© Orville Robertson

INSIGHTS

with Orville Robertson
(Fotophile Magazine)
about his own work.

I didn’t get interested in photography until I was in my early 20s My only exposure up until then was taking family snapshots and seeing an occasional photograph at the Brooklyn Museum. Of course, there were also magazines and books. I’m still not sure what made me begin to take photographs outdoors and wander around with my camera. I remember those early days of walking around after work (I still take about 99% of my photographs in the three or four hours after leaving work at 5pm) with my cheap Alpa SLR (not a real Swiss Alpa, mind you) and color print or slide film trying to photograph everything I saw. This earliest work was really awful and totally destroyed before I took about a year off from shooting, learned about Andre Kertesz and other street photographers and bought my first rangefinder. I loaded it up with black and white film and taught myself how to see and shoot.

‘Markings’ is a really interesting project An old friend who noticed my interest in the markings that make New York City so amazing suggested it. The focus is on billboards, posters, signs and graffiti. It symbolizes the many ways in which we choose to visually communicate and express ourselves in New York City. The photographs are taken the same way I take all of my pictures: I walk around with my Leica and snap whatever interests me. I never hide the camera or try to sneak a picture. I just learned to shoot quickly and precisely. By quickly I mean setting up quickly; I shoot very slowly otherwise. Fifteen rolls in a year is a busy year for me. It’s really a lot of fun! I keep things simple and real. I try to not let pretentiousness creep in, to only shoot things I find interesting, and I have learned to walk away, even from good shots. Why? You need to keep yourself hungry and passionate. Walking away is like putting your creativity on a diet, so that when you really want to shoot something interesting you enter into a frenzy of concentration that often produces remarkable images. These are all unconscious decisions. I can never teach or be taught any of this stuff. It’s deeply personal and bonded to my sense of self.

I don’t process or print my own work any more I have no time, and no space for a good darkroom. It’s a bad habit, but I have the excellent printers at 68 Degrees to handle my film and prints. I do own a Mac and scan most of my negatives, but that’s only to archive them for recordkeeping and so I can send digital samples of my work.

© Orville Robertson

I have two M6 Leicas, one loaded with Tri-X and one loaded with T-max 3200 I use one for daytime and the other for night work. Most of the time, I use either 35mm or 28mm lenses. My favorite lenses are the Voightlander lenses. They are really great and amazingly cheap. I recently bought a Voightlander 25/f4, which is the widest lens I’ve ever used. It doesn’t couple with the rangefinder, so I’ve been trying to get used to that. I absolutely love trying good equipment for the first time because it forces me to continually freshen my approach to taking pictures. For instance, about 5 years ago I still had my first rangefinder, my Minolta CLE, but I had fallen into a rut. Then I bought my first Leica M6. It was so simple, solid, and fast that it woke me up from a malaise I had dug myself into. Similarly, when I bought a digital camera to experiment with, looking at an LCD screen made me rethink my approach to shooting with my Leicas. I became even more aware of my surroundings when I’m taking or composing a picture. I now often shoot with both eyes open to see what is not only within the frame but also what is about to enter or leave. It takes more concentration to shoot this way – and I will sometimes revert to the left-eye shooting – but it works great for me. My standard kit is just the two Leicas with a 35mm or 28mm lens, my 25mm, a spare 35 or 50mm, and now my beloved Panasonic video camera.

© Orville Robertson

I have never really sold my work successfully I haven’t had a gallery represent my work in almost 20 years. These days I sell to institutions and private collectors. This doesn’t concern me as I have a regular job as a representative for Verizon that provides me with a stable income. Photography provides me with a creative outlet rather than an income, though when I retire in about eight years that might change.

Don’t listen to advice from old farts like me Observe and imitate at first until you develop an instinct for what is a good image and what is a bad image. You have to understand which of your images is good or bad and why. The best advice is to really get to know yourself, and to be unafraid of expressing or showing yourself. That’s where your photographs will emerge from, so you might as well master yourself first.

There’s no particular direction in artistic photography, only trends Some type of work will get hot and be fed upon by the curators and gallerists, and then another trend will emerge, onward and onward. Some are interesting to watch develop, some are not. I think one key trend is the increasing commercialization of the museums. They have limited budgets and will now mostly show and collect the commercially hot artists pushed by the commercial galleries. It’s a sad trend but probably an unavoidable one. Curators these days have to be concerned with art and with finance.

My favorite trend is to follow the increased respect (but not yet exposure) given to street photography. For me it’s the most difficult form of fine art photography to master, because you’re always reacting to constant and unpredictable changes. The challenge can drive you nuts. Nuances flick across your viewfinder like bolts of lightning. On the other hand there are many valid approaches to street photography that can be captured beautifully by any sort of camera. All you need is talent for street shooting plus comfortable and reliable equipment.

I continue to have very mixed feelings about digital photography On the one hand it is very exciting to hear and read about the technological advances. I love scanning my negatives as part of my own digital experience, but I’m still devoted to the negative as my preferred medium. Negative are always accessible with just a loupe. My big bug with digital involves most modern cameras. They are way too complicated, big, loud. I love a small camera approach. I love simplicity. So it’s not so much an avoidance of digital as distaste for the typical modern camera. I do closely follow digital trends because I’m basically a technology nerd at heart. I’m very handy with my Mac and I’m competent with Photoshop and other programs.

You might as well ask me what else would I be if I weren’t human! I’m a street photographer.

The day photography becomes just a job is when I sell all of this expensive equipment and turn to some other some other creative outlet.

To view Mr Robertson’s website: http://www.newyorkstreetphotography.com
For more information on Fotophile Publications: Web: http://www.inliquid.com/index.html
(click on the Partnerships link)

Interviewed/Written by Toby Sterling.