Portraiture and Kwunho revisited

What is portraiture? Before taking photography seriously, I never would have used this word. And even during the time when I was photographing the male nude, I would have only said that I shoot people photography. Maybe it was simply because portraiture demanded more from the photographer and I wasn’t going to be pinned to the term. Or maybe because the nude photography that I was doing was not what I considered to be portraiture. I never categorized my work to such detail. I was shooting the male nude and I was interested in form, texture, and of how light fell onto the body and face. The face, if it was to be in the photograph, must be natural, and the expression had to come from the heart, not the head. It makes a lot of difference in the end and I can see through an image for what it is, and for what it’s not. I think now, after shooting as much as I have on the face and body, I have a better idea of what the word portraiture is about, and it has to do with a realm of photography that I find very challenging, yet exciting. It is not easy, but for some reason, I find it very natural.

Every person I photograph is different in how I approach a shoot. Some need time and a great deal of patience. And others, I just need a moment or two. Photographing the essence of a person requires trust and vulnerability. Trust because this person who holds the camera up to you might be then asking you to take off your clothes, or photograph a side of you that might you might not consider flattering, or maybe it’s because I am asking you to be yourself, and many people, haven’t a clue as to who they are. And vulnerability because there has to be something there fragile in that giving of one’s self the scrutiny of the camera, to the person on the other side, may it be me, or you, the blog viewer. Vulnerability is a desired trait in the shooting session, as only then, that we can get inside the person.