5/25/2017 Interview with photographer Tytia HabingTytia Habing's photographs document the everyday, both ordinary and extraordinary, the images come across like poems, explorations of life unfolding, Raymond Carver like, in those small but significant moments that make up the tapestry and landscape of our hours. In Injured, Habing explores both the human body and nature's ability to self-repair/heal, "The human body’s capacity for healing is phenomenal," says Tytia, "each cell in our body is its own living unit, and cells are ceaselessly busying themselves healing and repairing. We don’t even need to think about it. It just happens." Habing's main subjects are the members of her own family, portraits in which nuance hold sway over glossy, happy, far too simplified versions of growing up. Through Tytia's lens, the complicated yet beautiful dimensions of environment, familial bonds, and time itself unfolds like a universal family album. AHC: Having come to photography later in life, I'm curious to know in what ways perhaps creativity was manifesting itself in your life before the lens of the camera became a pathway of realizing that creativity. Were you aware of an observant nature at work in yourself, in how you looked at the world, objects, people and your environment, long before photography entered your life? A sort of dormant documentarian? Tytia: I’ve always been artsy and crafty. I would sketch and draw, but could never produce exactly what I had in my mind, which I found extremely frustrating. I would build things with my hands. I did mosaics way back in the day, but again, I was never great at it and I was never satisfied with the results. I remember making insect sculptures out of coconuts and palm tree fronds when I lived in Cayman and I remember really liking those! Mostly though, I was dissatisfied with my artistic abilities, although I couldn’t have been all bad because my friends would ask me to do their art homework in high school, which of course I did because I loved art! I have a degree in landscape architecture and that definitely involves a lot of creativity, so I suppose my answer is, I’ve expressed creativity in my life in a multitude of ways, and I’ve always been very observant. I’m an introvert through and through and introverts are known to sit back, be quiet and just observe, and I do. It’s one of my favorite things. I believe everyone is creative. Most people say they’re not, but they are. They just don’t realize it. You can be in any sort of field and be creative. Chefs, gardeners, accountants, teachers, nurses, carpenters, therapists, anything and everything involves creativity. You don’t have to be in the arts to be creative. My brother is a farmer and he could be the most creative person I know. He can look at any problem and figure out a creative way to fix it. It blows my mind. Not sure if I answered your question. I think I went off on a tangent! AHC: Could you talk some about your overall process, themes & inspirations? Tytia: My process is extremely simple. I try and have my camera on hand as much as possible and if the light is beautiful and something catches my eye, I’ll photograph it. In a nutshell, that’s my process. As far as themes and inspirations, those too are also fairly simplistic. My family and loved ones and nature are what inspire me, and also what I photograph. Planning photo shoots, thinking about what to shoot, how to shoot, when to shoot, etc. is actually stressful to me. I like to keep it very laid back and shoot when I feel inspired. I started doing this out of the sheer love for it and I don’t see any need to complicate things. AHC: Who are some of your artistic influences? Is there anyone outside of the art & photography world whose work has impacted your own, or who just generally inspire you, writers, filmmakers, musicians etc? Tytia: When I first started photography nearly twenty years ago, I was mostly learning on my own with no formal education in it, so I never learned much about the history of photography or about noteworthy photographers. To be completely honest, I still don’t know a ton about either of those things, so I was never really all that influenced by other photographers. I see loads and loads of work that I’m smitten with on a daily basis now, but I was lucky that I was able to develop who I was as a photographer before the digital age. I was able to figure myself out without being too influenced by others. I’m definitely inspired by others outside of art and photography. I always have music playing. I always thought once you got a little older that the volume you liked to listen to music at would get lower, but apparently that hasn’t kicked in for me yet. I still love playing music as loud as I can get away with. A few of my favorite musicians and bands are Eddie Vedder/Pearl Jam, Debbie Harry/Blondie, The Head and the Heart, Prince, Beastie Boys, and pretty much any 80’s music. I could list hundreds of bands and musicians I love. I’m also a movie fanatic! I love movies. Love them! My favorite director by a long shot is Wes Anderson. He’s brilliant. I love to read too, but as of late, I feel like I’m too busy reading all the ghastly news to have any time to read an actual book. I should really change that though. I miss reading a good book. AHC: In your series Injured, you've taken up what you describe as your lifelong fascination and appreciation of our bodies' ability to repair itself, could talk some about this and how you see its extension into nature/plant life playing out? Tytia: Nature really is a wondrous thing and I think most of us take it for granted. It’s something we experience everyday so it seems mundane. If you really think about it though, the world is a magical, wondrous