Disruptive Behaviour
Losing the attachment to perfection
Hartland Quay
Hello,
The print is held in such reverence that often people are either frightened of trying to make prints or get stressed about them being good enough because of the technical process that it involves.
Printing your photographs has always been the rightful end of the photography process, but what if the print could be the beginning of a new adventure?
Now don’t get me wrong I love printed photographs but sometimes they lack the unique expression that a person encounters when the make a photograph and this saddens me.
When we make or receive images from our subjects often we ask ourselves is it good enough, how do I make it perfect? But we are forgetting that neither we nor our subject is perfect in any way.
In truth we should be asking how do I make this feel like I felt, how do I make this image more authentically me?
One of the things I love most about the creative process is individual expression, I never look at art work and say to myself ‘wow, that is technically perfect!’.
When I look at other people’s work and indeed my own, I always ask what do I feel something, or did the artist feel something? Feeling is important in any creative activity because we are communicating what and how we feel about ourselves in a place at a particular moment in time.
Often in the photography world we forget to feel, the talk is of lenses, megapixels, definition, clarity, awards, sponsorships and perfection but very rarely is the talk about the actual image and what we feel or how we experienced the moment.
The world we live in is far from perfect, in fact, if like me you believe in God, when her created the world and all the creatures he said it was very good.
Genesis 1:31, "And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good".
This I find incredible and liberating, if God or whatever higher power you believe can think of something as very good why do we strive for perfection?
Perfection is poison, it is bland, expressionless, limiting creativity and and individuality.
I have never made a technically perfect image, I never intend to, but I have made images that match the feeling of the experience, these I think of a very good.
Disruptive behaviour is a new online workshop I have just launched to help creatives get away from the concept of perfectionism and work towards very good.
Over six weeks we will explore the idea that a perfect print is not the end of the process, we will not even use photographic paper to print on! I want to free you up to write, rip, paint, gild, sew and glue your images to add the dimensions that are sometimes missing from print.
The workshop will be held over zoom on a Tuesday evening at 1830 BST for one hour, each session is recorded and emailed to you so that you can follow the ideas and use them as a starting point to find the limits of your imagination.
The sessions start on April 1st - April Fool’s day - the perfect day for starting to fool around!
You can sign up here
I really hope that you will join me
Thank you for your time
Best wishes
Paul
The retreats I am offering for 2025 are as follows:
The Rainforest Retreat, Cornwall, 5th to 9th May 2025
Last Places
Join me in the temperate rainforest of Cabilla - one of the few areas of temperate rainforest left in Britain. The magical forest is filled with twisted oaks, ferns and lichen, a creative jungle, we will explore making prints and rubbings of trees as well as making hand sewn photobooks.
Erth Cornwall Mindful Photography Retreat, 27- 31st October 2025
Erth is special place sitting in the curve of a river just inside Cornwall. It is a place where time slows down and you can decompress by exploring your creativity and leave with a handmade book
Cornwall Boconnoc Mindful Photography Retreat, 3rd to 7th November 2025
The grounds of Boconnoc in south east Cornwall are a treasure trove for photographers, the house is surrounded by ancient deer park and magnificent trees, a meandering river winds through the grounds passing the saw mill all have a multitude of visual treats.
Collaborative Workshops
Together with Adrian and Clea Beasley I am running a number of creative photography and bookbinding for photographers workshops. We only have a couple of places left on these all inclusive workshops.
Margate Image and Word 18th - 21st March 2025 TWO PLACES REMAINING
The faded beauty of the English seaside, Margate is a goldmine for photographers it boast a couple of tidal swimming pools, a run down and graffiti covered lido, narrow alleys, an amusement part all for you to make a compelling set of images to bind into a hand made book.
Explore Creative Image making North Devon 2nd -5th June 2025
This is our second exploration of creative techniques for image making. Myself Adrian and Clea like to push the boundaries of our equipment and imaginations in this workshop designed to inspire you to think out of the traditional box.
Such a challenging thought Paul, about how I might view my own work, or someone else’s and ask’ how does this make me feel?’ This is something I’m in the middle of at the moment. I’ve dragged my portrait gear downstairs and have been making self portraits…but more vulnerable than I think I’ve felt in a long time. But it’s a starting point, not a destination, and I’m thinking about doing more of these