What motivated me to write Zen Camera: Creative Awakening with a Daily Practice in Photography? Sometimes it feels as if all the elements of my life have lined up, conspiring to help me realize this endeavor of writing a comprehensive book on the creative process in photography. A lifelong passion for the arts, a propensity for teaching, a long-term investigation of creativity as an artist and writer, and the resonating […]
Healing a Broken World
“We must learn to reawaken and keep ourselves awake … I know of no more encouraging fact than the unquestionable ability of man to elevate his life by a conscious endeavour. It is something to be able to paint a particular picture, or to carve a statue, and so to make a few objects beautiful; but it is far more glorious to carve and paint the very atmosphere and medium […]
On Learning Photography: The Terrors and Pleasures of Instagram
“We don’t see things as they are, we see them as we are.” — Anais Nïn I recently joined Instagram to promote my upcoming book, Zen Camera: Creative Awakening with a Daily Practice in Photography, and am struck by the incredible variety, range of quality, and diversity of content found within its digital realm. Everyone is a photographer. As I browse the platform, it is increasingly clear to me […]
Creativity and Zen
Creativity and Zen practice are deeply allied. They are both ways of life and are not just something you do. Rather, they are related to what you are—how you live your life, and on what kind of values you bestow meaning and importance. Creativity and Zen are pathways that can help make us whole and help us become more present, awake, and alive. Many artists intuitively grasp the necessity for […]
Earth Day and the Living Planet
The Social Conscience of Memory For those of us who were alive before the 70’s, we must remember. And in doing so, poignantly remind others, speak out tirelessly about our experience of the scarred earth that is forever blazed in our minds and likely still lodged in our bodies, and advocate strongly for mother earth to anyone who will listen — our elected representatives, corporate leaders, and the masses enamored […]
Zen Camera: Seeing and the Five Visual Elements of Photography
Each of us has in our possession a powerful and time-honored way of knowing about the world. Observation, direct perception in the present moment, teaches us about ourselves and others and helps us interpret the many dynamics that surround us. It shapes our response to the world and forms the basis for both knowledge and action. In one’s way of seeing lies one’s way of action. —Alfred Stieglitz, photographer Both […]
Photography for Social Change
After the election of November 8, 2016, a healthy majority of Americans feel fear and despair over the impending erosion of our constitutional liberties, the potentially shattering setbacks for our hard-won civil rights, and the likely acceleration of environmental catastrophe. Many people are asking where are we heading? What have we done? And the most important question: What can we do to avert the potential consequences of social and environmental […]
Photography in Hawai‘i: Part Two
In a previous post, I wrote about accomplished photographers from elsewhere who have created bodies of work in Hawai‘i. Now I have the privilege—and the much harder to task—to write about photographers who live and work here as part of the island’s vibrant photographic community. I must disclose that I am one of those photographers and many of the others are old friends and colleagues. What I have to say […]