It’s been a good long while since I posted on this blog – in
the meantime, I’ve been doing some thinking and asking myself all sorts of questions
about my images and their meanings.
Questions about the subjects I write about and want to share here.
And so the rebranding: Human
Nature. It’s nature, but...as we know it – or, as how we as humans think of
it.
I’ve been fascinated for a long time with the role of
animals and natural images in the human imagination and mythology, and that is
where my photography begins.
In ancient, mythological stories, as well as in the images
depicted in paintings from prehistoric times to great masters of the second
millenium, animals often take on a magical, supernatural appearance, and it’s
this magic and super-nature that interests me.
Not because I believe in the magical or the supernatural, I don’t; instead,
it seems clear to me that people in ancient times must have had a sense of deep
connection with nature to the point where real-life encounters with animals,
plants, woodlands, etc, led to the experience of some magic moments that
triggered their imagination, generating magical stories and associations. Perhaps it’s a moment of where the light
reflects in a certain way, or a mysterious encounter in the dark.
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| Wild Goat, Isle of Mull |
It’s this kind of magical encounter with real-life nature
which triggers such stories of magic that I want to seek out for myself and
depict in my photos. All my photos show
real-life encounters with nature. I
shoot and process my photos digitally, but I don’t construct images after the
event or carry out techniques of digital manipulation. I’m concerned with finding the natural facts
behind the myths, since the facts often reveal that nature in its purest form can be experienced as fantastically and emotionally as in any myth or story of
magic.
What is this emotion, this instinct for a connection with
nature? It’s an instinct that every child has, but it isn’t childish. A primeval instinct that we undoubtedly share
in some was with our ancestors tens of thousands of years ago, but it isn’t primitive
in the crudest sense of the word.
It's nature as we have come to experience it internally.
So, for now, let’s call it ‘human nature’.
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