The Paintings and Photographs That Shaped My Photography
On a recent LensWork episode, Brooks Jensen talked about images that changed his life. I'm not sure any single image changed mine — but two came close: Edward Hopper's Nighthawks and Fan Ho's street photography of Hong Kong. It took years of looking back at my own photos before I recognized how deeply both had shaped the way I compose a scene.
Do Locations Make Photographers? Or Do Photographers Make Locations Their Own?
When an Australian photographer was priced out of Japan and moved back home, his new work looked nothing like his old. It raised a question worth sitting with: are we shaped by the places we shoot, or do we shape them — even Ansel Adams left Yosemite once in a while.
Our Photos Most Likely Won’t Outlast Us — And That’s Okay
Photographers often worry about legacy: archival prints, acid‑free paper, and whether our images will survive us. After hearing Brooks Jensen discuss the long‑term survival of photo prints, I began questioning whether permanence is the point—or if the act of creating is enough.