I have always regarded still photography as a challenge in composition. It was not until I fell in love with the films of Andrei Tarkovsky that I began to take note on the even more challenging nature of a moving frame. Continuous uncut shots were described by Tarkovsky as “sculpting in time.” Composition in film becomes a constant balancing act as negative space shifts across the screen. It would be inaccurate, however, to conclude that still ../images are easier to construct than cinematic sequences. The suspended baseball in transit, caught when a light is momentarily switched on in a room, is a clue to the subtleties of all which remains unsaid: we neither know where the ball came from or which direction it is heading. The frozen moment is pregnant with possibilities.
As a reminder and inspiration, I keep on my work desk Clive Barda’s black-and-white photo in the compact disc booklet for the Archiv recording of John Eliot Gardiner conducting the Monteverdi Choir and the English Baroque Soloists’ performance of St. John Passion. The flat uninspired clothing of the musicians in the monochromatic picture must surely be the converse of the stately music of J.S. Bach unheard. One wonders how discoverers of a time capsule will respond when examining this photograph: “Really? Nondescript gangs like these guys in dull sweaters made sumptuous music in the olden days?” It is this sense of wonder in the implied that propels one to delve behind an image in anticipation of what lies within a piece of work. Hopefully some of art work on the book covers I design at work can capture a small part of such alchemy in inquiry.
