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Tragically, Galen Rowell and his wife Barbara
died when their aircraft crashed in 2002. Thankfully his images live on an will continue to inspire
generations of photographers who love wild places. Galen Rowell His books and images inspire and amaze. Galen Rowell is not only one of the
worlds best photographers, heÕs an elite climber, a marathon runner and an
environmental campaigner. In a
two part interview, he reveals to Simon Willis his unique approach to life,
the outdoors and photography, and gives a master class on how to take better
pictures. In 1972 it must have seemed like a huge gamble to
sell a small automotive business and set up as a full time photographer, yet
within a year heÕd completed his first assignment for National
Geographic. What makes this all
the more surprising, is Galen Rowell never experienced the typical
photographerÕs desire to see the world through a view finder, for him the
camera was simply a means to share his love of high wild places with his
family and friends. This is why
I his work resonates so strongly with so many hill walkers around the
world. Like us, Galen Rowell
sets out to become part of the landscape he celebrates - Òa participantÓ, he
calls it, not the photographerÕs traditional role of Òan observerÓ. According to The Washington Post,
ÒGalen Rowell may be the foremost practitioner of that hybrid art,
photojournalism.Ó At one time, his photographic credits were almost
eclipsed by those for his climbing.
He has more than one hundred first ascents of new routes in Yosemite
and the High Sierra backcountry, and has visited the mountains of India,
China, Siberia, New Zealand, Norway and Patagonia. Besides participating in major expeditions to Everest, K2,
and Gasherbrum 2, he made the first one-day ascents of both Mt McKinley in
Alaska and Kilimanjaro in Africa.
He also made the highest complete ascent and descent of a mountain on
skis on Mustagh Ata, and ticked off first ascents of Himalayan routes on
Cholatse and the Great Trango Tower. Now in his sixties, Galen is still climbing. He undertakes photographic and
writing assignments for Life, National Geographic and other publications
while running his successful Mountain Light business at Berkeley in California,
from where he answered my questions. SW.
How did your photographic career start, and what was it about
capturing images on film which interested you? GR. I began taking pictures in the
natural world to be able to show people what I was experiencing when I
climbed and explored in Yosemite in the High Sierra. Words weren't doing it. At first, pictures didn't do it
either. About 98% of them
"didn't come out." In other words, they didn't look anywhere near
as good as what I saw. I began
to realise that film sees the world differently than the human eye, and that
sometimes those differences can make a photograph more powerful than what you
actually observed. IÕve been
studying those differences and using them creatively and thatÕs what
initially got me going on photography as a career and keeps me going almost
40 years later. SW.
How important are your mountaineering skills compared to your
photographic ones, and how do they combine in your work - and is this what
you mean when you say you see yourself as participant rather than observer? GR. My mountaineering skills are not
important to my best photographs, but they do add a component to my work that
is definitely a bit different than that of most photographers. Wanting to take a light camera with
me when I climb or do mountain runs has kept me using exclusively 35 mm. By trying to get the most out of 35
mm IÕve learned to pursue technical quality while at the same time using a
camera system that is incredibly versatile from ultra-wide angle, to extreme
telephotos, to flash fill, and use of graduated neutral-density filters. What I mean by photographing as a
participant rather than observer is that IÕm not only involved directly with
some of the activities that I photograph, such as mountain climbing, but even
when IÕm not I have the philosophy that my mind and body are part of the
natural world. IÕm exchanging
molecules every 30 days with the natural world and in a spiritual sense I
know I am a part of it and take my photographs from that emotional feeling
within me, rather than from an emotional distance as a spectator. SW. Err, to British ears that might sound
rather, well, ÒCalifornianÓ! GR. Although this may sound new agey and
spiritual, I don't see it that way at all. I think that cognitive scientists would support the view
that our visual system does not directly represent what is out there in the
world and that our brain constructs a lot of the imagery that we believe we
are seeing. When we tune in to
an especially human way of viewing the landscape powerfully, it resonates
with an audience. ThatÕs a lot
of what IÕm trying to do in my landscape photographs. The landscape is like being there
with a powerful personality and IÕm searching for just the right angles to
make that portrait come across as meaningfully as possible. SW.
So do you think landscape photography undervalued? And what distinguishes a good
photograph from a great one? GR. I think landscape photography in
general is somewhat undervalued. I remember when an editor at the National
Geographic promised to run about a dozen of my landscape pictures from a
story on the John Muir trail as an essay, but when the group of editors got
together, someone said that my pictures looked like postcards. That was the worst insult anyone
could say. In other words, instead
of being interpretative
works of art, craft, or journalism, they were kitsch. Luckily, many other
people tell me how they have had a particular landscape photograph of mine in
their office or bedroom for 15 years and it always speaks to them strongly
whenever they see it. The end
result at the Geographic was a nice people story without a special essay of
landscapes. SW.
I confess, IÕm one of them.
But youÕve gone on to write many pieces for many magazines and sixteen
large format books. Although
your words and pictures work together, which do you think has the greater
power to communicate? GR. There's no question that photographs
communicate more instantly and powerfully than words do, but if you want to
communicate a complex concept clearly, you need words, too. The combination of pictures and words
together can be really effective, and I began to realise in my career that
unless I wrote my own words, then my message was diluted. I actually was published as a writer
in the 1960s before I had any photographs published, so it comes somewhat
naturally to me. I used to say that I spent 2/3 of my time writing and 1/3
photographing, but yet make 1/3 of my income from writing and 2/3 from
photography. I think the time
function is more like 50:50 these days, but I still make far more from my
photography than from my writing.
The reason that I keep writing is that all my most powerful messages
about the fates of wild places that I care about need to have words as well
as images. SW.
Yes, you've been involved with environmental movements for a long
time. Tell me something about
that and how photography helps. GR. There is no question that photography
has played a major role in the environmental movement. Ever since the 1860s when
photographers travelled the American West and brought photographs of scenic
wonders back to the people on the East Coast of America we have had a North
American tradition of landscape photography used for the environment. Many times in the past, a
photographer wasn't particularly environmentally aware, but their photographs
become de facto environmental statements when they displayed the value of
wildness. These days, most nature photographers are deeply committed to the
environmental message. Speaking
for myself, I often donate use of my work to worthy environmental
organisations, and sometimes donate my time as well. I serve on the Board of Directors of
at least a dozen major environmental organisations protecting everything from
wildlife in general to Yosemite Park to an endangered race of bighorn sheep,
to youth education in the wilderness, and a number of other subjects. SW.
Can I bring up the issue with which all outdoor writers and
photographers wrestle - do you accept any responsibility for helping attract
people to specific wilderness, such as Denali, and their numbers spoiling the
very thing they went to find? GR. I do accept responsibility for
attracting people to specific wildernesses, but I don't think that there is
any clear and simple way of looking at it and saying that a person is wrong
because they have written or photographed an area and therefore caused
greater impact. If you look at
the history of environmentalism, those who have opted the other direction
have had zero effect. TheyÕre
dropouts. Every person like
David Brower, John Muir, or Jacques Cousteau who has made a difference has
opted for the other direction of communicating their special passion for
parts of the environment that they love. Today, IÕm very careful not to mention very specific
locations when I write or give captions. I may say that I like a certain area or have hiked a
certain trail, but I don't say that a quarter-mile past such and such a
junction you walk out one hundred feet to a point and that itÕs the most
fabulous view that IÕve ever seen.
That would be causing excess impact on that point. SW. Galen Rowell for the moment, thank
you very much. |
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