Last week, Boston photographer Lou Jones taught a workshop on speed lights and flash photography. Lou has shot everything from commercial material for Nike, to social documentary and humanitarian work for Amnesty International. His craft takes him all over the world, photographing for National Geographic and the Olympic Games. At the end of his stay, I caught up with Lou for an interview.
Is this your first time visiting the Ranch?
Yes, this is my first time. I’ve heard about it for years, but I don’t know if I had any kind of direct contact with it. I’ve happened to know Andrea [Wallace, Artistic Director for Photography and Digital Media] for a long time. I’ve had a great time.
You’re primarily a commercial photographer. Do you often teach workshops like this one?
I’m actually asked to teach them fairly often, but they are usually one, two or three day seminars. And I don’t seek them out. I’m a commercial photographer; the workshops are a whole other field.
What was the draw in coming Anderson Ranch?
Well, it was far away from Boston. But more importantly, it was a chance to see other artists and experience their work. When dealing exclusively with photographers, I feel as if I’m living in a narrowly focused world. Here I was able to see other people that are trying to be artists like I am, but working in different disciplines. For me, that was the real attraction.
I know you’ve probably talked about it a lot, but I hoped you could tell me a little more about your photo series on death row.
That’s a project that we started right in the studio several years ago. I had several people working for me at the time and we were working on several good things. But I suddenly turned around and realized that I was never going to be remembered just for that annual report cover for a computer company. I wanted to do something that would be a legacy. The death row series was also the beginning of a new kind of career. Since then, I’ve been doing more and more socially conscious work.
I’ve always been very conscious of—even in commercial or editorial work—going after clients and the kind of work that is serious, that introduces a new idea or sets it in a new context. The death row was an idea that came out of my head. I thought about what I wanted to do and how I wanted to do it for a good year before we actually kicked it off.
You’ve worked with Amnesty International and various other socially conscious organizations since then.
Absolutely. And that all began with the death penalty series. We’ve worked for a bunch of NGO’s and UUSC [Unitarian Universalist Service Committee], Amnesty [International], American Friends [Service Committee] and those kinds of organizations. Years ago I traveled all over Central America during the wars, photographing the plight of different people from both sides—people in power and the resistance forces. I was getting shot at in those days. So I did a lot of that kind of work–war photography.
What do you think is the most dangerous situation you’ve been in?
I undertook a venture where I had to go into the frontier of El Salvador. I smuggled in a bulletproof vest and we were walking around where there were supposed to be claymores and land mines. Lots of people who were my colleagues at that time were injured or killed in that area. That was probably the most dangerous situation I’ve encountered.
I also photographed in opium dens in Singapore, and that’s the death penalty if you get caught. That was pretty harrowing. But, I’ve photographed in aircraft carriers and they call that the most dangerous acre in the world right now. I happen to like them. It’s really pretty, but once you get up there you realize how dangerous it is.
I’ve been in all kinds of various situations. I spent a lot of time in jail because of the stupid things I do and I suppose that’s dangerous too. It’s strange how people sometimes see it when you’re taking photographs. I spent jail time in Santo Domingo, Greece and a lot of time here in the United States for the same reasons. Although I have a little more access to people that might be able to help me in the United States. I’ve probably been in as many jails in the United States as I have been overseas.
Given the opportunity, would you still go to a war zone?
Oh, absolutely, I’d go in a heartbeat—a heartbeat. I’m not a thrill seeker—never have been—but a lot of the things that human populations undergo happen in pretty unsavory places.
Just a couple months ago, I was in the slums in India. I had to bribe my way in to photograph the slums there. The gangs were really pissed off at me, but it was a side of the world that I had been interested in for a long time. And finally I was able get my way in. I didn’t feel in danger at the time, however the people who helped me get in were a little nervous. I supposed I should have paid a lot more attention to their nervousness at the time.
Are you particularly attracted to war?
No, no. Often my projects have nothing to do with war, but happen to deal with a particular part of the world in conflict. So in order to be able to cover it, I usually have to go into a couple war zones. I frequently hire handlers who know the terrain better than I do, rather than put myself in harm’s way.
Would you say that documentary photography is your favorite area to work in?
Well, no, I work on people. I try to come up with ideas that are bizarre, different points of view or things that people haven’t already covered. In the art world, not so much in the commercial world, but in the art world they always talk about process and non-derivative work. Well, it’s very difficult to come up with something brand new—technique that’s brand new, a new way to approach an art form or a subject matter—it’s very difficult. My entire career I’ve tried to be fairly conscious of my approach.
Sometimes I can do a new slant on an old concept or idea. I have projects that cover fairly familiar subjects, but I approach the subject in a non-derivative way. For example, when I talk to friends about India, they will say, “oh, I went to India and we road elephants, and we saw tigers, and we stayed at the Hotel Maharaja.” And I’m thinking, “I didn’t see any of that. I was in slums for Christ sake!” Not that slums are all that unique either, but I try to take a slightly different tack.
There are a lot of people in the world who have almost no voice–they’re billions of people that are almost invisible. They have no political clout, they have no financial clout, and they have no say in most of their destiny. And we’re photographers—we have a really wonderful vehicle to give voice to many of these people.
I don’t for a minute think that I’m going to do anything that will change the world, but we’ve got to constantly strive to give them more voice, because they’re refugees and people who are elderly and sick. A lot of my colleagues approach these issues too, but I just try to approach it with a little bit of a different tack on it.
Where do you go for inspiration for a new body of work? Do you have a particular process?
No. In the beginning I just kept my ear to the ground. I watch a lot of T.V. I know that many people say, “oh, I don’t ever look at T.V.”, but my entire childhood I was looking at T.V. It was how I accepted imagery. By the time I got to high school I was looking at photography. I was insatiable about it! I would have twenty T.V.s on at the same time, all day, everyday if I could. There’s a lot of crap—but there’s a lot of information that you can gather as well. And that’s my medium if you think about that. It’s literally my inspiration.
I listen to NPR in the studio and I’m reading all the time. There is an amazing amount of information out there, and if you accept it, it comes through. That’s how the death row series started; I saw a little video in a hotel room in Kyoto, Japan.
Working on the death row series was a really somber experience—for seven, eight years in the studio—that’s all we did. We ate, slept and lived the death penalty–it was depressing as hell. After that we had to do other series that were a little more uplifting.
What specifically do you like to read?
I read mostly magazines–cover to cover. I devour them. I read on subjects that I have absolutely no interest in, because I can learn about people I had never met. It keeps me in contact with my present world, allowing me to reach out into those alleys and byways that most people don’t have access to. Investigating other peoples’ lives prompts me to pursue opium dens or headhunters in Borneo, or the marginal sides of life.
So, since your devouring so much information, do you have a vetting process? How do you decide which ideas you want to pursue?
Yes, it’s a very complicated vetting process. If I get interested in an idea, I start to look at the way I react to it and the way I would approach it. Then I research what other people are doing with it, if there’s any information on it. Of course, now we have Google and all of that to help speed up the process. If I’m finding too much of it, then I reject the idea. If I find several people who have done a good job covering that concept, it lets me move on to something else.
Have you enjoyed your stay in Snowmass Village and at the Ranch?
The Ranch is pretty impressive. I’ve been to these other art enclaves that focus primarily on photography. I’ve never been to one where you have so much cross pollination of various artist and mediums. Being able to talk to a few artists in particular has been a real plus. For example, I don’t usually associate with painters, simply because it is a totally different field. In a funny way, the Ranch is isolated from the real world. It’s almost idyllic.
- Lou Jones and students from “Lighting the World” Photography Workshop at Maroon Bells
