Alec Soth:

Photographic Storytelling

Approaching Photography
Contents What Feels Right

Language & Limitations

4

An Emotional Approach 6

Mirrors & Windows 10

Equipment 12

Alec Soth: Photographic Storytelling – Approaching Photography 2

 “Photography, is so stupid. It’s so obvious…
Everyone can do it, and yet certain moments
have this magic. And that’s what you’re always
looking for. I make the analogy with popular
music. In some ways, it’s so easy to write a pop
song, but why do certain ones do that thing that
touches a nerve and makes them a hit? It’s such
a subtle little mix of elements. It drives me crazy
because I’ll often go out and think it’s super
easy—you can just point the camera anywhere
and make a picture—and it just doesn’t capture
it at all. To this day, it’s really mysterious to me.”
— Alec Soth
in a 2015 interview with Mick Brown of The Telegraph

Alec Soth: Photographic Storytelling – Approaching Photography 3

What Feels Right A core question for all photographers is “what kind of photographer
am I?” For Soth, his mission isn’t to necessarily change the world;
his is a personal, creative endeavour and his primary goal is to fulfill
his artistic vision. However you are approaching photography, the key
is that it feels right and authentic to you.

“Try everything. Photojournalism, fashion, portraiture, nudes,

whatever. You won’t know what kind of photographer you are until
you try it. During one summer vacation—in college—I worked for
a born-again, tabletop photographer. All day long we’d photograph
socks and listen to Christian radio. That summer I learned I was
neither a studio photographer nor a born-again Christian. Another
year I worked for a small suburban newspaper chain and was
surprised to learn that I enjoyed assignment photography. Fun is
important. You should like the process and the subject. If you are
bored or unhappy with your subject it will show up in the pictures.
If in your heart of hearts you want to take pictures of kitties, take
pictures of kitties.”

— Alec Soth
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Alec Soth: Photographic Storytelling – Approaching Photography 4

Language “Photography is a language… It’s important to understand that language.”

Photography is an ever-evolving visual language; a powerful tool to

& Limitations communicate ideas. However, the medium has many limitations and
it can be seen as reductive, fixing the world into a single frame, lacking
in context. What good photography can do, as referenced in this course
and by Soth below, is suggest stories.

“Photographs aren’t good at telling stories. Stories require a beginning,

middle and end. They require the progression of time. Photographs stop
time. They are frozen. Mute. As viewers of the picture, we have no idea
what those people on the waterfront are talking about.

So what are photographs good at? While they can’t tell stories, they are
Reading List John Berger, Ways of Seeing
brilliant at suggesting stories. Photographs are successful in advertising
John Berger, Understanding the Photograph
Roland Barthes, Camera Lucida
because they help suggest that if we buy X we will have the perfect
Susan Sontag, On Photography lifestyle. And photographs are successful as propaganda because they
David Bate, Photography: Key Concepts can function as proof for whatever agenda someone wants to suggest.”1
David Bate, Art Photography
David Campany, Art and Photography (Themes & Movements) Alec advises that you ‘dig in’ to the history of photography and the
Liz Wells, Photography: A Critical Introduction
background of artists to gain a fuller appreciation of the medium.
Walter Benjamin, On Photography
Ian Jeffery, Photography: A Concise History
Much has been written on photography and the language of images.
Graham Clarke, The Photograph: A Visual and Cultural History To the left is a reading list that may help build a foundational
Henri Cartier-Bresson, The Mind’s Eye: Writings on Photography understanding of the medium.
and Photographers
Marvin Heiferman, Photography Changes Everything
Stephen Shore, The Nature of Photographs: A Primer
Charlotte Cotton, Contemporary Photography Now
¹ Alec Soth’s Archived Blog. 2019. 1/500th of a second.

Alec Soth: Photographic Storytelling – Approaching Photography 5

An Emotional “I don’t have the keys to photography. Everyone has to find
their own path.”

Approach For Soth, his personal projects are driven from an “internal need”
and often reflect his desires and mindset at a given time in his life.
Sleeping by the Mississippi is the result of a longing for freedom
and adventure, NIAGARA is an exploration of love and long-term
relationships and Broken Manual is a meditation on the approach of
middle age and the accompanying desires for escapism.

Alec Soth: Photographic Storytelling – Approaching Photography 6

 Helena. Arkansas, USA. 2002.
From the series Sleeping by
the Mississippi.

