CareerManagement / Portfolio
Part 1 Attention
Working in a studio meant two things: I was "home" (Paris or New York), and I had more time. Usually, we started around 9 a.m. (with everybody being on time in NY and nobody being on time in Paris). After the lunch break, while makeup and hair were refreshed, I set aside one hour for seeing books of models (GoSee) as well as portfolios from young photographers.
Structure
Looking back, one of the most stunning things I noticed was the lack of structure or signature in the portfolios of young photographers. And having them sit right beside me quickly revealed their logic:
"Oh, I thought I had to show a variety of different styles."
"But I wanted to show that I can do stills and landscapes as well."
"Yeah, I also like those five images best, but I wanted to fill empty pages."
It is complete nonsense that a portfolio should show ALL the things you can do. Don’t show that you can be crazy and romantic, do nudes and landscapes, or work in color, B&W, and tritone. Show only what you love and what is essentially you. But what IS essentially you?
I remember how I struggled when I worked on my portfolios. My first one was when I was about 15, and I wanted to be the assistant of the town's coolest photographer (who, by the way, just laughed and told me to fuck off). Then, over the years, one would assume that the portfolios got clearer in vision and better in structure—but they didn’t! Why not?
Because I did not have a clue who I was (it was all completely muddy), and secondly, I did not even grasp the idea that there is such a thing as 'structure' or 'concept.'
Because I remembered my own struggle vividly, I always looked at portfolios from other photographers in two ways: The first one being what I would see, and the second what I could see.
Above: For my portfolio, I stuck the selected photos on a wall for a few days and made notes on how to enhance them. After about a week, I threw out all those I got tired of. I marked those that would best describe what my current style was as "PB" (…at that time, it was all about “1001Nights” Orient-inspired themes and over-the-top makeup…)
Truthful
They say a portfolio should be honest, and you should be true to yourself. But how do you know who you are when you're 18?
One of my strong beliefs is: Things are essentially simple in life. If they're complicated, something goes wrong.
In fact, finding out who you are, what you believe in, and what you should be doing in certain situations is essentially simple: You just have to start listening to YOUR OWN inner voice. Shut out all the crap and noise around you, shut down social media, magazines, and friends, and tune in to yourself:
WITHOUT any judgment, WITHOUT any agenda, WITHOUT any assumptions, WITHOUT any expectations.
Once you do that, all the answers you need are inherently there: Am I multi-layered, over-the-top, and crazy? Am I simple, down-to-earth, and normal? The answer to those questions already defines what your portfolio should show and what not.
Agenda
Why do I love this photograph so much? There are only two answers: The first: This photograph triggers a memory of yours, which in turn triggers an emotion. TAKE IT OUT OF YOUR PORTFOLIO because that memory is essential to 'reading' and decoding the image, and it’s only known to you. The second answer: The photograph captures something important to you.
If you look at your photographs with the differentiation of a triggered emotion having to do with memory or with something worth capturing, you are not only on a path to look at your photographs in a meaningful way, but you are also on a path to honestly look at yourself.
In other words, you start seeing the difference between LOVING an image because of what it captures versus what it triggers based on your own memory. Why? Because memory is essentially nostalgia, and love is essentially ATTENTION.
The Little Red Thread
Once you look at your portfolio in that new way, you will also see all those photographs that are still missing. To get a clear idea of what is already there and what isn’t, ask yourself:
Which photographs are REALLY important to me?
Which photographs are ONLY important because they trigger a memory? (Take those out.)
Is there something that connects all those photographs?
Is that connection something that is essentially me?
Give that something ATTENTION. Think it, love it, be it.
Then start exploring, taking photographs of THAT thing.
That is the beginning of a new portfolio. The surprising thing is: It might be filled with a variety of different styles and themes, but if it is essentially YOU, there is a little red thread connecting all those images, and not only you will be able to see it.
This is the last post for a while. Summer is approaching and I will “unplug” my laptop and myself for a few months and will return next winter. All the best wishes till then!