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How Do Cameras Come into Play?

I took this photograph of my mother taking a photograph of a movie being made in Budapest when it was still behind the Iron Curtain in 1978. Actors or extras are dressed in Nazi and Russian uniforms and standing in front of Buda Castle waiting for a scene to be shot. At the time, photographs were verboten of military installations behind the Iron Curtain. This was a movie, so we weren't concerned. We weren't concerned until some real honest to goodness military guys began chasing us. I suppose they wanted to pull the film out from the cameras or destroy the cameras. We raced all over Old Buda, hiding in alleys and in setbacks in alleys. We came home with our film AND a story. Obviously, cameras and images meant a lot to us.

• What role does the camera play, or could it play, in the creation of your art? When do you use it? How do you use it? Why do you use it? Do you recommend a specific camera?

                Sidney Oliver

Note: The answer to the question lies at the end of the post, so scroll down to the bottom of the post and look for the paragraph in bold if you don't want to wade through a couple of stories on cameras & painting.

While walking on the wall above and surrounding Dubrovnik in 1979, I took over 100 photographs in one hour. Film didn't come cheap. Laundry was in full view as I looked down in the back gardens and I remember having the sense that I couldn’t decide which I liked best, painting or photography. I get a cheap thrill every time I click that shutter. 

1979 Photograph of Dubrovnik

Those were my watercolor days and I was able to paint from some of those Dubrovnik photographs. At the time, I adhered more closely to what I was seeing in photographs than I do now. 

What a magnificent feeling it is to take a photograph as a jumping off point and then to let the organic process spew forth what the mind takes from that one stilted image. I’m not sure I could have done that back then. I was more wedded to the actual subject as people commissioned me to paint their houses and man, did that do a number on me!

I would take a photograph and meticulously follow it, especially after one unnecessary encounter. I remember that I altered the shrubbery around someone’s house, not much, but I might have made it bushier or moved some things around a little. The client was not pleased. After that, I began painting every single little bush exactly as I saw it and this was way too confining, so much so that, for years, I feared someone would say something, even in a non-commissioned piece, like, “That branch should be moved a centimeter to the right.” It took me decades to erase that garbage from my mind. And then I had the client, shortly after the aforementioned one, who jokingly asked why I hadn't improved his shrubbery. Creativity be damned as it was like plodding along in someone else's march with no room for adventure.

Painting houses is a bit like painting portraits. The owner wants the painting to look like the house, but lovelier.

I am rarely without a camera due to the size of my iPhone. I do have the big clunker camera, which is a Canon, and I’ve lugged that thing or its non-digital predecessor all over Europe. More often than not, it now sits on a shelf.

The clunker camera's strap is hung around my neck in this shot taken in front of the National Gallery in Budapest.

I’ve literally walked from village to village in Provence, the Czech Republic, Ireland, and some in England toting that monster. Several years ago, I bought a Nikon Coolpix, so I have 3 cameras which all do different things for me depending on what I want to capture. If one doesn't capture what I want, I'll grab another. The one camera I cannot do without is the iPhone as it is handy, versatile, and takes quite splendid photographs. 

• Being able to detect the problem areas of your work is more obvious due to computers, iPhones & digital images. One can sit for hours looking at a painting, knowing something is off. If one then takes a photograph of the painting-in-progress, it's much easier to spot the difficult area.

Sometimes the changes from a photograph to a painting are more subtle than others as shown in the two images directly below.

Sunset in Oxford from photograph to painting

Evening Sunset in Oxford

16X20" Oil

And then we have this extreme where the fog in my backyard became an ocean.

Almost Ashore

20X24" Oil

• One has to be willing to make that seemingly wild change and not go with the preconceived notion. Sticking to an initial decision is sometimes detrimental to the vitality of the painting. One needs to know when to trust the eye and the gut.
• Always use your own photograph. Don't use another's photographer's vision. Use your own. It's creatively dishonest to do otherwise. For whatever reason, if you absolutely have to use someone else's photograph, please credit them or don't offer your finished product for sale. Legally, you are safer if you do this.  

I suppose the real answer is that cameras are useful aids, but not to be solely relied upon. Photographed images can inspire, but they aren't paintings. Photographs are wonderful for documentation, but they are limiting. They do take the first step for you by transferring something that is 3-dimensional into something 2-dimensional, but, alas, something is always lost in that process. Use them, but don't abuse them.

Enjoy the process!

     Ruthie Windsor-Mann 

This post is part of a series of Q & As between Ruthie Windsor-Mann and Sidney Oliver. 

We invite the reader to join in with other questions in the comments section. This needs to be interactive in order to work.

All photographs are by Ruthie Windsor-Mann unless otherwise credited.

Copyright 2019 Ruthie Windsor-Mann All Rights Reserved