Back in the Before Times I used to take the winter holidays to go explore a new city. They're not perfectly timed -- I'm not sick to death of endless rain until the end of January but they used to coincide with lull in the work seasons and it seemed a reasonable way to break up the year. In the 2010's I seemed to have a habit of picking places and booking my travel only to have the city leveled by a hurricane two or three weeks before I arrived. Despite the tribulations, Charleston has always been incredibly welcoming. And as I type this it occurs to me that I am badly overdue for a visit.
I arrived the day after Thanksgiving and my cab driver from the airport was a friendly kid. When I mentioned that I was a photographer he promptly volunteered that he knew a wonderful model and pointed me to Meredith's Insta. By the time I got to my lodgings, a century-old scow converted to a live aboard in the river, we were meeting for lunch the next day.
M proceeded to run me ragged the next day (and did it in heels!). She had the codes to every little locked alleyway and we ran through the college campus sneaking into sun porches and gorgeous spiral stairways. Winding up at the Customs House to shoot on the stairs at sunset, I pointed at the restaurant across the street and suggested we both needed dinner. It turned out to be a fantastic choice as it was one of the best joints in town. Our waiter pointed us in the right direction and was filling our wine glasses when I asked Meredith if there was anything she might want to shoot while I was in town. Much to his credit, he didn't spill a drop when she came back with a quippy, "Well...I guess I would be happiest naked and covered with doughnuts!"
I allowed that such a thing could be made to happen.
We reconvened the next day at the boat. I was armed with a few props I had thrown into my bags and a fresh box of doughnuts along with a quart container of powdered sugar.
We started with some warmups. M had worn a stylish dress with an external corset and I was just being impressed all over again with her fashion sense. She had brought a fuzzy coat, as well, and we ran through those looks before getting to simpler things -- a scarf, a necklace, some fairy lights. Honestly, I've tended to skip the warmups and gnash my teeth over how to edit the meat of the shoot but tonight I walked through the whole thing and was absolutely impressed all over again. Meredith was just plain wonderful and I cannot say it enough.
I go through these files at least once a year and I probably send her a smile and a thank you note every time. I was still very very new in my jump into photography and had just begun working with "real" models. Meredith had a strong sense of herself and her movements and during our jaunt around the city she had me shooting toward her style, which was a wonderful new experience for me. It got me thinking about the nature of collaborative work and how we influence one another as we collide creatively. That internal dialogue has continued ever since and it's become something I ask myself every time I review files. It's helped me SEE what models are doing and it's changed the way I see the archive. It's a multi-dimensional Venn diagram of location, mood, props, attitude, me, them, the tools....lest I get big-headed at my own genius, this conversation helps keep me down to earth.
Also, Meredith is just a neat person and I immediately considered her a friend. I have a soft spot for goofballs.
As I've wandered through photography, I've come to think of it as documentary more and more. It may sound cliche but it really is a privilege to meet a stranger and 40 minutes later be rendering my own idea of some intimate persona they possess. It's not just about capturing someone being "beautiful" but looking for the little smiles as we tell a joke or have an idea. The conversation proceeds on multiple levels and there's no set path. I always try to come armed with a few different ideas but I'm quick to abandon them when we find something that really resonates.
Over time, my floor has gotten higher -- I can pull a decent photo out of almost any environment. Sometimes I think that the ceiling has remained in place, worry that I haven't gotten any better but going through the archive quickly disabuses me of that notion. The work has changed. When the pandemic took my studio away I began to work with more natural light and THAT has been a huge shift that has changed the nature of my work. At one point I was very concerned with how to keep the ME-ness of what I was doing while moving to natural light but that hasn't been an issue. I worry about seeing too much of other peoples work -- I see things that I really like but can't replicate or just that I'll start to look like everyone else. Every few years, though, I get a chance to look behind the scenes at the shot-by-shot work of other photographers and honestly it's a big ego stroke. Oh, the shots on either side of these suck. I'm not even remotely good shot-by-shot. And these might only be good because I was there, because it's a smile and an adventure with a new friend and a memory that keeps me laughing.
I tell this story a lot and keep looking for the right way to tell it because it was very formative for me. More in the alt-text. #muse #collaboration #roadtrip #travelingphotographer #serendipity #charlestonsc #adventures
