Reflection . . . “Decisions in the Darkroom”

A few years back (earlier this century) my elder daughter began to pursue her professional and artistic development vision as an art-photographer.  She is doing great. 

She began to ask questions, daughters do that with daddies; so we spent time talking and thinking together back into one of my former lifetimes – professional photography  . . . 

We got to reflecting; the following reflections arise in part from our times over these last few years, as I have interacted with her questions into past “photographic development” - especially my years of darkroom experience . . .  and learnt from her growing artistic professionalism and creativity with darkroom-processed media . . . 

• Reflection, thinking about our experiences, is the key to life and professional learning . . . 

Reflection allows us to analyse our experiences, make changes based on our mistakes and fresh appreciations of the profession’s principles we violated (aka did wrongly), keep doing what is successful, and build upon or modify past knowledge based on new knowledge.                              

Our conversations keep the “visualising/interpreting artist in community” alive in me ... nowadays my image developing work is as a counsellor to others in my vocation as a spiritual director – while the “media” has changed, the principles and transferable wisdom’s dynamic . . . ruminate with me . . . 

• Deciding in the dark means you firstly have creative-vision from the light ...

• Achieving what you envisaged seeing when you took the picture in the light requires the making of “decisions in the altered light of the darkroom”, then coming back into the light to “check the image being achieved” ...

• Shining light on a picture is different to projecting light through a negative ...

• Creative insight captured as image through the moment of the shutter’s release, journeyed through the darkroom’s environmental processes, yields a positive result which the artist may not be as positive towards as their perception in the “click-moment” ...

• Best images still come through the skilful use of negative media ...

• It is only by the balanced projection of light through a negative can a positive image find its objective existence ...

• To see things in detail like the embroidery on a white bridal dress (burning in), the light on the face often needs to be “held-back” (dodged).   To just focus on the face compromises the fullness of the image ...

• The good technician must firstly be an artist, not in isolation; a facilitator in a community of artists ...

• What you project in the dark, must be developed and “fixed”, before it can make the transition back to the light ...

• In the creative-pursuit of a good print you will make more than a single processing-visit into the darkroom ...

• You can alter the negative, etch the negative, touch up the negative, but destroy the negative and you will never get the positive image ... get the picture ...

• Skilful work in the darkroom creates a finished image from the negative of greater clarity than the raw negative initially seems to promise ...

• Note, the most sophisticated computer is a limited and crude copy of the human brain and a mere makeshift mind for the image maker ... bypassing the negative for the polished positive ignores the creativeness of the “dark-side of the process.”

The pictures are over 40 years old ...  both of us are older ... both of us are still working at growing wiser, not just older ... growing older just happens if you keep getting out of bed and having birthdays . . . 

See Solutions . . .

Been thinking about some of the “dumb” things, ideas, beliefs, actions, and attitudes I see and hear in my physical world and social community  .  .  .   “at my age, shouldn’t I be telling folks a thing-or-two?”

Throughout life we constantly see things that just aren’t right . . . things, ideas, attitudes, beliefs or “alleged truths”’ that just won’t work!!! Often they are simply wrong.

By-the-way saying after the fact; “I told them it wouldn’t work” is not all that helpful . . . 

• Any fool can tell you what’s wrong; it takes wisdom to see solutions . . .

• Wisdom to know what’s right, and courage to do it regardless of “personal-ego cost!”

THOT:  "When we honestly identify or oppose wrong, we also commit to a long-term engagement in doing the compassionate right.”

• Opening your mouth doesn’t close the matter . . . 

Chewing on a book or two . . .

There’s a common factor in thousands of my library’s books; all have been acquired as tools.

Embarking into Christian ministry in 1971 my early mentor, Pastor Marcus Goulton said;

• “John, you had a trade/craft as a typographer. Each week you worked at ‘the trade’ among your wages your employers paid an amount designated ‘tool-money’. Money above earnings to enable you to buy the personal tools needed in the ongoing pursuit of that trade/craft. Not extra cash for discretionary spending, it was dedicated to your profession.  Now you are joining in a new trade/craft. This new trade has different tools; books. You will be paid tool-money (we may call it an educational allowance) along with your salary. Buy books that will serve as tools, ones that won’t just sit on your shelves; they perch there, coming ‘on-and-off’ many times.”

I took his advice on-board. For over forty years I’ve sought to spend my tool-money in that vein, acquiring ‘literary-tools’ on a one per week average. 

