Jeff Smudde, 1968 Corvette Stingray, St. Joseph, MI 2020
Was what my old professor said to me when I asked him for critique on a series I’ve been working on for nearly two years. I laughed a little bit, but understood where he was coming from. I told my father about this comment from my old professor and my father elaborated on why he thinks he may have said that.
Something about straight-forward photos of cars can be uninteresting. It’s not leaving any room for interpretation, if anything it’s just a keepsake for myself. My father said that the photos of cars work better when it’s a bigger scene, when the car isn’t necessarily the main object of attention. When its meticulously composed or there’s a conceptual aspect.
Now, I still love photos of cars, especially cars between the 60’s and 70’s, and if I see any generation of Corvette, I’m going to take a photograph of it. Even the current model of the Honda Civic is attractive to me (honestly, I’ve never considered buying a Civic before the new model). While I see many photographers seem to limit themselves to photographing cars made before the 80’s, there’s an aspect of contemporary understanding with current generation and recent generations of cars.
What I’ve noticed in my photographs of cars is that the images with cars made within the last 25 or so years are generally entire scenes, worked out to fit everything it its own little home, creating a narrative where those cars are just, well, vehicles of time. Cars are a major note of time in a photograph, as they are so dominant in American culture. You can tell when a car was made between 2015 and 2020, you can tell when it was made in the 90’s, but it’s a combination of objects in a scene that can pinpoint exactly when the photograph was made.
Jeff Smudde, Decatur, IL 2019
What I’ve noticed in many of my photographs of cars older than 1980 is that they’re usually center-weighted, dominant subjects screaming for attention. The thing is, they’re beautiful vehicles, and if they’re in great shape, it could even trick the viewer into thinking it was shot decades before I was even born. There’s time and places for these kinds of photographs, but more often than not, those center-weighted, dominant old car photographs serve one purpose: eye candy. And that’s not a bad thing at all, and that’s a conversation for another day.
Matthew Porter, Gold Hill, 2015 from “The Heights”
The project by Matthew Porter comes to mind: “The Heights.” A series made within roughly ten years, all photographs of muscle cars flying in the air above the road, usually back-lit by sunset or sunrise light. Usually in a metropolitan area like LA or San Fransisco (there’s a lot of palm trees and Californian style architecture). This is a series entirely made of center-weighted, dominant old cars in the frame. And it all works. Why is that? There’s an obvious answer which is that they’re flying instead of just parked on the street. And that’s entirely it. The scenery around the car provides time and place, but the exact year isn’t even of concern. We see mid-day light in some, sunset or sunrise light in others. The buildings or lack thereof tell us the kind of location this adventure is taking place in. And finally, the car, flying through the air, is more than just an object in the image, but a protagonist (or antagonist, if you will) driving (literally) the story of the image. A kind of whimsical approach to the idea of photographing old cars.
Stephen Shore, Natural Bridge, NY, July 31, 1974
Matthew Porter’s teacher, Stephen Shore, has myriad photographs of old cars, too. But here’s the thing: they weren’t old when Shore photographed them. He photographed the car he and his wife were traveling in, this green thing that is seen in few select images in Uncommon Places and Selected Works. Shore worked out compositions utilizing the contemporary vehicles of the 70’s and early 80’s when shooting for Uncommon Places. Including straight-forward images of cars parked or stopped at a light and even his own car. A particular photograph he made in Natural Bridge, NY in 1974 of a green car placed among a dense green background comes to mind. When people may have looked at the images in the 80’s after he began publishing and showing them, people often weren’t too thrilled. It was all so normal. But something was forgotten among that crowd, that it was all meticulously composed, choices were very specific in making the images, and that the normalcy of the images was also part of the entire concept of the body of work.
