The Language of Photography
Camera gripped in the palm of my hand, I make eye contact with a complete stranger, I lift the camera body toward my face with a smile. In that split moment, time stops. You will either be turned away, or ushered into a fleeting moment of storytelling.
The one common thread through my travels around the world is the language of photography. I’m not talking about exposure, shutter speed, lenses or memory cards, but that of communicating through your camera, a photo you take, a photo you share.
It calls to memory a wonderful moment shared with a woman I came across in Kisumu Kenya. The two days spent traveling to Kenya were filled with many unknowns…“what type environment would I be experiencing? How would people react to my wanting to photograph the visible world around me?” Questions of excitement raced through my mind. Upon arrival I was greeted with such warmth and a sense of home. I immediately knew my camera and I were off on a newfangled adventure.
The two families we shared our time with lived next door to each other. Our daily walks between the two families would cross paths with an older woman sitting outside of her small, humble abode. One day she would be doing laundry, another cooking over a small outdoor stove. Then there was the day I walked by her with my camera in hand, before I could make eye contact with her, she started talking to me in Swahili, which unfortunately I wasn’t able to understand, but then she pointed to my camera.
Though we weren’t speaking the same verbal language, it was the nonverbal communication that made a moment happen. The woman positioned herself against her front door, stood up right and smiled for the camera. I clicked the shutter a few times and then showed her the images on the back of my camera. Sharing that moment in time with her lightened my heart.
So often we shy away from being in front of the camera, but having that experience made me realize that the camera is a tool for so much more than just capturing a great image. Am I idealizing the concept a bit?…maybe. However, I choose to see opportunities such as this as an opportunity to communicate with members of the larger community around us. I love what I do.
