Must Place Narratives Speak Coherently?
From Iris to Iceland?
In my “art or not” hybrid and increasingly “lived experience” writing about place, I’ve thought a lot—and researched—how to construct photo essays that flow by theme. Some say a coherent, subject-based essay differs from a photo story, where an individual image or a series leads the observer down an articulated path.
What if the message or sequence is personal to the photographer, the creator who could argue for a coherence no one else can see?
Perhaps the imagery is a sequence of photos taken when feeling a particular way, accompanied by the same person over time, or intended to display a continuum of hues. Perhaps only the photographer knows that despite various subjects and locations, all images were captured at the same time of day.
Or a collection could show nothing other than random images based on memories of particular places, which raises further issues. Why are the photographs so memorable?
I challenged myself to find a series of memorable photos from the last 15 years without any effort to rationalize my choice. I fought a search for order once I had chosen nine, and I arranged them.
They start and end with the letter “i.” Hence, irises to Iceland. A coincidence.
They show a progression of fertile soil and walks (ahead, behind, and across), then the sun, then a black-and-white sun, then a climate event, and then the dystopia of a frozen world. I created that idea last night, but it sounds good.
I provide the location, year, and memory in the captions and am left with two questions.
Must there be a straightforward narrative or sequence when understanding places?
What do you see?
Great photos are great. In the context of a rapidly warming world, the last photo strikes me as anti-dystopian. Your brief notes answer the most important questions of who, what, where, and when, leaving it to the viewer to speculate on why and how. I like that, and I've rarely seen a nicer or more interesting collection of images. Thanks.