This is why I want to encourage others who are interested in including images with cars in their work to consider photographing current and recent cars. If a 2015 Honda Civic is in the scene, work with it. Move yourself around until it plays a role in the scene. Don’t walk up to a scene that caught your eye and the scoff at the Toyota Corolla parked by the Barber Shop with its 50’s style neon lights. There’s an interesting conversation about photographing newer cars within a scene that makes the images much more intriguing.
Photographs of old cars are nice, and can be made to be very strong images. That same professor even noted a few images with old cars that he thought worked very well, and that was because they offered more room for the viewer to play. More room for the viewer to form their own story and connection to the other images. It’s a matter of composition, light and color. When it comes to photographing old cars, go back to your other photographs, see how you can utilize those composition styles you’ve used in the past to make a story with this 1960 Chevrolet. What can you do besides a straight-up photo of the car? a headlight or tail light image? Walk around, work something out, and hell if the owner walks up to the car, maybe even ask them for a portrait with their car (even if it’s a newer one, they may be confused but they will likely humor you).
The car photos that don’t interest my old professor taught me that there’s importance in choosing how I photograph the objects that I like to photograph. Just because it’s an old car doesn’t mean I have to make an image of it straight-up, center-weighted and dominant in the frame. How can I make this scene work better for me AND the viewer? How can I tell a story with this car within a greater scene, and in comparison with the other images I may be considering showing it with? These questions don’t have to be answered while you’re shooting. The main thing to ask yourself while you’re out is how you can make the scene work. Walk around, see how objects in the the whole scene are interacting with each other, think about your frame edges and especially about the colors within the scene and you you may emphasize or mute them in editing.
There’s a lot about this subject that I know may rub some photographers the wrong way. Ultimately, it’s about a general aesthetic attraction to the design of years past, which is good and important to consider, and by all means make those straight-forward images. There’s plenty of times I’ve shot a car only because I wanted a print of it hanging in my studio, not for any series or project. Consider these things and hold a conversation about it with your friends and see where it may lead.
Ultimately, you will end up a better photographer the more you ask yourself questions. If you aren interested in photographing old cars, you are inherently photographing the past. Likely a past you did not live through (however, if you did live through the 70’s, 80’s or whatever, that’s a very different discussion. I’m more talking to younger, teenage, 20 or 30-something photographers). Making photographs of something from the past will always be something photographers of any generation will be attracted to. It’s kind-of unavoidable. There’s a keen aesthetic attraction and romanticization of the past that is dominant in photography, and is especially seen in photographs of cars. It all comes down to delivery.
A discussion for another day in-depth, delivery is a topic I’ve talked about a lot with my friends and colleagues in both visual art and music. Not only is it about how you present your work, but also the thought process, the actual work you put in, and the why behind the work. How you deliver the image is important, especially with photographs of the past in a present world.
But I do not want to discourage anyone, I want anyone who enjoys making photographs of old cars to go out and do it. I only want to encourage pushing yourself. Make images that are composed differently from images you’ve already seen. Push yourself forward, don’t find yourself trapped in this never-ending cycle of making essentially the same photograph over and over again. There’s a different between consistency and being monotonous. Matthew Porter’s “The Heights” may look like many of the same images, but there’s enough information in the scene to change the story for each individual photograph, while also not being too much information. The scene turns into the vehicle, and the vehicle turns into the subject.
These days, I think it’s more important than ever for photographers of any age and skill level to begin asking those questions while shooting. With more photographers not going to get a formal photography education, and rather going to friends, social media and youtube for their schooling (which I highly encourage for anyone just starting out with photography), they are sadly revoked of a culture of formal critique and being pushed to be a stronger artist. Yet another discussion for another day.
Ultimately, do what you wish, photograph what you want how you want. I only hope that you won’t pigeon-hole yourself into an endless cycle of making only look-alike images. Make the best work you can for yourself, and please, for all things good, get proper critique from your friends and colleagues. I wouldn’t have had this post written if I didn’t that that one comment from my old professor. Make the most of what you’re interested in, and you will see yourself grow as an artist exponentially.