Bringing Attention to Spaciousness

FROM FORM TO FORMLESSNESS Maui, Hawaii | Stillness Speaks Portfolio

If you close your eyes and visualize your living room and the various elements within the room, what do you see? A sofa, a coffee table, an entertainment center, a TV, artwork on the wall, and probably many other elements. Now, which element is the largest in the room?

If you are like most people, your response might be - the sofa, the TV, or the entertainment center. If you think more cleverly, you might say - the walls. Most people don't recognize that there is much more "space" than anything else. Physicists tell us that 99.999% of the universe is space. If you removed all the empty space from the entire human race, leaving only electrons and the other subatomic particles, all seven billion human bodies would fit in the area of a sugar cube. That's mind-boggling stuff, right!? But that gives you a sense of how much space there is in relation to form. Yet, humans rarely bring our attention to space, or spaciousness, that's all around.


The living room exercise points to how our attention is primarily form-based, both externally and internally. Externally, our attention flows from one form-object to the next to the next, continuously throughout the day. Internally, our attention flows constantly from one thought-form to the next to the next. We are form-conscious beings. But is this our natural state? Isn't it odd that 99.999% of everything is space, yet we hardly bring our attention to it? What would our life and this world look like if humans had balance in space/form consciousness?


During photography workshops, I inevitably work this into the discussion. Admittedly, I find it highly fascinating. But it's relevant to photography. Photography is part science, part art; part technical, part creative; part thinking, part feeling; part form, and part space. If you only develop one side of this, your work will never fully develop, sing, and resonate with a viewer the way you may like. You can see how the typical form-based mindset will focus on technique rather than creative perspective, thinking rather than feeling. But when someone resonates with a piece of art and is genuinely moved by it, is it something that the thinking-mind is responding to, or something else? It's not the mind at all. 


When a piece of art moves the viewer and the mind quiets, something else is awakened. I call this the "feeling body." We all have one - it's that part of us moved by something beautiful or inspiring, such as a magical sunrise, an epic movie, or a fabulous musical piece. It renders us still and quiet-minded. Within this state, we appreciate the artwork. And it's within this state we must also learn to make the artwork! This state is not widely recognized, which is likely why there is so much photography in the world right now that may be technically sound but does little to move the viewer to emotion. This state of working from an active feeling-body becomes one of the most important things to recognize in creating more dynamic and expressive work. You must delve deeper than the technical, thinking, scientific, form-based nature of things and activate your inner creative, feeling, artistic spirit.


I often quote Elliott Porter saying, "The essential quality of a photograph is the emotional impact that it carries, which is a measure of the author's success in translating into photographic terms his or her own emotional response to the subject." This quote so eloquently sums up much of what I'm describing. You can not expect to evoke an emotional response in a viewer of your photograph when you are not connecting emotionally to your subject or to the process of making the image. Once this is recognized, the obvious question to explore deeper becomes - how do I connect more emotionally with my subject? How do I quiet my mind and activate my feeling-body?


Compositionally, the technical-seeking form-based mind would love to sit down with a 473-page book discussing every possible rule and theory regarding photographic composition throughout its sixty-something chapters. There are many books like this that you can read and feed your mind with more. The mind loves it. Form devouring form. It's essential to recognize that this aspect of ourselves - the form-based thinking-mind - is rarely satisfied. It will never get to the point of having enough information and being satisfied with its consumption. By its very nature, it wants more food for thought. More to chew on. More to take in. More more more.

BETWEEN HEAVEN AND EARTH Maui, Hawaii | Stillness Speaks Portfolio

Edward Weston said, "To consult the rules of composition before making a picture is a little like consulting the laws of gravitation before going for a walk." He's poking fun at the analytical mind that wants to theorize every minute aspect of composition. Composition isn't technical - it's creative. It is not form - it's space. I come from the same camp as Weston here. Therefore, I minimize my discussion points on composition to a handful of important guiding principles to be mindful of and bring greater awareness. One of these primary points is giving equal attention to the 'space' and the 'form' within a composition. We look at our living room's sofa, entertainment center, TV, and other physical elements. Or we look at the palm trees, beach, rocks, and other physical aspects of a natural scene. And most often, this is done without paying any attention to the spaciousness surrounding it all. But what happens when you give equal attention to the space and the form?


To recognize the space between the hanging branch of a tree and the horizon. Or between the line of this rock and a distant mountain. Adjusting your camera position subtly up-down, side-to-side, mindfully making the space around the forms balanced and optimal, clear and concise, and working towards visual harmony is very powerful. The space within our compositions is equally important to the forms, and when our attention is equally with both, compositions naturally become more dynamic and successful.


In many ways, it started as space-consciousness in my photographic compositions. Soon, it spilled over into the rest of my life and became transformative on a more significant life level. For example, imagine that you have a negative emotion building within. Frustration could arise from being behind a slow vehicle you cannot pass. Without awareness, the frustration builds and builds and takes over your emotional state. At this point, you may be murmuring aloud or even cursing the driver ahead of you. In this state, the form of an emotion has taken you over. Attention is wholly on the form of frustration - there is no attention to spaciousness.


Now, imagine that frustration as a tiny grain of sand. The grain of sand is so close to the forefront of your attention that nothing else is visible. There is only the sand. Now, visualize that grain of sand between your two fingers and pull it away, holding it out in front of you. Bring awareness to the spaciousness around the form of the sand, and your hand. By now, you will begin to notice the state of frustration already dissipating.

To continue, visualize pulling the sand away further and setting it down on a big, long, beautiful beach. See that sand grain as one of millions or billions of sand grains. Draw way back and look down at that beach from the perspective of 1,000 feet up, then 5,000 feet. Notice all the spaciousness around the coast. Draw back miles and miles up into the atmosphere and now visualize the blue planet floating in space. Keep going back many light-years and see the planet as a distant speck of light, one of many faint stars in the distance. All you see at this point is 99.999% spaciousness with tiny form particles. This visual exercise takes as little as one minute yet is so powerful. The frustration that just had you cursing aloud now has you focused on spaciousness, and the frustration has completely dissipated away. It was of the world of form. Paying closer attention to the space within a photographic composition, the space around a thought-form, or the space around the form of an emotion - there is no difference. A deepening of attention to space in one stream is a deepening of attention in all streams. Space is space.


While technique, camera gear, scientific equations, and 473-page books on compositional arrangements may have their place on the photographic path, it makes up only half the equation. Delve deeper into both sides of making images - the science and art, the technical and creative, the form and space. From here, you may find that you begin to create images that truly sing. You may find that the lessons learned in making more expressive, compelling photographs are also lessons toward living a more fulfilling and joyful life. Could it be that the no-thingness of empty space holds the most powerful truths for us to learn? Are joy, happiness, and peacefulness found in the forms of the world or in the spaciousness? What happens when we bring equal attention to the space and the forms of life?