[This article is part of the new Photography and Audiovisual Narratives Page launch. All accompanying launch posts can be found here.]
This is the first post of a new initiative by the Photography and Visual Narratives Page called "For A Narrative That is Yours." This monthly column contains curated tips or advice solicited from one photographer that the Co-Editors of the Photography and Visual Narratives Page select from the Middle East or North Africa. These tips could come in the form of bullet points, articles, film recommendations, or many other formats and forms. Each photographer is given the freedom to choose how he/she might contribute.
In this first installation, we have asked Bruno Hadjih for such advice, Bruno usually works between France and the Algerian desert, where he produces most of his work. The projects Bruno works on focuses on the redefinition of spaces, whether they are physical spaces or emotional ones.
Advice from Bruno:
- Photography, as everyone knows it, means to write with light. This form of "writing" represents speech and thinking by taking the form of conventional graphical mediums. However, this definition doesn’t take into consideration the style, form, and even less the singularity of a photographer. Photography, like any other medium, uses this definition, but with the exception that it works with light.
- In any practice, experience matters in acquiring the know-hows of the trade. However, photography, much like art in general, doesn’t require such experience in order to produce the art product—photos, in this case.
- The passion, curiosity, engagement, and the knowledge that we have both because of photography and as photographers is important.
- The history of photography is filled with photographers that enrich us. One shouldn’t be afraid of being drawn to non-conventional experiences in photography. Get out of your comfort zone and push the boundaries. As in poetry, create your own language and syntax, and stick to it. Sharpen your gaze by visiting exhibitions and going through photographer’s books. Being conscious of one’s weaknesses is the first step to singularity. Your singularity.
