Telling Stories
Sunday, March 22, 2009 by Guest Shutter Sister 
When I was in graduate school for creative writing, I took up photography.
I probably should have been working on my writing. But writing alone is never quite enough. You have to have something to write about, right?
Plus, I was feeling discouraged. I knew a lot of good writers who weren’t getting anywhere. And I certainly wasn’t getting anywhere. And I wasn’t sure that I wanted to stick with it.
I took a photography class at a local art school. We worked with film and paper. We developed photos in a darkroom. We processed our own film. I didn’t have any kids then, so I could spend as much time as I liked in the darkroom. And I wound up spending hours and hours. I’d walk in at lunchtime, and suddenly they’d be locking up the building for the night.
I liked the idea of looking at everything in my life as if it had the potential to be a photograph. I liked the idea that the photographs were already out there and all I had to do was learn to see them. It made the world more beautiful to me. It made faces, buildings, and everything in between more interesting. And it made me more interesting, too—just by approaching the world that way.
For a while, I thought about quitting writing to do photography. I carried my camera (a Lubitel twin-lens reflex) everywhere I went for about two years. It felt like I was moving away from stories and toward photographs.
Until I realized that photographs are stories, in their way.
I remember my photography teacher telling us once that the photos she liked best were ones that asked questions. And not long after that, I heard Garrison Keillor, talking about writing, say, “A plot is just raising questions in people’s minds.”
That’s when I saw how it fit together. That all the things I loved about photography were the things I loved about writing: paying attention to detail, capturing the moment, marveling at each discovery, developing a point of view. A photographer has a voice, just like any storyteller. And we are all telling stories all the time—with our own tools in our own way.
In the end, I never could manage to quit writing. But not because I ever chose writing over photography. Just because writing—in its own magical way—chose me.
Thank you to Katherine Center for sharing her words and photographs with us. Katherine is the author of Everyone is Beautifuland is an all around beautiful person!
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Congratulations to our most recent winner of the One Word Project, Simple Sparrow. Well deserved, she wins a copy of Katherine's book and a Diana camera courtesy of Ballantine Books. YAY!
Reader Comments (15)
http://esterdaphne.blogspot.com/2009/03/giocare-fare.html
then as these thoughts swirl... who is writing this? as always here on shutter sisters, i feel a kinship, like the words are coming from myself. and always mid blog post i can contain my curiousity no more and i have to see who this sister is, who is feeling like me today of all days. when i scroll down and see your name, katherine, it just fills me with hope. yes, it's you, the writer that i adore. the writer who tells me i can do it too.
so, thank you.
thank you.
http://emmatree.blogspot.com/2009/01/i-spy-story.html
as a former professional writer turned photographer, my best photography work tells a story well. while a picture truly is worth a thousand words, i've found that combining words *and* photos can culminate in a hybrid art form that makes my soul sing...or sob. i did just this with a tribute to my great grandmother and have posted it in my "personal projects" gallery on my web site. you can see it there at http://www.lifeographer.com
thank you for sharing your own story...off to view more of your work.
stephanie (lifeography)
I did a little something today hope it spoke a little more about how I feel...I'm not the best at sharing my feelings in writing...but I'm going to try because I so get this post. congrats to Toni of simple sparrow...I've been a long time fan of her and her work for many years. Loved this post. Thanks sisters!