I am a collector. You might say I’m a packrat. For as long as I can remember, I have had a hard time throwing things away. Hot Wheels and baseball cards when I was a kid. Stamps and coins too. Old books and magazines. Concert tickets and shot glasses when I got older. Pots, pans and kitchen paraphernalia. Rocks and shells. Fillmore posters, record albums and bootleg tapes. T-shirts. Glass insulators. Bobbleheads. The list goes on and on and on. As I lost interest in one collection, my curiosity was piqued by another. But what to do with all that stuff?
One day I noticed I was collecting things with my camera. Trail Markers. Street Signs. Staircases, alleys and other passageways. Windows, doors and walls. Corner Stores. Graffiti and other forms of street art. Old cars. Power lines. Other photographers. And more. Some collections were transient; a record of something that caught my attention at a certain time and place. (Door knockers in Venice and manhole covers in Prague come to mind.) Others have been with me for longer than I have even been aware of them.
Once I started noticing what I notice, that caused me to notice more. Soon, I began to photograph these subjects instinctively. A quick frame or two as I walked by, a momentary distraction from whatever subject or light I told myself I was chasing that day. Individually the images may not have been all that interesting, but together they began to tell a story. About me. About the world. About the connections between people and places and things. As each of these collections grows, the connections became more apparent. The whole eventually becomes greater than the sum of its parts.
I call these collections “Snapshots” because that is what they are: Quick reactions to something that momentarily caught my attention. But unlike the shot glasses hidden in the back corner of a cabinet or the old newspapers gathering dust in the basement, these collections continue to evolve and grow. They are all works in progress.
Collecting these images has heightened my awareness of the world around me. The mere act (or is it art?) of collecting focuses my attention on my surroundings. Being alert causes me to notice things I might have otherwise passed by. And sometimes that is all it takes to spark my imagination, to lead me in a new and unexpected direction. Before I know it, I’ve started another collection. I told you I’m a packrat.
Maybe you want to be a packrat too. The next time you are out walking around, pay attention to where your mind wanders. Notice where your eyes rest. Perk up when something catches your attention, even if only for an instant. Snap a shot before you move on. You never know where it might lead.