What is to be discovered cannot yet be found

Like all photographers I am aware of the influence of Bresson and Frank etc., (i.e. the better known masters), but for me, Baltz, Bullock, Callahan, Egglestone, Friedlander (especially), Kertesz , Metzler, Meatyard, Siskind and Shore are stronger influences. I have a greater resonance with their less conventional and innovative approaches to photography, although they still seem well grounded as far as my understanding of reality goes; that is to say there are those whose images which whilst unconventional, do nothing for me; it is not the experimental per se that interests me, rather that it requires a less conventional approach to photography to avail myself of a language through which I can both (re)discover and communicate my personal perception.

There is a dichotomy produced within me between the disparate demands of mundane awareness and artistic mood; they exist at opposite ends of the perceptual spectrum as far as I'm concerned (though why this tension should exist is another discussion). Although an imperative to resolve these polarities exists, in the attempt it may produce little but a messy reflection of itself, so it's unreliable as a motivator. Hopefully however it is persistence that provides an arterial route to creative blood. Providing it does indeed exist, perhaps it is to be mined from that snaking vein somewhere in the winding corridors of subterranean existential oppression, of whose existence there is sadly, no doubt.

I do often enjoy the wrestling within me between the the deliberate formal portrayal of concepts and the spontaneous unreasoned gut reaction. I find myself demanding 'why on earth am I taking a picture of that?' whilst another internal voice presses me on, to dispense with analysis and formality, to relegate the reasoning of form and charting of significance to a later time; not out of procrastination but to maintain this fleeting marginal state of mind as long as possible which like that place between sleep and waking, is usually beyond conscious control and harder to focus on than a star with the naked eye.

That's not to dismiss the infrequent but fortuituos happenstance, which may be in its effect as a small child that adds its puny tug to one side in this tug of war where the two sides are too evenly matched - although not normally significant, it can be just enough to tip the scales and provoke a sudden falling to one side into a less ordered awareness; a momentary hiatus to take advantage of as far as possible before the demands of mundanity reimpose themselves and 'normal service' resumes.

Occasionally peace is to be had when either of the internal protagonists prevails momentarily, or their impasse may even itself present the gateway sought; to an inspiration that is not born of puerile suppression, parental meaning or adult reconciliation. Provided that is where one's heart is set when there is a 'time out' - if the lull is sufficient a contrast to the ongoing melee, this brief interlude gives a temporary platform from which one can try to lauch off with filled sail unnoticed in the leeward direction.

Sometimes I feel I have a clarity of vision and intellect which at other times feels like it must have belonged to a different person altogether, as somedays, irrespective of the weather or light, I feel I am straining to catch a glimpse of anything at all through a dank mist, a fog that clouds any artistic direction or judgement or vision. Yet on another occasion it may find me crystal clear in purpose but blind in execution, it is here that I seek the example of those masters mentioned, and take them as mentors.

I observe a progression in my dominating influences from the intellectual to the visceral. I want to build on this. I have taken to wearing an iPod when walking with camera and of listening to such artists as Captain Beefheart, whose driving renderings, (nonsensical and cacophonous to many ears), elicit more subconcious representations in my photography and an increasingly satisfying experience and result for me, than those planned with logic and which give conceptually literal representations.

I am hunting, I know I am, but for what I am unlikely to know until I stumble upon it and with luck, recognise it. Then I will have found what I have not yet discovered.