It’s funny, I opened up a blank page on my writing app to start writing this blog, and I just couldn’t start. There was a hesitation, a discomfort. But the moment I open up the “Blog” section on my website and hit the “+” sign, the words begin to flow. Does anyone else experience this?

On an entirely different note, I want to take about perspective today. Not technical perspective, if you’ve read any of my blogs so far I think it’s pretty clear that I have very little interest in talking about the technical, this place is all touchy-feely. Rather, I am fascinated by the idea of perspective as a photographer, artist, human being. I’m even more fascinated by the phenomenon of relative perspective. The idea that our perspective at any given moment is largely informed by our current circumstance. Keep in mind that I have no idea what the actual definition of “phenomenon” is… And my least favourite thing in the world is when someone puts in a blog or a speech “Webster defines _____ as…”

So, it’s either a phenomenon or a marvel or a frustrating fact of life that our perspective is wildly changeable.

Let’s go on a road trip, you and me. Maybe we’re driving for 10 hours today, trying to get to a honeypot location to take a photo I’ve wanted to take for years. You, the great friend that you are, offer to come along for company, even though you have zero interest in photographing that old fence or whatever it is that I am obsessed with photographing (I love to photograph boring stuff). It gets to be around lunch-time and you skipped breakfast and are starving. I just realized that I didn’t pack a memory card for my camera. This is our current state as we drive through one of those towns where the highway runs right through the main drag. We get to the other end of town and we’re back to driving by factories and farmland.

If someone asked you what you remember about that town you would probably say “there was a McDonalds and a Wendy’s, and a little diner that was advertising there new lunch specials.” If they asked me I might say “There was a best buy and a cell phone store and a Wal-Mart.” You saw the places where you could eat, I saw the places I figured I could get a memory card. We went through the same town, but we didn’t. Each of us went through a different town, because of our perspective at the time.

How does this impact our photography? That is probably a question you need to answer for yourself. But what I will offer is that rather than thinking about our technical perspective in regards to composition, it is worthwhile to think about what perspective we are bringing into a particular shoot. Our phyical-mental-emotional-psycho-spiritual perspective, and how that informs the photographs we take. We can zoom out and think about this from a broader perspective over our career (probably my next blog post) and we can think about it from a seasonal, monthly, weekly and daily perspective too.

Here are two images from a trip to Mexico last February. I was there to photograph a friend as he worked on launching his Mezcal brand. Our goal was to create a kind of “BTS” gallery of images showing his work in Mexico City and Oaxaca.

This was my first time in Mexico in many years and it was a trip that I was immensely excited for. There’s a lot to unpack about that trip but a really, really important caveat is that my family is indigenous to Mexico on my fathers side, and it is the part of my heritage that I have always felt the deepest connection to. So, moving through these cities, I was feeling an overwhelming sense of being home, while also being acutely aware of my status as a visitor, and deeply concerned with photographing with integrity and kindness, rather than promoting the same old narrative of these cities… you know the one.

So, that was the perspective I had when we stepped out on that first morning, and that is the perspective with which I took the photo below.

I love this photograph, because I think it shows a lot about my perspective that first morning. It feels kind of voyeuristic, kind of like I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to be there. It so fully encompasses what an early morning in CDMX feels like, while at the same time gives a strong sense of how this morning looked and felt to me. Rich colours, lots of contrast, a million things to look at and notice. It was a beautiful moment, but one that I wasn’t sure I was necessarily welcomed into, despite how instantly I felt at home.

Five days later, and a trip to Oaxaca in between, I took the photo below, about half an hour before heading back to Canada. It is arguably a worse photo. But I think it shows something very important about a shift in perspective.

I snapped the first photo quickly, from a hidden space where no one could see me. I knew I wanted to take the photo, but I didn’t know how the people around me would respond. I was nervous, concerned they would assume ill-intentions.

The second photo was taken in plain sight. I worked the scene for a few minutes, took several photos to get the composition I wanted, and had no worry about the people in the photograph seeing me. I think this comes across. Everyone is relaxed, everyone is aware of whats happening, no one is worried about the photograph being taken, including me. By this point I knew that CDMX was somewhere I was allowed to be, allowed to photograph, that my intentions were pure and my love for that part of my homeland was evident. I don’t think I would have thought to take this photograph on day one, I don’t think I would have seen it, and I don’t believe I would have felt comfortable positioning myself where I had. Now, I can pick this apart and find lots of ways to improve the photo, but the perspective I had when taking it is what compels me.

I was in a different town than I was a few days prior.

Chiokoe Utte’esia,

C