| My Website & Contact Details: |
|---|
| www.theunveiledeye.com
www.xanga.com/EyetoI
theunveiledeye@hotmail.com |
|
| We went to the souk yesterday, to buy Aria an Omani dress for her National Day Assembly. Only two scenes caught my eye (quick snaps taken while walking).
If you look carefully, you'll see a Dalmation-child reflected in the mirror.
A complex image. My first reaction to the pile was, "What?! Why?!" And, "This looks like my life . . . a chaos of words and images, and shoes that don't fit!"
My clients ask daily, "Why are you leaving Oman? Why don't you like it here? Why don't you just go visit your family, and come back?"
I do like Oman. There's nothing wrong with Oman.
Looking at the flag, or pictures of the Sultan, I feel a quirky sense of pride. Gratefulness for all this country has granted me. (Via Allah and His followers.)
My daughter was born here (nearly five years ago).
My photographic career was born here (three years ago).
I (as a woman/mother) have grown here, through photography, writing, painting, teaching, expressing myself within the parameters of this culture.
People say, "In Oman, you're a big fish in a small pond! Everyone knows you . . . you're established . . . easy life . . . ! How can you leave and start over?"
But a fish in a bowl, or in a small pond, doesn't have room to grow. It's a pet. It exists for someone else's pleasure.
While I-fish dream of rivers, seas. Freedom.
Last night at an engagement party, a woman introduced herself and asked me to photograph her daughters. Then she said, "Why did you cut off all your hair? The ladies are afraid you're a man! You should grow it out a little bit, to make us feel better." (I did notice quite a few women nervously covering themselves! And whispering..."Man? Woman?!")
I get a kick out of it.
That a man is something to fear. And requires hiding oneself. (And I am mistaken for one.)
I cut off my hair, because I am not anywhere near the ideal of a beautiful Arab woman. (Curvaceous, long dark hair, makeup, and bling under the abaya.)
It is the brides' job to be "beautiful". Not mine. (I'm happy to admire and photograph it.)
I cut off my hair, because the longer I'm in Oman, the more I realize I am "other." That the shoe doesn't fit.
That I cannot (don't want to) be "woman" as dictated by this culture.
But the "wrongness" (if there must be a clear right and wrong) lies not in the culture, but within me.
---
I found a children's book called, "The Empty Pot."
An emperor gives seeds to all the children of the land, telling them to come back in one year, to show him the flowers they've grown. The child with the most beautiful flowers, will become his successor. One small boy plants the seeds in a pot, but nothing happens. He tends the pot through the seasons, but nothing grows. On the festival day, the children return, all bearing pots of beautiful flowers. Except for the boy. He shamefully brings his pot before the emperor, and says, "I planted your seeds, but nothing grew. I have nothing to give you."
The emperor knelt before him, and said, "You alone have had the courage to bring me the empty truth. I gave everyone cooked seeds, impossible to grow."
And because the boy brought (carefully tended) nothing, he was chosen to be the Emperor's successor.
---
I'm not entirely sure what the parable means (for me) yet.
But "the empty truth" strikes something deep inside me, near the place of the piled shoes, and the patriotic sequins. (Symbols of woman/beauty/Oman.)
The empty nothing . . .
| | |
|
Spotlight
I'm always happy to find an image that surreptitiously says, "Omani wedding." (Without showing any female hair or skin.) It's also a self-portrait. My shadow is in the lower right corner.
