Better to be safe than sorry, or an idiot, and the last thing I want to do with my advertisement/editorial work is to let my portfolio get stale, or look a lot like someone else's, or let down a client on a job due to not raising my own bar every step. So I'm CONSTANTLY researching, refining, making it mine, and settling for noting less than, "The best look" whatever that might be given the circumstances that create my opportunities.
To me, its way easier to be perceived by a unique viewer, in a matter of seconds, as a complete shmuck these days. ...It really is, with the never ending surplus of garbage that's considered "acceptable work" out there.
It happens in every industry. Just think about typing in any given genre of music and imagine how many crappy bands you have to sift through to find great examples of sound, its insanity. Everything starts to sound the same / everything starts to look and feel the same way. ...Ya gotta stand out.
Why I ended up choosing surrealism to express my early artwork:
I absolutely idolized Storm Thorgerson's album artwork from Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, Mars Volta, etc... When you look at those album covers, they make you re-asses yourself and do a double take. Successful surrealism offsets the viewer like that.
Also, its was one of those instances I can pull the card out and say, "It was weird time in my life." I was 22, just finished assisting in Florida, and came back to my zero network in Erie, PA. I used surrealism to literally get away from reality. I was working really shitty 3rd shift jobs and took my confusion and frustration out in art. ...It may sound cliche, but whatever it worked.
I eventually stopped creating surrealism when I finally received my photography position at Great Lakes Life Magazine in March of 2008, which almost never happened. The universe is crazy, but that's a story for another time.
How I tackled this new genre of photography in my life?
I knew there was a greater reason as to why I used to have to create "Concept Boards" in college for a particular large format class, because 10 times out of 10 you're very first amazing idea totally sucks and you never realized it and no one has the nerve to tell you that it sucks. Which helps no one, especially not you. The more you break down ideas, rationalize, break it down, rationalize, the less you get. I'm a less is more kind of guy, and most examples of visual harmony feel the same way.
Why I quit producing deeper perspective pieces:
The funny thing about deeper perspective work with me is that I'll always tend to lean more heavily with a depressing tone, because there are large topics out there that bother me and everyone else i.e. politics, loss, emptiness, etc...
But when you're constantly thinking, writing, and talking about depressing content and trying to make it visually epic, you in turn become a bit depressed. And that's not really cool when I'm just trying to enjoy the time I have here. I'll leave that kind of artwork to the mopy, debby downers, of this world while I focus on making people feel good about the photos I make for them today.
7 Prints:
Title: (2007)
Untitled
Title / Poem excerpt by: (2007)
Mike Knappenbergger
Our best relationships are where you can sit in the same room and be alone.
Title:
Untitled 2007
Title: (2007)
You Weren't Here
Why that title?
I went into my old high school to show my art teachers what I had been up to and one of them wasn't in that day. So I took my 4x6 proof of the image above and wrote on the back of it the words, "You Weren't Here" and put it on her keyboard for her to see when she came back. As I was leaving the building I thought about those words. They really set in... They were exactly the right amount of words for that piece. I don't know what I would have called it if I hadn't showed up that day and she was there?
Title: (2007)
Every Day
Title: (2007)
What Went Wrong
Title: (February 2008)
Dogs of Recession
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