Spaces & Places

I’ve got places and spaces on the brain this morning! This morning I started the “Creating with the Environment” chapter in Trust the Process by Shaun McNiff. He talks about our physical spaces and response to places in the creative process. I love this line:

We create together with our physical environments and don’t always appreciate how their qualities contribute to our expression.

True for any type of artist, but even more so for photographers. For many of us, the physical environment is the raw material of our creation. We capture and compose from the environment. Like today’s photo… While the owner of the house created this beautiful space on the porch to sit and relax, I captured it to share the idea of cheery relaxation with all of you. Someone else created the place, but I create with it too. So very fun.

Since I love to explore and photograph places, my environment has become my creative fuel. We really explored the concepts behind creating with places in A Sense of Place, the 8-week course that just wrapped up a couple of weeks ago. It was awesome! I love how much I learn by organizing my thoughts into a class and sharing them with a group. I am in awe of how much I gain from the discussion and interaction with the course participants. This week I read the feedback from the class participants, as they shared their impressions of the class. I get a little giddy sometimes, realizing that these ideas of mine have made an impression on someone else too. You can read a few of the comments, newly added to my class information page here. Pretty darn cool that I can do something I love so much and have it resonate with others too! How lucky am I?

I can’t wait to run A Sense of Place again, in spring of 2013. Until then, I’ll continue exploring the spaces and places around me. They are the fuel of my creative expression. What fuels you?

Feel free to share!

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