Book Review : The Tao of Photography

Back to the bookshelf.

The last book was a wee bit too technical for my preferences. Useful, certainly, but not what I was after. As interesting as it was to see how different lenses using different focal lengths could be used to different effect, I wanted something more artistically inclined.

Which leads us to The Tao of Photography, which practically invites you to leave your f-stop at the door.

The Tao of Photography

The cover leaped out at me as I was browsing the shelves. A stark, high contrast image, other-worldly image that really grabbed my eye. The sort of picture I’d like to shoot more of, really.

Tao, though? Seriously? I was intrigued, but in a marketplace that is glutted with books that attempt to tie “Tao” into everything from chess to Elvis to Star Wars, I was more than a little skeptical. I didn’t want a book of mangled fortue cookie aphorisms used to justify or explain the intangible. Fortunately, that wasn’t the case.

Chapters of the book may begin with quotes from the Chuang-tzu or a description of a central tenet of Taoist philosophy but shortly thereafter, the authors bring the discussion around to photography, often with another quote or a story about Cartier-Bresson. Looking back on the book, it actually makes a lot of sense to tie in concepts such as wu wei (variably “inaction” or “knowing when to act” or a thousand and one other things) with the act of taking a picture (simply being open to the possibilities). The earlier chapters explain these concepts and build to more and more real world discussions without ever letting go of the philosophy entirely.

Ultimately the book’s goal is the concept of “conscious camerawork”, the application of mindfulness to photography and being aware of the possibilities without getting lost in the maelstrom of daily life. In a way the conclusion is a bit of a letdown but only because it’s not possible to teach that in the form of a lesson plan. There are no ten steps to better photography, just a certain willingness to try something different.

To pull a quote from the book by Ernst Haas: “I am not interested in shooting new things — I am interested to see things new.”

That’s it in a nutshell.

Then there are the photographs, page after page of black and whites, favoring the author (of course) but with a generous sampling of plenty other photographers. It really serves as a great way to sample and branch out based on your own tastes.

More importantly is that after Within the Frame‘s exoticism, these are decidedly do-able. Here’s a pepper, there’s a water tower in New Jersey, there’s a street scene in Trafalgar Square but it could be anywhere. Frame made me think that I can’t go to Nepal, Tao makes me want to go downtown with a roll of black and white in my 35mm and go nuts.

I can’t recommend this book highly enough. So I’ll end with a joke.

Me: I’m reading this really cool book called The Tao of Photography.
Jen: Really? Is it up? Or did it drop again? I didn’t check the papers.
Me: *pause* Y’know, that joke was standard and poor.
Jen: *extended groan* That was awful…