Inspired – Street and Fashion Photography

In recent years I’ve focused on developing my eye for composition and increasing my knowledge of technical skills in photography, specifically fashion and street photography.

Desire

This visual interest in photography was sparked as if a preexisting flame inside of me found inspiration during my time in Paris. Living in this compact, cosmopolitan and imperial city with such a strong claim to fashion and street photography helped form my desire to first understand buildings and people then how the two constructed imagery used in French magazines, books and photos.

Discovery

I set out to discover the relationship with street photography and with the fashion that created an aesthetics to each photograph. But I am interested, too, in street photography’s evolution to blogging. From Henri Cartier-Bresson’s early work with “life reportage” to The Sartorialist’s work in modern, everyday fashion, I believe understanding the dialogue between the street-photograph and the fashion world allows us to better understand our participation and the perception of that which we create through art.

The Satorialist

My “Street Photography”

My principle subject, Vanessa, is shared through stylishlyme.com. Although we have begun to define our role in street photography, personal style, and fashion we acknowledge our own collaborative – and often complex – narrative and exploration into this genre and industry help us seek equal footing though we are pulled in radically different directions and opportunities.

Peter Lang

Conclusion

Is there then, truly, a genre called “street photography”? Street photography certainly puts us in a quandary, not only because it stands at the crossroads between tourist photos, documentary, photojournalism, high art and the new age: blogs, Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.

Besides the elements of history mentioned above the next step of our expression is the new technology and it’s intense impact on our reality and it’s opportunity to be a driving instrument in providing contact with the world. Does this quasi world of street photography, fashion, personal blogs and instantaneous imagery serve us with conflicting interests? My overall opinion is a relatively simple one. If we examine the landscape in it’s entirety we see that this world has taken steps to abandon the studio/room for the street, the canvas wall print for the web, and thus developing an environment where we all can contribute to today’s visual composition.

We are certainly used to the construction of visual understanding from the traditional sources: history, art, photographers, and magazine editors, but now we are self-authenticating, creating, and becoming that which we label the “New Vision of Composition.” Significant are the mechanisms of purely visual discovery (like: pinterest) that we may contribute to and capture the world around us.

We now control how the journey is captured and it’s with the contribution of many that this evolution will continue. From time to time it’s important to look back at this huge and overwhelming ethos and understand our place and goal in it all.

As a spectator and/or participant how do you fit into this evolution?

Thank you for reading.

-Peter