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Interview by Aras Ahmed Mhamad:
Soran Naqishbandy
1. Is photography an art or a job? How is photography connected to art?
Since the invention of photography in 1826 by Joseph Nicephore Niepce, all serious attempts towards photography were neither in terms of art nor a job; it was a pure chemical invention. Photography immediately became the most popular phenomenon wanted by everyone, especially after a decade from its invention. Aristocrats wanted to be captured instead of waiting sometimes hours to be painted. Although photography took several minutes to capture the subject, they still liked to try photography rather than painting.
The first photograph in history to be exposed to sunlight was for more than eight hours, which nowadays can be done in 0.5/250 seconds. This can be regarded as parallel lines or a competition between photography as an art, and painting as an art. From another perspective, we can say yes, it is also a job; every profession can be regarded as a job, if we regard jobs as an attempt by someone to gain money and do something according to professional ethics. Nowadays photographers who do journalism are also called photo-journalists: it is a respectful job around the world, because of them we can see and hear news around the world. To conclude, we can say that photography is making money in the territory of art, and then it is art as well as a job.
2. Why do you like photography and what inspires you?
Photography is an excuse to enjoy looking at the beauty of this universe whenever and wherever I am. It is my third eye; the camera allows me to convey the abstract beauty of life into objective views, to be an interpretation of what the photographer sees, artistically. But on the other hand when we do photo–journalism, we have to convey the ugly truth, which unfortunately includes terrorist attacks, and other the bloody scenes of our daily life. Then we have a humanitarian responsibility.
3. How do you know if a particular scene deserves a shot? What are some of the outstanding features of an inspiring and successful photographer?
Firstly we have to mention that a good photographer is the one who decides if a particular scene deserves to be shot or not, and a good photographer is the one who knows his camera just like his name and parts of his body, in order to be capable of using it anywhere and at anytime. Photographers should know about the fundamentals of photography which can be listed as the following:
Firstly and the most important point to be considered, is to be enthusiastic about seeing the world and its beauty.
Technically, to be a skilful user of his/her camera.
Artistically to be sensitive and sensuous about art in general and visual-art specifically.
To know about color, lighting, and all that is related to photography
4. In what ways is photography likely to make a difference in people’s lives?
To answer precisely and exactly, the best example we may think about is to mention one of the most famous and great works of photography that changed the view of the whole world towards immigration in the USA. The photograph that has become known as “Migrant Mother” is one of a series of photographs that Dorothea Lange made of Florence Owens Thompson and her children in February or March of 1936 in Nipomo, California. Lange was concluding a month’s trip photographing migratory farm labor around the state for what was then the Resettlement Administration. In 1960, Lange gave this account of the experience:
“I saw and approached the hungry and desperate mother, as if drawn by a magnet. I do not 
remember how I explained my presence or my camera to her, but I do remember she asked me no questions. I made five exposures, working closer and closer from the same direction. I did not ask her name or her history. She told me her age, that she was thirty-two. She said that they had been living on frozen vegetables from the surrounding fields, and birds that the children killed. She had just sold the tires from her car to buy food. There she sat in that lean-to tent with her children huddled around her, and seemed to know that my pictures might help her, and so she helped me. There was a sort of equality about it”*.
5. What is your definition of photography and how significant is it for the development of human communication?
My definition is not different from the one that we can find in any kind of encyclopedia or dictionary. The most acceptable and appellative one to me that can convey what photography is, would be the one that I always keep in mind: Photography, when studied as a language, is perhaps the most impactful and purest form of communication: it transcends verbal and written language, objectifies both time and space, and is at the same time both art and fact; both beauty and information. Photography is one of the most significant records that humans ever reached to communicate with others without saying a word. One of the greatest editors says: ‘one picture is worth a thousand words’.
6. People communicate faster with photos than with words. What is your opinion of that?
The dilemma of words and photos is not a new one, it may have started from the caves, when humans started to engrave or draw shapes and symbols to mean different things and aspects of their surroundings. Later we see the start of symbols being engraved or, better to say, had passed through the same phases that drawing and pictures had passed before, this time more specifically to mean letters and expressions, smaller, but more expressive when put together. This can be considered as the starting point of that struggle or battle between words and pictures. To say explicitly, photos or pictures can convey messages much better and easier than words, even illiterate people can get the idea behind what is shown, in contrast to words. Moreover, with words we have implicative meanings hidden among words or lines, while with picture or photographs the possibility of having elaborated and implicative hidden meanings is less.
The best quote to end this conversation with is the following:
“The camera is an instrument that teaches people how to see without a camera.” Dorothea Lange
*’Popular Photography’, Feb. 1960.
Soran Naqishbandy is third prize winner of the CAPA International photo competition, 2007, Canada
Aras Ahmed Mhamad is a freelance writer and translator. He is the Founder and Deputy Editor of SMART magazine, an independent English magazine that focuses on ‘Literature, Language, Society’.
