refreshed

I've been taking large format photography this semester, and so far, it's been probably the most refreshing classes I've taken in a while. My professor, Ben Reynolds, has been very open about the assignments. He knows it's a learning experience and has been quite understanding of my many mishaps.

I've always had long, drawn out critiques. It's really not my style to spend 15 minutes per person for critique and arguing (debating) about how the photo doesn't give the right "feeling". I've had previous professors talk about how certain works did not convey what the assignment called for. I don't understand how they can come to that conclusion. Granted, maybe there's a sense of integrity behind it where the student should take carefully planned out photos; they shouldn't just shoot some random subject the last minute and try to think of some great artist statement that will fit along the lines of the given assignment. But, when it comes to me, I usually carefully plan and take photos; yet, the professor never seemed to get a "feel" for them and during critique, I rarely heard suggestions on how to better what I wanted to convey. It's always "great photo" or "I don't feel it."

In large format, my professor goes through each group of photos and gives us the option of saying something about it. He then critiques on technical aspects and how we can use lighting, camera positions, etc to make the photo stand out more. If we failed to meet the assignment guidelines, he won't say the picture sucks; rather, he'll point out areas where we succeeded, and areas where we need to better for the next time around. It's very constructive criticism. I think I'm getting better each time and it's because he helps us to be better. He doesn't just throw us out hoping we'll figure it out for ourselves.

This semester in general has been refreshing. I'm able to really take time during my classes to discover myself as an art project. For far too long, I've been catering to what everyone else thought was art that I ended up not building myself up as an artist.

If anyone has any articles they'd find helpful to me during my quest of "searching for my identiy as an artist", please pass them along.