AT WHAT COST?

INTERSECTION PHOTOS / Brown Cannon III

Last week in Nayarit, Mexico

This time I almost stayed for good.

Intersection Photos offers Prints!

We are excited to announce that the Intersection Photos collection of images is now available for those interested purchasing Prints. Signed Collectors prints are being offered in limited editions as well a cheaper unsigned option. For more details see the About Page our our site. www.intersectionphotos.com

Then and Now

I have this album that I shot and put together in 1978. I was 8 years old. When I look through the pictures I feel as though I remember every moment of that family trip to Yellowstone National Park. But I am not sure if I truly remember or if the pictures themselves create the memories. Thirty years later I revisited the park on a shoot for Sunset magazine. At some point following my return I pulled out my 1st album. There was something about the way I used the camera when I was 8 that I appreciated all of these years later. Something that came naturally. I believe it is imperfection. At 8 you don't care if your horizons are crooked, if your exposure is off, if the time of day is right or about the rule of thirds. You simply point the camera because you like it. My goal now is to unlearn so much of what I have been taught, or been told about photography. Knowledge, politics, responsibility, your editors, it all plays a part in the way in which you approach your subjects. But when you are 8 none of this exists. One similarity that I do recognize between then and now, is that the appreciation I shared for open space when I was 8, still exists in me today. - brown

To see other pages from the album visit the INTERSECTION PHOTOS facebook page.

Thank You

We are very excited and relieved to have Intersection Photos up and running. More than anything we appreciate all of the emails and excitement we have received during our first week. We will be updating the site regularly with new stories and material. Keep checking in to see what we are up to and where we have been.

thank you, Brown + Cedric

THOUGHTS ON LOOKING AND SEEING

I have never blogged before and I felt lost for words this morning until Mia showed me an excerpt of writing by John Steinbeck that resonated with me. So, I will let Mr. Steinbeck's words start my first blog:

It occurs to me to wonder and to ask how much I see or am capable of seeing...

Some Years ago, the US Information Service paid the expenses of a famous and fine Italian Photographer to go to America and to take pictures of our country... The man had travelled everywhere in America, and do you know what his pictures were? Italy. In every American city, he had unconsciously sought and found Italy. The portraits--Italians; the countryside--Tuscany and the Po Valley and the Abruzzi. His eye looked for what was familiar to him and found it. This is interesting as an incident, but I think we all do it. This man did not see the America which is not like Italy, and there is very much that isn't. And I wonder what I have missed in the wonderful trip to the south [of Israel] i have just completed. Did I see only America? I confess I caught myself at it. Travelling over those breathtaking mountains and looking down at the shimmering deserts, cut to wadis by the occasional flash floods, I found myself saying or agreeing--yes, that's like the Texas panhandle--that could be Nevada, and that might be Death Valley. The frightening thought...is that they weren't andy of those places. They were themselves. But by identifying them with something I knew, was I not cutting myself off completely from the things I did not know, not seeing, not even recognizing, because I did not have the easy bridge of recognition?

This is a serious thing and it extends in many directions. Because we do not use quarter tones in music, many of us do not hear them in Oriental music. How many people, seeing a painting, automatically dislike it because it is not familiar? And, most important of all, how many ideas do we reject without a hearing simply because our experience pattern can bring up no recognition parallel?

I took the picture above of the kids playing in the ocean in the French Polynesia, along the coast of Raiatea Island...but the image could have been from anywhere. I realized that, like Steinbeck in his trip to Israel, I was guilty of seeking out the familiar.

The scene of the kids swimming in the water reminds me of my childhood in the Philippines. I could be any of those boys jumping in the water. In my search to find something different, I unconsciously found the familiar. Coconut plantations just like in my hometown, fishermen fixing their nets, families in the water, men gathered under the trees--these are the images I took. Granted that Raiatea Island, the whole French Polynesia has a lot of similarities to the Philippines, it is not.

But is that really bad thing?

Aren't we suppose to photograph who we are, to be personal. One's work should be a reflection of oneself.

But I think Steinbeck is talking about experiences. To be open to all of them, specially to the unfamiliar.

The danger is when we start dismissing experiences that we do not identify with and that would be death for a Photographer.

Cedric Angeles

INTERSECTION

"Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime."

-Mark Twain, The Innocents Abroad, 1869

Over the years, travel has taught us that people are generally thoughtful, open and good. It doesn’t matter where you’re from, how you’re raised, your culture, or whether you’re rich or poor, we all want the same things. The basic need of a roof overhead, food on the table and a better life for children is the same in every corner of this planet. And while, as a culture, we are fed information designed to keep countries and people apart, travel has taught us over and over that the world is, in fact, receptive to our differences.

Intersection Photos is technically a boutique travel stock site that offers an extensive catalog of high quality travel images for editorial, advertising and fine art use. We also think of it as our journal and as a place to freely experiment and grow. Through exploration and observation we will continue to evolve and so will Intersection Photos. We are excited to have you be part of this journey.

Brown Cannon III + Cedric Angeles

SRI LANKA • TURKEY • PERU • MENTAWAI ISLANDS • COMING SOON!

INTERSECTION PHOTOS is dedicated to anyone who has traveled in search of anything but what they have already known.