Thoughts on Being There
Wednesday, April 18, 2012 at 10:03AM 
I am so inspired by the post from Kristin at Shutter Sisters today. About how important it is that we, as camera wielding women, include ourselves in the pictures of our lives. If we hold the camera, then we carry with that the responsibility to turn it around and reveal ourselves. Who we are as women. Who we are as creative beings. Who we are as mothers or daughters or sisters or wives.
In my soon-coming book, Elevate the Everyday: a Photographic Guide to Picturing Motherhood, I included a running thread throughout the chapters called Your Story. Kristin's post today reminded me of these lines in my book;
Forget the tired eyes, extra pounds, and bad hair days. All that matters is that you are using your camera to bear witness to your being there...
Have you turned your camera toward you lately? Do you have proof of being there? I encourage you to to give yourself (and your family) the gift of seeing you.
Reader Comments (9)
YOU ARE BEYOND GORGEOUS! LOVE YOU MY FRIEND!!
Yeah I enjoyed that post too. Sometimes I think about when I die, (not that that's going to be any time soon, hopefully!) my family will have a whole pile of wonderful self-portraits to share at my memorial. I know that's kind of a weird thought, but I kind of like the idea that those photos which would be there to represent my life would have been taken by ME and really reflect who I was. That's no necessarily something anyone else could capture in the same way. It's me saying "this is who I am and this is how I saw myself". I hope that in some way, that's a gift to the people I'll someday leave behind.
This is soo beautiful. I have tried extra hard with my family to be present in pictures. After my mom passed away I realized that we had barely any pictures of her and it makes me so sad to this day She always hid from the camera. I would love to have more to show my kids who their grandma was and all the fun things we did. Definitely something that I find soo important. Thank you for this post :)
I am a huge believer in this reminder. I wrote about it a few years ago over at Write.Click.Scrapbook. after a friend passed away unexpectedly: http://www.writeclickscrapbook.com/write_click_scrapbook/2009/09/a-reminder-i-just-cant-ignore.html
yes. thank you. i love this proof of you. your shorter do and shades are so you! beautiful you.
what a great reminder....you are beautiful, tracey!
Such good advice! I do try to do this but I admit to at times feeling a bit hurt that my husband doesn't think to grab my camera and snap some photos of my daughter and I. And then I'm always reminded that he's not obsessed with documenting everything in the same (or even remotely the same) way that I am. So I have to take it into my own hands. Thanks for this reminder though. I need to do it more often!
I came looking for 'calm' and I found it. I'm turning the camera around today, Tracey.
I have not practiced this regularly. I am now feeling the brunt of it. SO many pix of everyone but me. Oops. Thanks for the reminder. I am making a vow, today. Blessings. Love your blog