An Afternoon with Masud Olufani

I saw the work before I met the artist.

I was standing outside Masud Olufani’s studio waiting for him to let me in when something through the window caught my attention. I didn’t know yet that what I was looking at was his. I just knew I wanted to see it closer.

When he arrived, we introduced ourselves and made sure we were saying each other’s names correctly. “Stan, right?” We laughed.

I came there to make portraits. It took me almost an hour to pick up the camera.

Not because I didn’t know what I wanted to photograph. Masud was simply giving me too much to think about.

I asked about his work, what he was making, where the ideas came from and what was next. We walked through the studio as he talked about his practice, his travels, the African diaspora, food and the histories carried through things as familiar as okra and yams. The conversation moved into Atlanta, art, education and what happens when children are exposed to creative possibility early.

At some point I realized I didn’t want to interrupt the conversation just to make a photograph.

So I listened.

Eventually the camera entered the conversation too.

View the photographs →

Is Photography Collectible Art?

I’ve been thinking about this since I visited one of my homie’s studio spaces.

Is photography collectible in the same way a painting, drawing, or sculpture is?

Not just in terms of price.
But in terms of value.
Presence.
Authorship.
Memory.

A painting carries the hand of the artist.
A drawing carries the pressure, the line, the hesitation, the decision.

But fine art photography carries something too.

A point of view.
A moment that can never be returned to.
A decision to stand in one place instead of another.
A way of seeing that belongs only to the person who made the image.

Sometimes I wonder if people collect photography differently because the process feels too familiar.

Everybody has a camera now.
Everybody can make an image.

But everybody cannot see.
Everybody cannot wait.
Everybody cannot recognize a moment before it disappears.

That’s the part I keep coming back to.

Maybe photography becomes collectible when the photograph is more than documentation.

When it carries memory.
When it carries authorship.
When it feels like evidence that somebody was really paying attention.

As I think more about art collecting, fine art photography, and the value of photographs, I keep asking myself:

Do people see photography as collectible art in the same way they see paintings, drawings, or sculpture?

Or does photography still have to fight to be seen that way?