Sky Earth Human Being


  • Photographer
    Stuart Sperling
  • Prize
    Honorable Mention
  • Date of Photograph
    2009-2012
  • Technical Info
    Durst Silver Gelatin B&W Print

1) My Shadow in Firelight on Rock Formation Beneath the Milky Way Galaxy 2) Campfire 3) Inyo Mountains Deep Swirl 4) Moon Emerging from Annular Eclipse of the Sun, May 20, 2012 5) International Space Station in the Trees

Story

Who am I? The singular me; the seven-billion we; the one-hundred-seven-billion all (we humans who have ever lived).

I know that I am fire & rock, stars and space
that I am at home among the trees, and that I am of the soil
that I am gazing at the sky
that I am inquiry and exploration, molten and glowing
fully enlivened by the sun
awakened by starfall
and most afraid during the time of dusk, not yet ready to be eaten.

I am pointed and together, wherever
and safe.
I am exploded, atop a long-dreamt-of rocket
and I am warmed and whisked
at the hearth.


Photography itself is a primordial medium, what with its core being the simple binary of light and shadow. The wonder of representationality quickly unfurls itself from that core, and photography becomes a sweet instigator, creating relationships between the seer and the seen. It becomes a method for making anything and everything intimate. It draws the outside in and the inside out. Indeed, the camera, in its very existence as a purpose-built eye, becomes a manifesto on the active nature of perception.

When I began to make pictures with the understanding that photography is always an act of self-portraiture (and of exposure), I began to open into compassion. I began to encounter my sensitivity, my wonderment, and my uniqueness (And here I mean my uniqueness both as an individual and as one among a species of beast that’s lucky enough in this shuffling universe to find itself breathing, feeling, thinking, relaxing, and even loving and finding awe.

In a sense, the photographic endeavor and the human journey are both willful explorations of dynamic range - hearty swirls of both subtlety and intensity - and I’ve lately taken on that exploration with intention. Living at a time when many have begun to question the sustainability and stature of current civilization, and challenged by the heart-filled commitment of nature-focused practical mystics such as Muir, Watkins, Adams, Minkkinen, and Turrell, I have begun to engage some of the more ancient aspects of myself as a being. What does it mean to know what I know, from my perspective here, on the side of a rock, staring up at suns? For me, self-portraiture begins at this neolithic level. It opens up from here.

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