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‹ Photo Notes · 13 února, 2015
Have you noticed how many photographers keep complaining about the Czech scene, criticize their colleagues and the audience, know exactly how things work differently abroad, etc.? And by the way, it’s not only photography this applies to.
I’m also fairly clear about it. At least at the moment when I hear one of the following sentences, whose common denominator is a feeling of exceptionality and at the same time grievance over failure or insufficient success. And of course the need to find someone to blame.
They don’t understand me here yet!
The authors of this sentence mostly make sure it is uttered often and loudly, in written form with one or more exclamation marks. They always feel they are creating something unique, but the Czech audience is so dull and spoiled by the mainstream that creating for it is casting pearls before swine, and if it were possible, it deserved to be punished and sent for re-education. The foreign audience doesn’t know about them (if it did, they wouldn’t bother with the Czech one). Try to guess what their work is really like; I don’t want to judge, I am part of the Czech audience…
Saudek can’t shoot at all
Among photographers it is very popular to rate negatively the work of the successful, not only Jan Saudek but anyone who is doing a little or a lot well. „They live only off their name, long ago they had two or three quite decent photos, but otherwise it’s all the same“ and so on. An evaluation of this type means „I can do it better„, which would however be a rather boastful statement, so it is rather wrapped in unassailable but all the more well-founded criticism (it mostly comes from somebody who is not yet understood).
Czech models – a disaster
„They don’t reply to me at all, or they ask for outrageous money„. I hear this often and always answer the same: „either you choose badly, or your portfolio doesn’t appeal to them„. And almost every time the reaction is the same: „you’re probably right, I probably choose the wrong girls„. Only very exceptionally can the author admit that his work might be uninteresting. Yet these same models, who shoot with other photographers for free or for a reasonable fee, say „yes, the price is meant to put me off or really make up for the shoot; have you seen what he shoots?„.
It’s different abroad
It isn’t, believe me. The saying another land, another custom is true, but everything I describe here I hear from foreign colleagues too, and in principle everyone complains about the same thing in the same way.
My work doesn’t appeal to everyone either; there are models who wouldn’t shoot with me, not everyone wants to buy my photo or visit my workshop. I’m grateful for every success, but of course not everything always works out the way I’d wish or plan. That’s normal. Everyone chooses their own path and carries the corresponding risk along it. If he isn’t satisfied and wants to change things, he has to start with himself, not with others; the only culprit of his dissatisfaction is always himself. In every field…
And do you know the joke about two photographers who met and didn’t badmouth anyone? 🙂
Have a lovely weekend 🙂