Some years ago I picked up a second-hand copy of Art Gish’s s book “Living in Christian Community.” (Scottsdale, Pa.: Herald Press, 1979.)

Art’s book has long had its place on my library shelves, many times over the years its “come on-and-off” that shelf. This year on a February morning it came off again, and as I scanned several points “relevant to what I’m writing in a dissertation,” a thought struck. “Is Art still alive?”

Both Google and my internalised-theology answered my question. They said; no and yes.  Sure I read about a tractor accident fatality in July 2010, but I’ve read in Art’s book too many times to settle a straight no to my question. Art’s book is a “tool forged in Christian community;” the ongoing community of my trade/craft’s pursuit. Art’s theology of community is alive, relevant, challenging, and replicating.

Just as Christian community exists in time and transcending it, so also its members.  What they have done, written or said still speaks.

The writer to the Hebrews resonates this into me (12:18-29). In that morning’s research writing, I found the longer-than-life strands of Art’s personal manifesto for living in community weaving into the argument that, “Christian spirituality is a social behaviour” – Yes for me while Art’s writing is a paper source, his words are living-source; incarnated-words in concert with the general assembly and the church/community of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven.

NOW - it’s ruminating time . . .

1. While good tool-books contain theology, what processes am I allowing for their theology to be internalised?
2. How is my life developing as a “tool forged in community for others to use?”
3. When I die will the answer to “are they still with us” be no and yes?
4. What books are coming on-and-off their perches in your collections? . . . Oh, don’t say the Bible; that one lives on the desk, not the shelf!!!  . . .  Selah . . . 

Made an intentional journey through the desert yet?

Lately I’ve been reading, thinking, and chewing-over the journeys of the “desert fathers and mothers.”

Interesting stuff . . .

The desert has long been part and context of Judeo-Christian experience, encounter, and spiritual formation. It’s a place of significance in the Christian imagination, and its role within Christian spirituality complex.

• In biblical and early Christian experience it’s an actual geographical locale within which crucial experiences of encounter with God occur.

• It is also a mythical place, a place of dreams and fears that has come to occupy a central place within the religious imaginations of Christians.

As I mull over foundational desert encounters in Jewish and Christian experience such as; Moses and the burning bush, John living in the desert, Jesus and the forty days in the wilderness, Paul in Arabia, the early Christian monastics (I.e. Anthony, Gregory, Cassian, Benedict, Syncletica, et.al.,) in the deserts of Egypt and Judea, I begin to appreciate that the desert is both an actual place and a rich ambiguous metaphor.

These people did not merely wander-off into the desert, their journey was intentional; a focused encounter with God and their inner selves.

As they grew in resolution with their innermost selves, they “blossomed” in their serving and knowing the God of their encounter. Actual encounter in a desert landscape stands at the heart of one’s experience, but the religious imagination makes the desert into something that can continue to feed the soul long after the desert itself is a distant memory.

Methinks one does not escape-to-a-desert; you choose to enter into, pass and grow through desert journey experiences.

How come I’m thinking this stuff?

Well, in sixty years of my Christian pilgrimage I’ve listened to a lot of preachers mention how, “people ran of into the desert and became irrelevant to life” implying; “choosing a desert sojourn was a waste of time.” But these last few years in reading for myself the life of the “runaways” - not just listening to “abbreviated-history” through preacher rhetoric, I get a different emerging story; I find that from Moses on, significant leaders and Christ-servants bought the memory of the desert back into the marketplaces of their time.

They went to the desert in order to come back to town.   In the desert through serving God they learnt how to serve others.

Thot: To experience God in the desert I intentionally go there with Him, not looking for Him.

PS: Not every desert has sand or looks sandy . . . Selah!

Appreciation – What’s in a word?

Some time back I defined myself on the website of an “arts group” as my practiced involvement in the arts being “appreciation” ... so what did I mean? 

Appreciation is one of those multiple meaning words, to say nothing of its contextual work as noun, verb, adverb or even adjective.  It can also be a “moody” word, just depends on who it’s with at the time.   Selah!!

Entailed in my approach to art appreciation is . . .

• Appreciation: an understanding of the nature or meaning or quality or magnitude of something; "she has a good grasp of photographic practices"

• Appreciation: a description of the amount by which a painting has increased in value.

• Admiration: a favourable judgment; "a small token in admiration of your works"

• Appreciative: a feeling or expressive of gratitude; "was appreciative of his artistic efforts"; "an appreciative word"

These entailments provide one a framework to grow as art appreciators. Understanding and having a growing-grasp calls us to be learners, recognising increased value calls us to be discerners, looking for positive meaning engages us as critical admirers, and being appreciative reminds us  “for creativity to increase, encouragers will always be required”.

