Timeless Beauty
I will praise thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made: marvellous are thy works; and that my soul knoweth right well.
Psalm 139:14
For my first blog post, I felt it fitting to address the backbone of why I do what I do, if anyone is interested. I love art, with all its open-endedness and the turns it can take in the hands of its creator. However, I don’t feel one should be so convinced that beauty is entirely subjective, or that beauty is simply in the eye of the beholder. I really don’t think it is. This is what we’ve been told and conditioned to believe since the turn of the twentieth century, but despite the guile of these efforts, I think most of us know what is true somewhere deep inside us. We inherently know and feel what is beautiful, and consequently it’s important to me to only create and give just that - with the gift I feel I’ve been given. Sometimes I feel like a peasant offering a gift to the King; “Do you like it?” I suppose it’s an apt comparison, because anything else feels like an injustice, spitting in the face of the ultimate Creator of it all. Clearly, beauty happens to be really important to me and I get a great deal of joy out of focusing on it on a daily basis, squeezing out the smallest drops of it in the most mundane of tasks.
I truly love expressing how I see the world through a visual medium, it’s how I am best able to capture those ineffable feelings of nostalgia in a way that hopefully provokes appreciation for the things that are already right in front of us. Some use music, some use paper and paint (I have a friend, Lina, who uses these unlike anyone I’ve ever seen. I’ll link her below, enjoy.) Some work with wood and stone; wouldn’t we rather live in a world of classical, immovable architecture than to relent to the wave of modernist emptiness that has done its very best to sweep us away? Besides lacking soul, it is not sustainable. We see this in the 50 year old buildings that get demolished because in a mere five decades they are deemed a blight, worthless. The depreciation rate of the new is staggering. Meanwhile, buildings and art stand from centuries ago that still carry the same fiscal value today- inflation be damned. Men built churches so grand and so elaborate they would never live to see the finished product. Where did their commitment and fulfillment come from? “Why do you always make your bed in the morning, or reset your kitchen at night, when tomorrow your efforts will be erased?” I have been asked. “First of all,” I answer, “they will not be erased although they may no longer be visible, and second of all, you underestimate how driven I am by beauty.” I have learned we, with humility and with all our flaws, should always be reaching for the ideal form. It’s special, valuable, and an honor to even attempt to do justice to beauty. It can be expensive, yes. Beauty is not and should not be an idol; rather I see it as a measure of devotion, revealing something bigger than itself.
This in mind, photography and particularly family photography is interesting. If we look at an image as built up by pillars, there’s that transcendent and immovable pillar of what beauty is, but then there’s this other pillar which is actually far more pliant and esoteric. Other people may appreciate or enjoy the image, in fact they most certainly will, but naturally, it’s going to hold something particularly special and meaningful for those in and connected to it. And this is honestly one of my favorite parts. It’s emotional, and changes at every session; it is in essence subjective. Dynamics can differ greatly among family members, one child may have a propensity to immediately sit in the nearest puddle. People aren’t perfect or without nuance, and maybe that’s never more clear than when we are in the era of “young family” - there’s tantrums and missing teeth and mischievous grins. It’s messy and sloppy and spontaneous and fun and at the risk of sounding saccharine, I love that. There’s this place in the images I adore most where these two pillars unite to make the most perfectly imperfect and utterly beautiful, timeless photographs. Reaching for this and providing it to people just could never get old for me.
In the same vein, the concept of “Quality over quantity” is also integral to my work, although, no one has ever complained I don’t give enough photos from my sessions, that is for sure. I say this because there is an undeniable contrast between rifling through Grandma's box of polaroids, and looking at your photos on a small device screen with blue light emanating from it. Walk with me through these two experiences for a moment; deciding to pull out an old photo album, instead of disappearing into your phone, you will notice the wear on the images almost to add value, right? They feel more precious? Tales of those who touched these photographs before, the edges of the paper will curl, they will feel lived in and warm; not just damaged as printed photos of the modern day might. The coloring on the former feels natural and alive, whereas that of the latter can be almost unsettling in its digital starkness. These old photographs undoubtedly feel more special and hold so much more weight, and we have less of them. As a photographer, I aspire to give meaningful photographs that will hold this weight. My hope is that they will eventually become an experience to be had again and again. (To encourage this in fact, my clients receive galleries with a store I chose full of high quality print options. I love imagining bustling sweet-fueled holiday energy being funneled into a moment on the couch where all children laugh at old pictures and the older generations reminisce.) My desire is that the photographs I take could fill the heart, home, and album or box in a way that can only be done with hands-on tending, curating, and an authentic approach. Easier, faster, more is not often fruitful nor meaningful in the long run, and I think today many of us are starting to really see the ramifications of such a philosophy. Of course there is a place for iphone photography! I take 500 photos of my daughter a day. But honestly, I kind of wish I could help myself not to. I’m not sure how much the next generations will get out of the 500 snapshots of my sweet Holly eating breakfast, or where they will end up. In all grim likelihood, they’ll end up nowhere. It fulfills me in the moment, but doesn't serve much more purpose than that. (How archetypal.) Conversely, I do know the real art I create and print and share will live on though. As our culture becomes blander, dimmed and dulled, my goal is simply to stay the same.
I am most inspired by the natural world, that is clear throughout my work. I particularly love photographing relationships, and mothers. I love photographing newborn babies, families as they grow, and the homes we raise them in. The long legs of children with bruises from play folded underneath them as they inspect a captured butterfly. The chalk left on the pavement before being called in from rain. First steps made, a perfect handstand in the pond down the road, an evening picnic in lush green grass. A woman still holding her babe in her belly standing amongst the willows. Both silly and serious love. I want my photos to feel like bedtime with open windows in late July, I want you to hear that chorus of crickets and smell the lilacs. I want you to feel the stillness of the first fall of snow. I want nothing more than the photographs I create to feel ever so precious, capturing beauty in harmonious tandem with the imperfections in us all. Those are the magical moments that will make up your dearest memories. It won’t be perfect, but it will be beautiful, and it sure will feel like something.
Most sincerely,
Ashley
Check out Lina’s paintings here;
