One of the few things I’m clear about is that I would like my future photographic career to have a number of strands, aside from creating photographic images. One of my main reasons for doing the MA was that it would provide possible openings into some of these potential career strands such as teaching.
I’ve always enjoyed writing, although having chosen a scientific career, there is little scope for the sort of writing I enjoy in my day to day work. Of course, writing this CRJ as we are obliged to do, hones the skill of writing for a photographic/critical theory audience and in this module I’ve taken another opportunity to write in this genre by agreeing to write two book reviews for Shutter Hub.
Book review published on Shutter Hub website last week
I’ve written for Shutter Hub in the past and it’s always an enjoyable opportunity, made only slightly less so on this occasion as their submission deadline coincided uncomfortably with that for the MA work this December. The stress is worth it though, for the opportunity to write about something I’m really interested in – I love books and I love photography – and to continue developing my written communication skills.
The review, for ‘Perception and Imaging: Photography as a Way of Seeing’ by John Suler & Richard D. Zakia is available here:
I’ve thought about how I might develop this strand of my practice further, and consider submitting work for a journal (e.g. Source) as possibly being the next step. I’m not sure I yet have the credentials to be a credible author in a photography journal but this is a forum I would hope to be able to contribute to in future.
I still see text as playing a role in my final project output also, and having planned to do a creative writing course at the time of my original project proposal I’ll be looking to do this as we move into the second year of the MA. I have a very important medical exam coming up in late February, so once that’s out of the way the creative writing course will possibly be the next thing on the agenda to do alongside the MA work.