Saint Paul, an appreciator of art in his time; in writing to some early Christians gives some encouragement fitting/transferable to growing as an art appreciator . . .

“Summing it all up, friends, I'd say you'll do best by filling your minds and meditating on things true, noble, reputable, authentic, compelling, gracious—the best, not the worst; the beautiful, not the ugly; things to praise, not things to curse. Put into practice what you learned from me, what you heard and saw and realized. Do that, and God, who makes everything work together, will work you into his most excellent harmonies.” -- Philippians 4:8-9 (Message Bible)

Art appreciation is not just in what I see and value, it is also in what we can become through the process.

Sow - it’s so simple . . .

I’ve been reading (yet again) the parable of the sower. Jesus went over it a couple of times to get this “simple” illustrated concept through to His followers. People like you and me.

How come the difficulty getting it?

My chew this raining Monday morning reduces the story’s kernel down to two elements; 

      The POWER is IN the seed . . .

      The TASK is WITH the sower . . . 

That’s it! 

So what?

So it’s simple - sowers, sow . . . seeds grow . . . so on I go – so, Sow 

Tonight should you ask me “how my day has been?” 

. . . Hopefully I can answer, “So, sow”

Musing with Molly, Minnie, Milton, and Me

What’s in a word?

What does mean to muse?

The word-term “muse” is a 14th century word denoting meditation; through its meaning-roots are more ancient, they relate to Greek mythology and “the muses,” the nine daughters of Zeus and Mnemosyne (Memory).

These nine nymphs were said to inspire artistic and literary creativity. Legends held they would arise by night, and shrouded in mist, walk the hills and bathe in springs. Mortals of “artistic inclination” could by calling upon and receiving the blessings of the Muses function inspirationally. A poet or dancer or musician could transcend the normal bounds of their raw-talent and rise to unimagined levels of creative insight.

Back to the 14th century; so, by "musing" or deep thought the word by then described reflective and creative thought engaged by poets, artists, and others in their active searching for artistic or creative ideas and inspiration.

Now the word musing is generally used to express a mental activity or thinking process; it still implies creativity.

Musing’s, a key to creative living.

Me and Musing

Musing has been a pastime since I was a child. Sort of came with my family territory. I’m the second of two sons born five years apart. Mum and dad enjoyed a ten year age difference, mum the junior. After they were married five years, my brother “appeared.” Then; five years later, just before dad’s forty-eight birthday, my turn to enter the scene. A scene surrounded by older adult conversation, visiting and staying in auntie’s homes packed with books, pictures and wall-mottos; musing was the natural-product of such exposure.

Unlike the Greeks there’s been no nymphs dancing at midnight in my world!

Rats!!

But wait; there’s been other triggers and creative influences for motivating my musing. The adult conversation, those visits and stays in auntie’s homes; the books, pictures, a since boyhood practice of reading in the Psalms, but especially the wall mottos – let me give you these “off-the-wall” motivation-to-musing sources, and then add one to my own wall . . .

Auntie Molly Laurenson

See us together in the first picture, with Mitty the dog; when I "grizzled" to get something extra, Molly just pointed to the following motto  . . . she kept pointing until I got the point . . . 

I had no shoes,

And I complained

Until I met a man who had no feet

Auntie Minnie Mactier-Douglas

For years I read this ancient “rune of hospitality” on Auntie's dining room wall, one day I “got it”, later it would get me . . .

Often, often, often,

Goes Christ in the strangers guise,

Often, often, often

John Milton

17th century English poet whose poetry and prose reflected deep personal convictions, a passion for freedom and self determination, the urgent issues and political turbulence of his day, and embracing theology that’s relevant to life. My long-time friend Wayne Wilson gave me Milton’s words on a plaque back in 1974; lost the plaque in one of our house-moves, but still have it in me. 

God made man

Sufficient to stand

And free to fall.

Me

In musing and writing on the above I've asked myself; “how would I put this on a wall to engender rumination by the children and grandchildren of my world?” . . . here’s my musing by musing . . .

Rhyme of Rumination

If I think about my thinking do I think or have I thought?

When I muse about my musing have I mused as well I ought?

If I muse about my musing have I mused or have I nought?

When I think about my musing, have I mused or have I thought? 

Well, enough musing, back to work . . . for a while . . .