Staszek Heyda - meaningless picture
Meaningless pictures sometimes start to mean something and their value suddenly grows.
We make them for fun, subconsciously, or ‘cause we need them for something, then we forget about them. Hills of negatives, thousands of files lies somewhere, forgotten and…waits.
Few months ago, ordering family pictures I found something that waited to be discovered.
Portrait of my mom, made at the London train station. 1977. Watching plenty of covered by dust pictures, just this sequence of pictures attracted my attention.
I showed this picture to my mom, who didn’t see this picture for at least 20 years. It appeared that the moment of taking the picture and the context is still very vivid in her memory.
She started to talk, explain, that she didn’t know how to pose, that it was just waste and that she has no idea how it happens that this picture, which supposed to be thrown away is still in family archives.
For me this image is frank and funny, and the time gave it additional value. Ordinary occupation – play in the photo box, which was capture, suddenly, today, after 30 years became an image that helps to keep in the memory the person and the time…and this is why we, perhaps, make majority of the pictures.
One more thing…for me, all of this shows how we are helpless against…photography. At the very moment of its creation, photography starts its individual life.
I am very happy this, very important picture came to my hands after 30 years.
We make them for fun, subconsciously, or ‘cause we need them for something, then we forget about them. Hills of negatives, thousands of files lies somewhere, forgotten and…waits.
Few months ago, ordering family pictures I found something that waited to be discovered.
Portrait of my mom, made at the London train station. 1977. Watching plenty of covered by dust pictures, just this sequence of pictures attracted my attention.
I showed this picture to my mom, who didn’t see this picture for at least 20 years. It appeared that the moment of taking the picture and the context is still very vivid in her memory.
She started to talk, explain, that she didn’t know how to pose, that it was just waste and that she has no idea how it happens that this picture, which supposed to be thrown away is still in family archives.
For me this image is frank and funny, and the time gave it additional value. Ordinary occupation – play in the photo box, which was capture, suddenly, today, after 30 years became an image that helps to keep in the memory the person and the time…and this is why we, perhaps, make majority of the pictures.
One more thing…for me, all of this shows how we are helpless against…photography. At the very moment of its creation, photography starts its individual life.
I am very happy this, very important picture came to my hands after 30 years.
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2 comments:
your absolutely right
and that perhaps why we go on photographing isn´t it?
the "great pictures" of today will sometimes be meaningless tomorrow
and the other way around
pictures need time
/Ulf
This post rings a reminder to all why photographs are so important. Dormant photos do bring in strong emotions that have also laid back under piles of "dust". Happy or sad, it is the little moments of our life, that make it what it is.
Thank you
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