Witness in Our Time by Ken Light

Author:Ken Light
Language: ru
Format: mobi
ISBN: 9781588343062
Publisher: Smithsonian
Published: 2010-10-04T20:00:00+00:00

Things are working out without a plan. I keep following my heart—things just come together. Photography is in my blood—I love to photograph the daily life, the people I love. Especially my daughter. She’s the pride and joy of my life. Everything I do, I do for Fanny to help her understand what it means to be female, how she must stand up for her rights.

I love darkroom work. I haven’t been with an agency since I left Black Star three years ago. I am a lone wolf and do okay representing myself, except I miss Howard Chapnick [the late president of Black Star photo agency]. I am pretty stubborn. I’ll turn down an assignment because it’s not right for me.

Photographers need to think about how they can make contributions to put their ideas across clearly so they can show there’s a reason for their work. Photographers must do their own proposals, research, and budgets, meet with the editors, represent themselves, figure out ways to make their work a vital tool needed by the community, by the society.

We have to face it—the magazines are not there for us, they haven’t been for a while. American magazines fund fewer and fewer social documentary projects.

A lot of the photographers are disgruntled, but many are used to having things fall into their laps. It’s going to be a particularly difficult struggle for the single-minded photographer who wants to see things change, to make a difference.

I always tell young photographers, “Discover the world. Take pictures. Live cheaply.”

Someday, I want to write a book on love and living from the heart. To show things from my early years as a secretary and then as a wanderer. I did everything I could just to be able to take pictures. I worked on a farm; I traveled like a gypsy. I learned so much and had so much fun. Nobody owned me. I didn’t have a credit card. I lived off the kindness of strangers generous to me who gave me food to eat and a darkroom to print in.

All these years, and I still don’t have my own darkroom. But, it sure is sweet getting older. Those ten years, when I was working on my book, I was very low-key about it. I just had a lot to learn. I still do. Boy, do I ever.

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