As photographers we tend to surround ourselves with images, as if we didn’t consume enough visual media in our everyday life.  We scroll images on Facebook, Instagram, websites, books, magazines, and on and on.  Pictures flyby us at the speed of light.  Which, consequentially is what we capture, light.

I just read a study that was conducted at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in NYC, that said that the median time spent viewing a masterpiece was 17 seconds; 17 seconds!  Does that seem absurd to anyone else?  Our TV, internet, Google based digital age has made us so passive that we spend 17 seconds to explore a masterpiece that has stood the test of time. 

This piqued my interest.  As someone who is a creative and wants to pursue not only photography, but other creative endeavors, I came up with two ways to dedicate ourselves to getting more out of our viewing experiences.  

Method one, go to a website, or someone’s Instagram account that you admire, and take the first five images there.  Don’t scroll through and pick, you don’t get to pick.  Just start with the first image and spend five minutes with each.  In that five minutes you could critique them, admire them, evaluate them, place yourself in them, approach them from a critical view or passively admire them.  Here when I say passively, I don’t mean passive like scrolling past it, I mean more like absorbing it, or meditating on it.  Take it in, in a passive way, not a critical way. 

Method two, again go to these same places to find images to look at.  But this time you can scroll till you find something that resonates with you.  Then take the same five minutes and ask why you’re drawn to it?  What about this image clicks with you?  Is it the subject matter, style, technique, colors, textures?  Is it something that you see in your own work?  Is it something that you want to emanate?  Perhaps something that you would like to incorporate into your own work?

Use these methods to bring yourself to the viewing experience.  Rather than quantity, seeing how many images you can view in a given amount of time, limit the number and spend quality time with the images you do see. 

I came upon an interesting quote and concept in a NY Times article called “The Art of Slowing Down in a Museum.  “When you go to the library,” said James O. Pawelski, the director of education for the Positive Psychology Center at the University of Pennsylvania, “you don’t walk along the shelves looking at the spines of the books and on your way-out tweet to your friends, ‘I read 100 books today!’”  You need to spend the time needed to ingest and digest images with intellect rather than passivity.  So, lets nourish our creative souls.