Within the Frame: The Journey of Photographic Vision

Chapter Eight. Final Thoughts

Of course, all these chapters are essentially inseparable. It’s a bit of an editorial contrivance to separate people from places or places from culture. It’s all an interconnected play in which they all work together—the characters, the settings, the plot. Our efforts to photograph them, to point to something—and all art must point to something—and say, “Look at this!” are themselves part of the play. We contribute, we touch lives, we say about this person, “He is noble,” or about this place, “It is beautiful,” or about this culture, “It is perishing and must be saved.” We are not only observing; by learning to see, to fit messages into a frame, we are participating. The best of our efforts can ripple far further ...