty, education and equitable access to health care. A quick perusal of the CAGC’s web site illustrates how broad the organization’s agenda is. Headlining the site’s front page is a large link to a page advocating direct action in the pursuit of health care reform. Below you will find links to campaigns advocating worker’s rights, poverty reduction, ‘moral economics’ and more aid for the survivors of Hurricane Katrina. By tapping into to talent from an organization with such a broad based response to American issues the President has clearly chosen someone who can not only steer the conversation about abortion towards greater dialog, but has the organizing experience to present tangible responses that may yield results.

Indeed this nation is in need of more moderate voice to cut through the cacophony of vitriol and crosstalk and create real dialog based on sound ideas and tangible data. According to the CACG’s 2008 report Reducing Abortion in America: The Effect of Socioeconomic Factors economic factors weigh heavily in a woman’s decision to proceed with or terminate a pregnancy. To further this position the reports presents evidence suggesting a correlation between cycles of economic expansion and contraction and corresponding increases and decrease in abortion rates across the nation.  The report states:

“…that a two standard deviation increase in economic assistance to low-income families is correlated with a 20% lower abortion rate in the 1990s. Across the entire United States, this translates into roughly 200,000 fewer abortions. Further, higher male employment in the 1990s was associated with a 21% lower abortion rate; and lower poverty rates were correlated with 10% reduction in the abortion rate.”

It goes on to conclude that:

“Elected officials can utilize effective and appropriate socioeconomic public policies to reduce abortions. These include: promoting policies that increase male employment; lower the poverty rate; provide funding for child care for working women; and increase economic assistance to low-income families. Legislation aimed at these goals can effectively reduce abortion in America.”

In the end a re-framing of the larger philosophical conversation about abortion will have to be preceded by a gradual steering towards rational ideas and practical responses. Finally, perhaps, this process has begun.

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