Dear Friends,
I am happy to share the 8th issue of A Twenty Percent Creative with you.
**Your email client could show you a shortened version of this issue. You will want to read this issue either on the web or in the substack app.**
Best wishes for a great week ahead.
Warm regards, Jeff
Lately, I have been thinking a lot about resistance. I have firmly reached a plateau in my photography. I know that I have so many fun, challenging, rewarding steps in my creative journey to go but I am riddled with inertia, inaction, and indifference. I want to share my work with others as framed prints and see them hung in homes, businesses, and gallery spaces. I want people to pick up a book of my photography from their coffee tables and enjoy it slowly on a peaceful, quiet Saturday morning. I want to grow and sustain my photography business through sales of my work, collaborations and commissioned projects, and by teaching online and in-person workshops. I want to direct my creativity and design interests towards making other visual art products as well.
I want to try to do “this whole photography business thing” for real but resistance has been holding me back. Resistance has been guarding the door closely and making me wait patiently for the time to be right. My resistance uses a concise but effective vocabulary that has stunted my progress, disrupted my thinking, and dampened my enthusiasm for the work needed to make my photography aspirations come true.
My resistance has been telling me mixed messages like the following:
You have a fine art photography business — but you rarely try to sell anything.
You want to exhibit your work in galleries. Why have you turned down offers to do so? You say “they didn’t seem like the right place for my work.”
You are waiting to be asked - for collaborations, for access to places, for paid gigs, for new challenges. By waiting to be asked, you have, for the most part, forced others to cosign your aspirations.
You don’t print your work because if you do, you might have to try to sell it through persuasion or self-promotion.
You get taxed thinking about VAT and state tax nexus. If you don’t sell anything, you don’t have to worry about taxes.
You want to photograph and share human stories. Why are you looking up at the buildings and taking the same types of pictures you took in 2018 and 2019?
Your photo backup system is an absolute disaster. I bet you won’t be able to find all of the original files. It is probably best to wait on making a book until you fix this completely.
Your mom wants to hang a few of your photographs in her place. Why can’t you print some of your favorites and send them to her. You know she supports you in everything you do. She won’t tell you if the photographs you selected aren’t really her style.
It is clear to me now, more than ever, that my resistance is fear in disguise.
Fear of rejection.
Fear of making mistakes.
Fear of devaluing my time, effort, talent, and care.
Fear of not being good enough.
Fear of the unknown
Fear of opening a door to the unchecked pursuit of a full time creative career instead of one in dentistry. (I will try to unpack this one in a future newsletter)
Thankfully, I hold the kryptonite for my resistance - it is the fear of regret. Starting today, I am ready to face my fears directly en route to living my best, regret free creative life.
Two weeks ago, my family and I visited Arizona during the kid’s spring break week at school. Our time in Arizona was an amazing escape from cold, snow Minnesota (yes, we are still getting snow in April). We had a great time in Phoenix, Scottsdale, and during a day trip to Sedona.
On our last full day there, I had some time in the afternoon to visit the Tempe campus of Arizona State University, the home of the Sun Devils. The weather was excellent - full sun, blue skies, and 90+ degree F temperatures. The campus was an excellent light and shadow playground full of bold architecture, palm trees and other natural elements, and tons of students to complete my candid scenes. I approached my 2-hour photowalk with a patient, yet efficient plan. Usually, I will linger at locations with amazing light and shadows to see what develops. Perhaps taking several photos of the same scene in the hopes of including the most interesting human subject or silhouette. On this day, I wanted to see as much of the campus as possible so I moved on quickly after getting one good photo at each scene.
The light was fantastic everywhere I went on the campus. I explored open spaces, paths between buildings, public stairwells, and social gathering areas protected from the harsh midday sun. The juxtaposition of color with shadows was remarkable. I made about 200 photographs while on campus and a few more while walking back to my car. It was such a great time!
Below are a few photos from the day. Three of them are pretty self explanatory. The second photo entitled Fast Food deserves a bit more explanation. This photo shows motorized delivery “robots” that travel across the campus delivering food to campus buildings and students in the dormitories. I was fascinated by these robots - partly because they were fascinated with me and partly because I felt like the future of contactless delivery was happening right before my eyes. If you want to learn more about these robots, here is an article from the university’s newsroom.
The fifth photo entitled Bird | Plane was a fun one to capture as well. The campus is quite close to the Phoenix airport and apparently a prime route for outgoing flights. I saw no less than two dozen planes flying over the campus during my time there. During a future visit (“mental note”), I am going to need to make a series of photos including the planes sub-framed within the various arches, stairwells, and open air lookouts found around campus.
ANNOUNCEMENT TIME!
I am happy to share a bit of good news from this past week. On Friday, I was announced as one of the instructors for the Call Me Artist (CMA) Online Photography Retreat. CMA 2022 is going to be held online from September 23rd to 25th. I will be preparing a 50+ page course packed with photos, instructional tips, techniques, and approaches I use in the field and when post-processing my light and shadow street photographs. I have entitled my course “The 10 C’s of Light & Shadow Street Photography.” You can read the course description on my instructor page. My course will be provided as a downloadable PDF for retreat participants. I will be doing a Q&A session about my course during the retreat too. I look forward to participating in the live event as a panelist during a photo critique session and as a learner as well. Seven instructors have been announced so far. Additional instructors will be announced in May via @callmeartistretreat on Instagram and the retreat website.
Early bird pricing is available now.
Use My Promo Code to Get $10 Off Your Ticket
Promo Code: KARP10
ZIQIAN LIU
1,133 unique yet totally recognizable self portraits — wow!
I am fascinated by the amazing art of Ziqian Liu, a Shanghai-based photographer and self portrait artist. Ziqian’s work is a stunning study of light, shape, form, and visual harmony. Please do check out her work @ziqianqian on Instagram or via her website. If you are looking for a place to start, begin with the series called Light.
Do you have questions for me or topics of interest that I should cover in future issues? Please submit them via the google form linked below. Thanks everyone!!
This week, I found these resources to be interesting, informative, and/or instructive.
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I welcome feedback about the newsletter. Please email me directly at: jeff@jeffreymkarp.com
Instagram: @jeffreymkarp
Agreed with Kris, the honesty and openness you speak with of your creative journey is incredibly inspiring and encouraging. Thank you for sharing! And as always so many great things to learn and discover from your newsletter, it’s amazing 🙌🏻
Great work Jeff! It’s awesome to read a refreshingly honest take on the creative journey. Really inspiring! Cheers bud!