place. The healing of the body is just one of many, many things I find completely fascinating. The human body’s capacity for healing is phenomenal. Each cell in our body is its own living unit, and cells are ceaselessly busying themselves healing and repairing. We don’t even need to think about it. It just happens. If we’re cut, the blood vessels at the site contract and slow the bleeding, and a whole elaborate process of healing begins. Healing isn’t confined to injuries either. Damaged and destroyed cells are constantly being replaced by healthy ones all day, every day. I could go on and on about this but you probably get the picture. I wish I would’ve studied biology more in my educational past! Self healing and regeneration certainly isn’t just for animal species. Plants and nature itself self heals as well. If a tree branch is cut or wounded in some way, it will cover the injured part in wound tissue. Or if an insect burrows into a tree, a lot of times the tree will put a growth around the damaged area to contain it, so I guess plant life seals off damage more than it heals itself but it’s still completely amazing. AHC: You've described shooting in black and white as a way of removing distractions for the viewer, of distilling what you see through the lens in a much clearer way than color allows. I'm curious about this, in part because color is how we experience the world, why is the camera unable to translate it as well as our eye does through color? Is the mechanics of black and white film/photography just better suited to bringing all those elements sharply together? Have you ever shot in color? Tytia: I’m not sure a camera will ever be able to translate exactly how or what we see in as much detail or depth. All of our other senses are involved in how we see the world and experience it, and a photograph can never live up to that. If we can’t see and experience it ourselves though, the next best thing is a photograph! Some photographers do color amazingly. Aline Smithson is one. She’s an absolute master at color. The palette of colors she uses for her photographs is perfection. I don’t have a great grasp on how to get color to do what I want it to in a photograph. I think great color photography is much harder than black and white. Just as my attempts at painting and drawing fell short, so does my color work. Luckily I gravitate towards black and white anyway. That’s what I originally learned to do in the darkroom and I’m a creature of habit, so it’s stuck with me all these years. I shoot digital now and have for many years now, so I’m always converting color images to black and white. I particularly enjoy black and white because I find it much easier to lead the eye where I want it to go, with the lighting I utilize and with editing afterwards. I’m not sure if black and white is better suited than color, but black and white is my preferred medium to work in. AHC: Much of your work is documentary in nature, do you prefer to photograph things as they are, or have you also staged a few shots beforehand? Also, along these lines I wonder what your thoughts are on photographers who rely heavily on Photoshop to alter their work, do you think that something is lost by this technique? Tytia: Yes, I do prefer things as they are. With the way I work and my subject matter, staging really doesn’t work for me. That’s not to say I won’t do it in the future and I suppose a few of my images from The Gift were staged, but they were spur of the moment staged, if that makes any sense. As far as your question about Photoshop, I don’t necessarily think a photograph loses something with the use of Photoshop, it’s just a different genre of photography. There are some really fantastic photographers out there using Photoshop in beautiful ways. Two that come to mind at the moment are Carol Erb and Tami Bone. AHC: What is the first work of art/photography you encountered that took your breath away? Tytia: A couple years after I got into photography and while I was living in Cayman, I had a roommate that had gone back to Canada to visit his family. When he returned, he brought Sally Mann’s book, Immediate Family, back as a gift for me. He said some of my photos reminded him of her work and thought I might like it. I loved it! It definitely took my breath away and I still feel exactly the same about her work now. Not only that, I think she’s a fascinating person. I first got to see an original print of hers at the Sheldon Museum in Lincoln, Nebraska a couple years ago. It was Candy Cigarette, and it was gorgeous! AHC: Are there times when you become blocked creatively? What do you do to rekindle inspiration? Tytia: I definitely have peaks and valleys, but I think that’s a normal process for creatives. I think it’s less about being blocked creatively and more about being too busy doing things other than my personal photography work. I do portrait and corporate work for clients as well, and even promoting my previous personal projects is a job all its own and it leaves me little time to do what I genuinely love, which is my own art. It’s not something that worries me though. I have to pay the bills so it’s a necessary evil. I always get back around to it eventually. AHC: Do you have any upcoming exhibits or new projects you'd like to tell people about? Tytia: I have a solo show of my project Tharin coming up this fall at Workspace Gallery in Lincoln, Nebraska. As far as new projects, I’ve recently started a project on the theme of Divinity. I’m not a believer in any formal religion even though I was raised Catholic, but that’s not to say I don’t believe there’s more to us, the world, and the universe than meets the eye. Comments are closed.
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