July 01st, 2017

"The camera's real gift to me has been its constraints, particularly the rigid constraint of the frame.  From the moment I first picked up a camera, it was clear . . . that what it does best is simplify.  It excludes and isolates and helps me focus.  And in the way it flattens the world and forces me to look more carefully at lines, light and moments, it has taught me to see and pay attention to the world around me.  It has helped keep me awake to life, more aware of the significance of a fraction of a second than I would have been if the camera didn't measure time so precisely . . . It has been one of the great gifts of my life."  David duChemin

I would add (or rather, comment)  that what this means for me is that the camera helps me—for a while—to silence the constant flow of noise, distraction, busyness which constantly pounds on us, to recognize (for that "fraction of a second," at least) where and when we actually exist—in this here and this now.  It does indeed "wake me up" to what I often  don't even notice, and that helps me to realized how much richer the world really is.