Alec Soth: Photographic Storytelling – Approaching Photography 7

Joy’s divorce party. USA. 2004.
From the series NIAGARA.

Alec Soth: Photographic Storytelling – Approaching Photography 8

 USA. 2008. From the series
Broken Manual.

Alec Soth: Photographic Storytelling – Approaching Photography 9

Mirrors In 1978, the landmark exhibition Mirrors and Windows: American
Photography since 1960 was presented at MoMA. Curator John Szarkowski
focused on the previous twenty years of American photography, which
& Windows he felt had shifted from “public to private concerns”. In this exhibition,
Szarkowski categorized photographers into two groups: mirrors and
windows. Szarkowski posited the thesis that mirrors were photographers
whose work reflected the author’s sensibilities, projecting themselves into
the work, while windows presented the exterior world at large, “in all its
presence and reality.”2

“...in terms of their conceptions of what a photograph is: is it a mirror,

reflecting a portrait of the artist who made it, or a window, through
which one might better know the world?”3
— John Szarkowski

Soth sees himself as sitting somewhere between these two camps:

a mirror photographer, out in the world, where his internal self—
emotions and mindset—are reflected in his photographs of people,
places and things.
Resource Mirrors and windows: American photography since 1960
– Exhibition Catalogue [PDF] “...my belief is that a window is also often a mirror in that it’s semi-
transparent, it has a reflection. In a reflection you see yourself, and so
there is a spectrum between a mirror and a window. And so reflection
2
The Museum of Modern Art, 1978, Mirrors and Windows: American Photography in photography very often has that quality where you are looking out
since 1960 – Press Release.
but you’re also looking in.”4
3
 zarkowski, J., 1978. Mirrors And Windows: American Photography Since 1960.
S
The Museum Of Modern Art. — Alec Soth
4
 indow Research Institute. 2019. Thinking about Windows through Photography |
W
Interviews | madoken.jp/en/interviews/849/

Alec Soth: Photographic Storytelling – Approaching Photography 10

 Véronique’s View. Toulouse.
France 2018. From the series
I Know How Furiously Your
Heart Is Beating.

Alec Soth: Photographic Storytelling – Approaching Photography 11

Equipment “There is no law that says you have to be one photographer, with
one camera. This is something I have tried to resist in my career.”

Though he is best-known for his large-format photography,

Soth employs a wide variety of approaches in his work. He opts for
the technical approach that will deliver the right aesthetic result,
whether that is the 8x10 large-format camera or digital with flash.
Throughout this course you will see Soth using these different
approaches across a variety of scenarios. One key lesson is to not allow
equipment—or lack of it—to hold you back from being productive.

Slowing Down
Take inspiration from Soth’s Dog Days, Bogota and take a slower
approach by introducing some of the components that come with
using a large-format camera, such as using a tripod, into your
photographic practice. If you are using a digital camera, try using using
the ‘live-view’ function while on the tripod to mimic the ground glass
of the large-format view camera.

Resource Alec Soth: Portraits – The Ground Glass (2007)

Alec Soth: Photographic Storytelling – Approaching Photography 12

Jay J and the Spiritual Boys.
Rochester, New York. USA. 2012.
From the series Songbook. Soth
used a digital camera with flash
during this project.

Alec Soth: Photographic Storytelling – Approaching Photography 13

Patrick, Palm Sunday. Baton
Rouge, Louisiana. USA. 2002.
From the series Sleeping by
the Mississippi. Soth used
an 8x10 large-format camera
during this project.

Alec Soth: Photographic Storytelling – Approaching Photography 14

Bogota. Colombia. 2003. Dog Days, Bogota (2003)
From the series Dog Days,
Bogota. “My wife and I adopted our baby
girl, Carmen Laura, from Bogota,
Colombia. While the courts
processed her paperwork, we spent
two months in Bogota waiting to
take Carmen home. Carmen’s birth
mother gave her a book filled with
letters, pictures and poems. ‘I hope
that the hardness of the world will
not hurt your sensitivity,’ she wrote,
‘When I think about you I hope
that your life is full of beautiful
things.’ With those words as a
mission statement, I began making
my own book for Carmen. In
photographing the city of her birth,
I hope I’ve described some of the
beauty in this hard place.”

Alec Soth: Photographic Storytelling – Approaching Photography 15

Bogota. Colombia. 2003.
From the series Dog Days,
Bogata.

Alec Soth: Photographic Storytelling – Approaching Photography 16

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