Photography & Meditation: Integrating the paths of photography and meditation
Views of 3 professional photographers in Barcelona
Focused awareness, and paying attention to everything you see, these are not just words I’ve heard on the spiritual path. These are also words from a professional photographer in Barcelona.
When you are on a spiritual path, you may try a range of tools and methods to release yourself from your limitations and feel a connection or union with everything.
Meditation and yoga allow you to transcend your limitations as you are intensely involved with your breath, your body and your energy - the mind gets out of the way. The fundamental aspect is intense involvement.
With intense involvement, no matter what we are doing, it can easily feel meditative. Meditation need not be limited to sitting with your eyes closed, it can be a very active process of focussed awareness with your eyes open.
Photography is particularly interesting in this context as the process allows the possibility to transcend ourselves while we scan our environment to capture a moment. But don’t just take my word for it, lets explore this further with 3 professional photographers.
This article has been written with fascinating contributions from:
Ben Evans, a British photographer, photography writer and photography coach based in Barcelona who works all over the world. He specialises in fine art photography across a range of photographic genres. His photography has won several awards while his writing has been published in some of the biggest photography magazines and websites in the world.
Candela Muschetto, Argentinan photographer, audiovisual filmmaker and a facilitator of creative processes based in Barcelona. She has trained with some highly accomplished photographers and filmmakers. She has worked in several countries as a camera operator and audiovisual producer, for production companies, dance companies, theatrical tours and festivals.
Mike Marchetti, Italian/Indonesian photographer and digital content creator based in Barcelona. He is most drawn towards documentary and street photography. Mike also shoots at corporate events and for commercial projects in lifestyle, portrait and product photography.
Total acceptance
On the meditation path, we learn the importance of a total sense of acceptance of everything. It is this acceptance that facilitates a free flow of life.
Q: As a photographer, to what degree do you accept what is there without wanting to change something about it?
“I believe that photography is a form of meditation, the necessary objectivity requires you to see the world more accurately than is normally needed.
I’ve decided to deliberately divide my approach to objective and subjective photography. The former preserves; the latter expresses.
I aim to create an accurate replication as possible when I’m aiming for objectivity.
For me, photography is a tool with which to experience, preserve and express truth and beauty. Since nature is objectively beautiful, it’s often enough to be straightforward in capturing and sharing it” Ben Evans
“As a photographer, I am firstly an observer and I believe that is at the heart of everything. Being in constant observation of what exists and physically moves around me, there is complete acceptance of what is there.
There is no wish to distort its reality to make it better — if I find something interesting in front me that moves me enough to make a photograph, to me that means it is already beautiful as it is.” Mike Marchetti
“My work style is documental; I don’t use filters and I almost don’t retouch my photos. My experience is focused on trying to capture the light, I think, that is what makes reality “real”. I dislike using artifices, I believe in the power of the gaze, of a frame, which reveals a unique way of seeing.
I think I am not fully aware when I have a camera in my hand, I know that there is something else operating at that moment, communication with what is being observed, with its soul. That force is something that transcends me. On more than one occasion, when I download the photos and look at them on the computer, I’m again surprised by what I see and I ask myself: who took those photographs?” Candela Muschetto
Process versus result
On the meditation path, some seekers focus on the process while others are impatiently focused on the result. In the latter, the question to ask is, how can the finish line be more important than the step you are taking right now?
The day we remain alert without being interested in getting anywhere, is when we are totally involved in the process and something starts to shift within ourselves.
Q: As a photographer how do you balance process versus result?
“For me, I’d say it’s probably 90% about the process and 10% about the result.
Photography has become my way of being and seeing things, a way of connecting with people, and with myself. It becomes a moving meditation, a process of self-discovery, of gratitude and appreciation for the things around me.
Of course — seeing good results is what motivates us to get better and improve in the art, but I find that true beauty lies in its process.” Mike Marchetti
“It is absolutely about the process. Although the result is of course what allows us to communicate with others and the image achieves its true destiny.
But the process is what allows me to connect with the unknown, with a dimension of things that only opens up in that space-time for me, through me, through my physical body, my eyes.
The process reveals the power of the instant. The instant is the essence of life. Photographing is a relationship with life.” Candela Muschetto
Reality
A mind is a reality creating tool, it filters and dissects according to its limitations. With meditation practices, we can create a distance from the mind which enables us to perceive beyond our limited personal reality.
When we keep our mind at a distance, we start exploring other realities.
Q: As a photographer, what is your experience of how the camera and its filters create a reality?
“The camera is a means, an assistant. One should not forget that behind the camera there is always a person.
I do not believe in a univocal reality.
There is always a person who communicates with what is “real”; in that communication, multiple factors influence the results, the emotional state for example; photographs of the same thing will be different depending on if the one taking them is sad or happy.
The difference might be subtle, but a camera is always at the service of a way of looking.” Candela Muschetto
“A camera is just a tool, a medium through which we are able to record what we like. In a way, filters are there to help us in making an alternate reinterpretation of a scene, giving us a direction of what particular mood or style we think comes closest to how it was first perceived.
Our cameras and eyes see differently, and that is where another, major element of beauty in the process of photography comes in for me: post-editing.
Learning how colour tones or other elements such as composition, exposure and contrast can all play a role in reinterpreting a scene, as close to how we first felt it at the time the photograph was made.
And by no means is this to change its reality, if not to give it our own touch and vision, making the work personal.” Mike Marchetti
“McLuhan said ‘the medium is the message’ and digital photography has changed everything. It’s not only democratised the process by putting an easily usable camera in the hands of billions of people. It’s also changed how we view photographs, and why.
And because image editing is ubiquitous, most people have lost faith in the idea that a camera never lies. Because people tend to prefer more saturated colours and camera, phone & app manufacturers tune their products to provide them, true and accurate colours can seem bland.
Using products like X-Rite’s colour checker to ensure accuracy suits a more objective approach. Commercial clients generally want this but not necessarily.
Certainly they expect to see models retouched and natural ‘imperfections’ airbrushed out, mainly because consumers respond more positively to this hyper-reality” Ben Evans
Who am I?
This is the most profound question that can be used as a tool to turn inward. Without knowing the fundamental of who we are, we are just living in a constant state of confusion. How can we claim to know anything at all, when “who am I” remains an unexplored question?
Whether we choose the path of photography or meditation, there are many ways to start the journey. The main challenge is, how willing are we to explore without the hunger for a conclusion?
When we commit ourselves to the process of exploring, who knows, perhaps the question “who am I” will disappear. So are you ready to find your truth?
“We are, what we see” Mike Marchetti
About the author
Many thanks to Dr Mehmet Yildiz for interviewing me as a new creative writer of ILLUMINATION
Further reading
As a new writer, I’ve been keen to explore various topics and writing styles. Have a look at some of the other articles I’ve published recently and please feel free to share your thoughts! It’s always great to learn from feedback
