Photo Hacks: Photographing Loneliness.

Friday, July 24, 2015

Photographing Loneliness.

“I have always photographed loneliness because that is my life” (Bob Richardson)

I read this quote and reflected over it some time.
We can define loneliness as a complex and usually unpleasant emotional response to isolation or lack of companionship.
So usually loneliness is interpreted as an unpleasant emotional state. However this opinion is not always true.

Sometimes humans need loneliness.

“A man can be himself only so long as he is alone.” (Arthur Schopenhauer)

When you are alone you could take off your mask. You could be yourself.

“To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment.” (Ralph Waldo Emerson).

To be yourself when you are alone is the first step. To remain yourself among others will be the second step.

“An artist is always alone – if he is an artist. No, what the artist needs is loneliness.” (Henry Miller)
“I am alone almost all of the time, but I am rarely lonely... it is those days where I do not paint or write or create something, that I am lonely, when I've generally been too busy with people of unlike mind and interests...” (Vicki Easingwood)

So often it is easier to create when you are alone … and not lonely - because you are with your camera/brush, piano, pen, etc.
And the joy of creation is the bright side of loneliness…

So how could we photograph loneliness? It could be a lonely figure on the road… But we could convey loneliness even without presence of a man…

Here are some examples.


A cup of loneliness. He forgot about his coffee and was sitting, staring at one point. He noticed my camera and shook his head. I obeyed. I was not a hunter, he was not my fowl. But I captured his cup full of coffee and loneliness.