Every Photograph a Prayer
PREFACE: Go back! Turn around! NSFW! Contains dangerous references, including language linking faith, spirituality, and creativity! Anathema, foolishness and an offense to most! You’ve been warned! Just leave it alone if you are even slightly vexed by such uncomfortable notions! You’ll be better off, at least for a while.
I was talking with my photographer friend, Christophe Potworowski yesterday about the spiritual basis for creativity. What are we trying to “say” with our images? Why are we so enamored with beauty? When we go out into the field, why do we sometimes feel the presence? Of other, of mystery, even of God? Why do we feel like we are trying and just missing expression in our images of something ineffable, sublime, even holy? With all the images, sacred and profane, on the internet are we just pissing in the ocean, contributing to the cacophony? In the written word, songs, poetry, sculpture, art often expresses the numinous; can we touch the sacred in our photographs? Can we make each photograph a prayer?
A wonderful teacher and photographer, a friend, Freeman Patterson once said to me, we long to create because the Creator within has something to say. Or words to that effect. As I’ve written previously here, Freeman also did a MDiv thesis on whether photography can be used to express, Ultimate Concern, a term coined by the theologian Paul Tillich. This leads to the premise that there is a creative drive inside us, which longs for expression, for hearing if you will, and in the absence of which we are left with meaninglessness.
Likewise and surprisingly, there is actually an audience for such things: Those who wish to listen, to understand, to see, to connect, with one another, even God, perhaps more importantly, to be inspired. Senders. Receivers. Ultimate Concern. Soul things.
Soul things exist and various forms of artistic activity can be used to express them. But this is not what I want to discuss here. With some forms of art, by definition, the soul of the artist emerges because the art is made up from within: That which did not exist, now exists only because of a creative, expressive, act by the artist. But pressing a shutter button is not a creative act. The camera merely records luminosity extant at the time the shutter is pressed. Color comes from filters or chemistry, by the way 😉😇😉 For this reason, some believe photography to be a simply mechanical act. Kind of like consciousness only more interesting and less complex 😉😉🤣
In early March, Christophe and I headed south to Saguaro National Park in Tucson Arizona. After a few days shooting around town, we were departing for northern Arizona and noticed an overnight snowstorm had left a significant layer of snow in the mountain foothills. Saguaro cactus in snow! What a treat! We turned around quickly and headed back into the park.
Saguaro are protected beasts. They emanate greatness. One cannot help but notice some of their anthropomorphic features. Perhaps because of this, the ancients revered them. In the Sonoran desert of Arizona, it is illegal to disturb, move, or damage a Saguaro cactus; you can’t even remove the bones of their skeletons, magnificent baskets of wood, revealed after death or after fallen parts decay on the ground. They can reach a hundred feet high, with multiple arms, live a few hundred years, and can hold thousands of gallons of water. In twilight, especially, you can’t help the feeling they are watching you.
Parking our truck, we were delighted indeed to find snow on the ground and not too many selfie seekers about. We headed up a trail into the more remote area after kitting up, cameras in hand. The morning light was pretty decent even with the cloud covering, but spotlights of filtered light occasionally popped a surprise as we moved further upwards to where we were more or less alone. A Saguaro in snow is fairly rare, at least to me, and I was very excited with the first I was able to get close to, a lone sentinel.
Saguaro in Snow
If you’ve never visited, it’s hard to imagine the millions of graceful giants, with their young’ns and babies; they cover the mountains, a cyan-green sea. We were surrounded. By the Saguaro in addition to all kinds of cactus species, but also creosote, Palo Verde and mesquite, prickly pear, teddy bear and purple stag horn cholla, Mormon tea and broom bush, some with small flowers. And the smell of a wet desert after the rain defies words; you can’t describe it, you have to visit.
A little further on, I came to this senior citizen; the first “arms” appear at about 100 years, sometimes one, sometimes a few, successively, especially after a rainy period. I couldn’t help thinking of hands reaching skyward in prayer and supplication. What was he praying for? I wondered. Perhaps the redemption of the Creation? For Peace? Maybe, for Beauty? For us? Unanswerable questions? I just knew he was. Praying.
Saguaro Prayers
A few days earlier we had come upon a magnificent sight. Billions of Mexican Poppies covered the slopes of Picacho Peak so we stopped and grabbed our gear. The orange carpet was punctuated by thousands of Saguaro, gentle giants surrounded by poppy blossoms. Cyan-green and orange, not complementary, but God’s own color wheel. Click on image to view larger.
Back in the morning snow, we slowly wandered up the trail. It was warming and the snow was beginning to melt, permeating the ground. But the light was also changing as the overshadowing clouds were breaking up. “Spotlights” were flashing here, there, back here! We didn’t talk, just the click, click, click of shutters firing. And then it happened. An almost eerie light seemed to come in from the east side from the rising sun, filtered by overhead clouds. Yet, it was warm, peaceful. I was so excited to see this, but I knew it was a picture that not even a thousand words could express. Worried about technical details and whether I’d be able to capture it successfully, I ran through fifty frames or more, different exposures, focal points, apertures, all of which seemed reasonable at the time, but I knew this was so subtle and important I’d have to get it just right.
I was afraid to look at my images after we returned from the trip, afraid I’d be unable to develop the image to the level it required and deserved. But a few days ago, I was ready to begin. Surprisingly, as if proof of origin, I didn’t have to “touch it” extensively. Gentle color and luminosity adjustment, a filter gradient taking advantage of the hues infusing the image itself, adjusting the texture in the sky, sharpening, and I was done, hoping it will touch you as it touches me. It is one of a very few I have captured that touches the mystery, the numinous, the Creator, all we see. And I was praying as I made the photograph… and praying as I show it.
Saguaro Rarelight
So, we come to the end of this episode, but I leave you with just one more photograph that speaks to me. Arizona is famous for its sunsets, brilliant colors flashing over the desert landscape. This one is more subtle, the silhouette of a Saguaro senior, surrounded by his family, against an orange-magenta sky. To me, he is saying, “I will watch through the night.” He is, you know. Watching. I believe it. Hope you do too.
Saguaro NP Sunset