"Local" Photography

Only in America could an idea like “eating locally” become a hot trend. Starting with Alice Waters at Chez Panisse many years ago and followed up more recently by Michael Pollan’s The Omnivore’s Dilemma, Barbara Kingsolver’s Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, and documentary films like King Corn, Americans are beginning to slowly recognize some of the downsides to the prepackaged processed foods that have come to dominate our diet and relearn the benefits of locally grown meat, vegetables and fruit. The rest of the world has of course known about “local” and “slow” foods all along; this is why we find cuisines from other nations so enticing and exotic - quirky flavors, unusual vegetables, and cultural traditions combining to make something altogether different from our homogenized day to day foods.

The recent worldwide economic challenges have certainly woken many people up to the choices they make and how they spend their money. A tougher “back to basics” mindset has become more pervasive across the nation in the past few years, led by an undercurrent of exhaustion with the relentless marketing and consumerism of our particular American lifestyle. The search for something more “authentic” and “genuine”, rather than a clever marketing ploy to get us to buy something, has become more urgent.

This line of thought has led me to wonder about how these broad trends could affect the world of contemporary photography (particularly in America), and the larger art world in general. I am coming around to thinking that one way out of the current challenging times for artists and galleries will be a rediscovery or redefinition of the “local” in our photography, both in content and approach, as it may lead us to art that has more personal resonance.

In terms of content, perhaps it is just my jaded eye, but the recent photography of the hyper polished, international jet set seems decreasingly relevant now just a few years later; sleek, global, industrial-scale uniformity, packaged up for the super rich, is less and less enticing or thought-provoking. We may indeed look back on the works from this era as the last of an over-inflated dying breed.

What is perhaps more surprising is the rise of more “local” photography: artists who are turning back to subjects closer to home, to themselves and their families, and to the idiosyncrasies of local communities of which they are a part. Often these ideas are now being used in juxtaposition or contrast: the local knowledge of environment, history, and culture, clashing with the larger forces of globalization, industrialization and suburbanization.

Given the power of the Internet communications tools at our disposal and the disruptive changes brought about by the digital revolution in photography, it is easy to see how the world of photography will continue to speed up. And yet, I think the most important changes will occur in the realization that websites, blogs/Twitter, and self-published and self-distributed books are making it easier for us to form “local” subcultures and tribes of like minded individuals and “followers” regardless of our geographies; just like we are reconnecting face to face with the farmers that grow our food, we are now often personally connecting with the artists and photographers who make our art.

Given the diversity in the world around us, it is altogether unexpected that broad terms like “Chinese photography” or “German photography” or “Dutch photography” have any meaning at all; and yet, high level geographic grouping still offers plenty of clues about the context and likely viewpoints of works from these locales. I believe this is a result of “local” conditions and “flavors” consistently being incorporated into the art, even when the artist now lives in New York or London or elsewhere.

The one exception to this rule is the term “American photography” which given our melting pot culture seems less and less to signify anything. But perhaps what may emerge from this “local” trend is the development of more durable artistic cultures in pockets across the country. We already know that the photography in Los Angeles is meaningfully different than that of Chicago, or Seattle, or Philadelphia or New York; what we need to encourage is the deepening of those cultural “schools”, rather than a downward spiral of homogenization across the nation. We need to more explicitly tie artists from a common geography across time, even if their styles are dissimilar; the key is that they are drawing from a similar well of local culture and experience and we should work harder to understand the meaning of those local connections.

While the ideas expressed here aren’t particularly well formed, I believe there is a nugget of something important for photography buried in this “local” trend. If you can help me connect the dots more coherently, please add your comments below.