---
Flipping through, "Criticizing Photographs: An Introduction to Understanding Images" by Terry Barrett, I found the following excerpt about Diane Neumaier:
---
Diane Neumaier traces the development of her thinking regarding women, particularly photographer's wives, including Eleanor (Harry Callahan's wife) as the subject matter of photographs. She recounts when as an undergraduate she discovered photography . . . She became acquainted with the work of such prominent photographers as Alfred Stieglitz and Emmet Gowin and their photographs of their wives, Georgia O'Keeffe and Edith Gowin. Neumaier was thrilled with the romanticism of these three famous couples, and she hoped to be like them and do similar work. However, as years passed, and as her consciousness grew through the experiences of being simultaneously a wife, mother, and artist, her conflicts also increased:
"I simultaneously wanted to be Harry, Alfred, or Emmet, and I wanted to be their adored captive subjects. I wanted to be Eleanor, or Edith and have my man focus on me and our child, and I wanted to be Georgia, passive beauty and active artist. Together these couples embodied all my most romantic, contradictory, and impossible dreams."
Neumaier unsuccessfully attempted to photograph her husband as these men had photographed their wives:
"To possess one's wife is to honor and revere her. To possess one's husband is impossible or castrating."
---
Hmmm... I identify with her struggle. Wanting to be the photographer and the model. The one in power/control, yet also an object of beauty.
My reaction to the last quote was, "(For anyone) to possess Anna is impossible or castrating."
I don't like the word "possess."
---
I did a quiz recently, which pegged me as an: Intellectual--Artist--Adventurer
Sounds about right.
Can one be an intellectual, without having gone to university? Without having "studied" something and earned degrees to prove it?
Can one's intellect think/speak in images? (And find it hard to communicate in words, when sleep deprived. Preferring feelings/ideas/questions.)
---
These bits from "The Journal of Joyce Carol Oates" make me want to tantrum:
For some writers, mere existence--survival--will assure them success of a kind. They are born writers, they cannot miss. For others, "success" must be forced--each story or poem or novel worked at--worried and teased into being--for they sense, quite correctly, that they have no natural destiny, they will have to create it . . . Joy certainly belongs to the former; they have merely to live their art. The later--? Joy must be forced, perhaps. I wouldn't know.
The irresistible pull of the external world. One could very easily lose oneself within it . . . "Keeping busy" is the remedy for all ills . . . It's also the means by which the creative impulse is destroyed.
The artist must find an environment, a pattern of living, that will protect his or her energies: the art must be cultivated, must be given priority.
---
This artist who must first . . . earn-a-living, and be Mommy. Or be Mommy, then earn-a-living.
Who dreams of having an intellect (insert SLEEP here), and making Art, and adventuring . . .
Who attempts to love the "Now."
The exquisite bride, carrying a bouquet of winter berries and succulents. (She's in the photo, behind the closed door on the left.)
The child beside me, dressed as a wonder-woman-pirate-pig-fairy. (Who needs my attention. Get-thee-off-the-computer-Mom!)
I do.
Love.
Life.
| | |
|
Henna Sample Design On Paper Plate
Last night at 12:30am (during a wedding) I started having strange thoughts, like: I wish I could curl up on the carpet and go to sleep... these people are addicted to being photographed... yes, I really think I should change careers...
And then through the night, I dreamt them--over and over--hundreds of images. Bride and groom and sister and cousin and aunties and grandma and fathers and friends.
I wonder if these photo-faces are etched permanently into my brain?
And if, one day, on my death-bed, when "my life flashes before my eyes..." The slideshow will be of Omani families times thousands?
| | |
|
Photos from one of my all-time best family sessions. Over 300 amazing pictures. (I usually give the client 100-200 images from a one hour session.)
I posted more on my commercial site: Eyetoi Blog
It's a three wedding week.
I dream of sleep.
But some amazing opportunities are coming my way. Here and in the States.
Aria's big sister is coming on Friday. And my Mom is coming next month!!! (Insert happy-thank-God-for-Moms dance here...)
All is well.
| | |
|
It's 11pm.
290 more photographs to edit before I go to bed.
Wedding Dress
Peacock Feather
My phone keeps ringing. More jobs. Why am I still surprised?
I'm saying "No" to all jobs after June 2010. In faith that I'll be elsewhere.
I'm starting another photography course in December or January. Please contact me if you're interested.
Only 8 months left in Oman?
Let the countdown begin.
| | |
|
Premium
