We are all voyeurs

We can't help it.  It's in the nature of perception.  

We each look out on the world from a unique point of view, 

through a filter which colors and deforms everything we see.

 The spectacle of life is so engrossing  

that we forget we are sitting in the darkened theater of the mind.  

When the lights come on we may blink,     

but are only for a brief moment dimly aware of ourselves.

Windows are a way of including in the experience 

a reminder of the voyeuristic nature of what we are doing:

 looking in from the outer darkness,  seeing without being seen.

.

Art is like fishing. 
The artist baits his hook with a piece of tempting flesh, 

 sinks the barb with a jerk of something new or disturbing,
but can only drag us from our unconscious depths 
with the steady pull of beauty.

But we want to be hooked! 
It's good when the curtains of the mind are open. 

We look into the dimly lit room

and sometimes we see inside ourselves.

So I keep repeating to myself,

It's OK to be a voyeur...
It's OK to be a voyeur...

model:  Emily
....on MM & flickr

There's a man outside

Windows (and camera lenses) separate inside from outside, feminine from masculine, warmth from cold, family from rugged individualism ..........yet allow us, tempt us, to peer into that other world, which is also our own.

Inside is warm, contained, protected but dark -- the place of often blurry emotions -- symbolically feminine, womb-like.

Outside is the world of men -- lone individuals, standing, phallic, enduring an often harsh environment, searching for clarity and meaning.   The masculine spirit is restless, always on the way somewhere, leaving the comfort of whatever he has found to house his spirit for a time.  Striking out on the next path to see where it leads.  Following his inner logic in an outer direction.

But enduring the masculine world leads to a nostalgia for the warmth and comfort of home, our lost Eden. Men go back to the window looking for what they have lost.  Hansel looks back at his dysfunctional family's cottage dropping crumbs to find his way back to his mother.  But the crows eat the crumbs and Hansel is attracted by the false glow coming from the witch's gingerbread house -- the glow of an oven he will be very warm in.

 

But sometimes when we look back in the window we find only the hollowness and alienation we felt outside in the rain and fog. 

 (note -- I'm searching for a way to use this blog to organize my concepts and images, but which is not an explanation of the images --  what I've done so far does not feel right.)

rain man

rain man
Originally uploaded by Stephen >

For the rain man, photography is a psychological journey -- looking outside to understand what's inside --