limit

I am always thankful when asked if I can photograph a family event or a wedding. There is a look of disbelief when I say that I am not that kind of photographer and when I respectfully decline. Recently, someone asked why I would not photograph events and limit myself to film. A limit describes a value as a function as it approaches a maximum amount of something. When art has a limit it is close to reaching its specified point, it has been restrained. I have yet to reach a limit of expression or application of my creative, emotional, or imaginative boundary.

The philosopher John Searle proposed a thought experiment that challenges the notion of consciousness. A person is in a room filled with boxes Chinese symbols with a rulebook in English. The person does not know or understand Chinese. A message is passed under the door. The person forms a new message using the rulebook and corresponding Chinese characters, and passes the message back under the door. The person outside the room understands the message and forms an opinion that the person inside the room is intelligent and understands Chinese. The posits of Searle’s argument is that the person inside the room is performing symbol recognition (syntax), like a computer or artificial intelligence, without the deeper understanding or meaning (semantics). The core finding of the Chinese Room experiment is; patterns in, and within symbols, is not the same as consciousness. The duality of the experiment is the same thing in art, wether I am a film photographer or an event photographer, art, and its notion and implications, just as consciousness, is subjective.

Love Only is a street photograph where the sign is in syntax and a person has applied the word “love,” making the photograph an urgent missive. The photograph was taken on film and printed in the darkroom on silver gelatin resin coated paper. We are taught controls of left turns and right turns through symbols. The same controls can be applied to constraints…authority, power, privilege, and rights, prescribed in religious, political, & societal bounds…restrictions and limits on the size, amount, or even direction of some things that are permissible or possible. In this time of uncertainty, some people are not treating people kind or decent. People are applying their constraints, and understandings of their boundaries, to others. Kindness and decency shows a deeper understanding and meaning of this shared notion of life. Art, living, and love, are consciousness and are limitless.

all my friends got broken wings
think they will never fly again

i aint no king of crows
i just know

the sky is always falling
love is always calling

love only