Why Enter?

This afternoon I’ll be mounting, matting, and framing “Brooklyn Bridge, October 2023” for a show that I’ve been juried into at the Attleboro Art Museum. Why bother? As author Seth Godin puts it, “Shipping creative work… is not the same as being creative.” When creativity lives on the hard drive, only I see it. Or if I work hard on it I’ll show it to my Creative Accountability Group. But since that group is spread out around the country we still only show each other work that lives on our hard drives. Back in the olden (film) days an image existed only when printed, from the darkroom or from (the late) Ritz Camera. It’s now conceivable that I’ll go months, or even years, without producing an actual physical product, regardless of how much time I put in to make it interesting.

Self-published books and magazines are a reasonable alternative, but even then I rarely “ship.” The exception is sharing authorship with another, like my friend Norman, where we push each other to create a finished product. I also like to have students in my classes produce a final project that they can hold in their hands (street photography, portrait and still life photography), and back in my full-time teaching days students would publish their own portfolios as end-of-year projects. I hope that some still have them.

So I’ve shipped, once I drop off the matted, mounted, framed print in Attleboro. I’ve shipped, strangers will see it, and perhaps someone will purchase it. If not, my kids can take it to the dump when I’m gone!

Brooklyn Bridge, October 2023