Does Propinquity Breed Contempt?
Mar 13, 2019
Does Propinquity Breed Contempt?
As a photographer, I often feel like I take my home environment for granted. When I'm traveling, I'm automatically forced out of my comfort zone - needing to look around me with fresh eyes, because it's all new - even if it's a place that I've been before. I usually have my camera with me even just on my phone, and I'm almost always tempted to pull it out and take some images, to capture what I see around me, even when the light is bad or if there's nothing particularly compelling about the composition. I think we all feel this way, which is why there are so many bad travel photos out there - the image is meant to document the place and time for the person who took the photo, but there's nothing that resonates with another viewer.
When I'm at home, by contrast, it's easy to get sucked into the day to day routine of work, home life, chores, school pickups and the like. Because I'm seeing scenes that I see every day, I often don't have my main camera with me and it can take amazing conditions for me to take a shot if it means stopping the car by the roadside and taking it with my iPhone, or to grab the camera and hustle out to catch the light over the pond out back (as it was for the image above, taken last summer). Sometimes new equipment can act as a motivator - getting a new camera or lens can get you out exploring that familiar environment with a new perspective, but that is only temporary, and eventually, it's easy to fall back into that rut of routine. So in that respect, I think the answer is yes, propinquity (or familiarity) does breed contempt of a sort.
In my mind, I think it becomes a question of continuously looking at the world with a sense of wonder, of having the mind of a child, excited by everything going on around you. It may mean putting artificial constraints on the situation - only look to shoot an image for black and white rather than color, or use a fixed lens as compared to a zoom, or go shoot in the forest and try and pull an interesting composition out of a tangle of trees and leaves - something to stimulate the photographer's eye and develop that sense of vision while waiting for the weather to provide those dramatic images we love to take.
If we can try to focus on the small things, the intimate details that make the places that we live unique, we can take joy in the simple images that we can craft. The image to the right, taken in my backyard last winter, is a favorite: The snow was wet enough to stick to everything, yet light enough to pile up nicely and the textures of the wood and metal stood out nicely against the snow.
I, personally, don't think I do a great job of taking joy in the images all around me at home, which is why my Instagram and Facebook feeds are full of images from exotic and exciting places, but it's something I'm trying to work on. My home in Amesbury is surrounded by beautiful forests, marshes and beaches, each of which have something to offer - it's just a question of getting out there and exploring them, sometimes with camera in hand, sometimes just to explore.
What about you? Do you pay attention to what's going on around you at home in the same way you do while you're visiting another place? If you're a photographer, how do you keep your vision active when you're not doing a big trip?
Leave an answer or a question in the comments and let's discuss!