In the early years of my photography life, I practiced "photography by acquisition." I gathered to me gear, knowledge, techniques, an inventory of images, and occasional accolades. As I've grown older and seen things more clearly, I've come to realize that an important part of progressing in the art life is letting go of ideas and practices that aren't productive. As futurist Alvin Toffler once said, "The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read or write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn." In other words, letting go in order to move forward.

LW1391 - Letting Go Is Moving Forward

Random Observations on Art, Photography, and the Creative Process. These talks focus on the creative process in fine art photography. LensWork editor Brooks Jensen side-steps techno-talk and artspeak to offer a stimulating mix of ideas, experience, and observations from his 50 years as a fine art photographer, writer, and publisher. Topics include a wide range of subjects from finding subject matter to presenting your work, and building an audience. 
Included in this RSS Feed are the LensWork Podcasts — posted weekly, typically 10-20 minutes exploring a topic a bit more deeply — and our almost daily Here's a thought… audios (extracted from the videos.) Here's a thought… are snippets, fragments, morsels, and tidbits from Brooks' fertile (and sometimes swiss-cheesy) brain. Usually just a minute or two. Always about photography and the art life.
Brooks Jensen is the publisher of LensWork, one of the world's most respected and award-winning photography publications, known for its museum-book quality printing and luxurious design. LensWork has subscribers in over 73 countries. He is the author of 13 books on photography and the creative life -- the latest books are The Best of the LensWork Interviews (2016), Photography, Art, and Media (2016), and the four annual volumes of Seeing in SIXES (2016-2019).

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One of the reasons I love the creative aspects of photography is that doing photography seduces me into a single-minded and thoroughly focused attention. In fact, without that level of immersion, I find my photographs are remote, emotionless, empty.

HT1902 - Single-minded Attention

I mentioned a while back that I stayed with some friends who had a couple of hundred framed pieces of art on their walls. It occurred to me that they had an incredibly wide variety of styles of frames. I asked them about this. They explained that the cost of framing is so high that they get all their frames from thrift shops and other second hand stores. This is a great idea.

HT1901 - Used Frames

Call me a cynic, call me a disbeliever, call me an irascible conspiracy theorist, but I simply don't believe the numbers reported by websites like YouTube. When I see that some new and unknown YouTube influencer is reported to have a half a million views of their video, I simply don't believe it. We have no idea how Google tallies those numbers, but knowing the statistics for our websites here at LensWork, I find it hard to believe when I read the download statistics from social media websites. Something funny is going on here.

HT1900 - Internet Numbers

I guess I've always been a bit snootish in my attitude towards snapshots versus fine art photography. But the more I think about it, the more I've begun to question my assumptions. Snapshots are form of memory, but don't we experience that with our fine art photography? What is the difference between a snapshot and a fine art photograph?

HT1899 - The Difference Between Snapshots and Art

When asked, I think most fine art photographers would have to confess that they would love to see their work become "collectible." I understand the motivations for validation that come with collectability and museum exhibition. It's curious, however, how different are the motivations of collectors compared to consumers.

LW1391 - Letting Go Is Moving Forward

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