Mixed Feelings

Galilee Chapel,
Durham Cathedral

I’ve mixed feelings about this photo.

On one hand it's a striking architectural image that fits my criterion of being 'wall-worthy' (i.e. good enough to hang on the wall, create as a Christmas card, or submit in a competition) but, on the other, it doesn't trigger all the 'right' kind of feelings – all the positive ones I'd expect from a 'wall-worthy'. And that, I fear, is a recurring problem with my ecclesiastical images.

I can create images that are 'wall-worthy' but they're not always 'heart-worthy'!

On one hand it prompts a mountain of memories of a special evening up in Durham – the only time I’ve ever taken photos in an ecclesiastical setting at sunset. And it’s also a reminder of every visit we’ve made over the decades, to every church, cathedral, abbey and monastery which has left its mark in my memory. Yes, it makes me smile just thinking about it.

But, on the other hand, I feel dissatisfied by it – though I’m not sure why; maybe it’s too austere, too formal; maybe the monochrome isn’t rich and warm enough; maybe a single image can never hope to represent the lavish tapestry of our cumulative experience. And the longer it’s felt ‘wrong’, the worse the ‘wrongness’ is getting.

Then I encountered ‘Photographic Psychology’ by John Suler, and a phrase jumped out of a section on ‘Mindfulness in Photography’:

“internal [mental] chatter … acts like smoke that clouds our vision”.

Yes – that’s it. The distracting ‘internal chatter’ inside my head is getting in the way of this image; it’s obscuring my (emotional) vision and letting the practicalities of the ‘process’ takeover.

Thinking back, the 'chatter' started weeks before we set off for Durham – my initial preparation was worthy of an expedition to find the source of The Nile!

When I heard I’d been lucky enough to get a ticket for this special photography event, I spent a lot of time and thought planning how to use the available two-hours; what would be distinctive about photographing the Cathedral in the evening (compared with the normal times we’re there); how could I best capture this distinctiveness? Then there was the ‘process’ of selecting a camera and suitable lenses before we left home; the ‘process’ of getting to Durham (there were road closures on the A1); the ‘process’ of shot-selection and camera settings whilst in the chapel.

I was a woman on a mission; internal chatter was certainly clouding my vision – and ‘mindful photography’ it wasn’t!!

It might have been possible for me to isolate these negative echoes about the actual Durham-experience and focus on the image itself, but I subsequently exacerbated them, amplified them and every other word I can find in our Thesaurus to signify that I made a difficult problem a hundred times worse. As soon as we got home, I started editing the image in the highly intense style you can see at the top of this page.

Paradoxically, I ‘lost’ myself in the ‘editing-process’ for several days (and four revisions) and I’m pleased with the outcome – but,sadly, the image now has the capacity to bring all that ‘internal chatter’ and negativity into the fore-front of my mind.

Maybe, I can offer it to Dr. Suler as an almost perfect exemplar of un-mindful photography.

Untitled
from 'Celebrations of Durham Cathedral' series

In contrast, I edited this second photograph last week, some four years after that visit to Durham (and four years after editing the earlier one). And I did it without any distracting chatter obscuring my vision – in fact my experience of reconnecting with it more closely fits Dr. Suler’s description of what mindful photography is; I was “not expecting or trying to control anything;” particularly, I was able to just “let the experience come to me.”

It felt fresh and spontaneous, relaxing and soothing.

Fun!

I don’t understand why it's different – maybe it’s simply the passage of time – but this new image is able to keep the distracting internal chatter at arm’s length. I’m still aware of the Durham-experience but it's pushed into the back-ground of my mind where it remains isolated, and means I’m not re‑engaging with it and re-enacting it (and if I tell you about it, you’d imagine it had happened to an acquaintance of mine, rather than to me). And importantly this seems to free up the fore-ground of my mind so that the resulting image has the 'mental-space' to remind me of the good times – of every visit we’ve made to Durham over the decades that has left its mark in my memory.

It’s a wonderful celebration; a bonus; a gift from the gods!

And now I understand these images better, and understand where the distracting chatter has come from, I hope I can continue to reconnect with all the positive and pleasurable memories of a very special evening in Durham, and cast all the ‘wrongness’ and dissatisfaction aside permanently.

Perhaps more importantly, I'm now fore-warned about the 'perils' of the negative distractions which can overwhelm my mind, so I should be better able to engage with the positives – the spontaneity, relaxation and fun – whenever I'm out and about with the camera.

Stay safe xx