Recently it's been pointed out to me that my
photographs are reminiscent of the Northern European food still life paintings
with their blacked-out backgrounds and organic presentation of food. I can't
outright deny their influence, but it definitely wasn't intentionally done.
Everything seen is absorbed and stored and ends up being influential whether I
want it to be or not.
In regards to this photo, I don't have any
emotional ties to grapefruit. I never really ate them growing up unless it was
at one particular friend's house. Mostly, I associate them with restriction and
diets so I may harbor some unfounded resentment against them. With that said,
they are extremely bitter, a flavor my non-supertaster self enjoys, so I decided
to revisit them, and posted this photograph along with a pithy, lean and
poignant blurb on my personal blog. I take photographs of a lot of the food I
eat for my blog, but only in controlled environments where I can use the
light and space how I want to. You'll never find me with my camera in a
restaurant unless it's a paid gig.[1]
My photographs go through some post-production to
achieve the look they end up with. I know what I'm going to modify them when I’m
edit them so I photograph them with that in mind. I also have preferred conditions to photograph food in so I
take steps to ensure those conditions are possible. I only shoot in natural
light, which means almost every photograph is taken in the morning or early
afternoon, a difficult feat during the weekdays, so weekends are when I work.
The interview with Olga Truchan nicely summed up
the way food styling and photography has changed over the decades. We have
moved from an artificial highly stylized presentation to food that is unpretentious,
half eaten and supremely approachable. The food photography on blogs (the good
ones) and the photography seen in today’s top magazines are actually comparable
and some food bloggers have made the transition from web to print. Both the
online community and magazines are now creating food photography trends. Any
person with a DSLR can take a decent picture of food. Food shots have become
tighter, more gratuitous, with the primary focus being on the food itself, not
the table setting, mood or environment. Gourmet Magazine’s evolutionary shots
of lobsters are indicative of this trend. Their cover in the 1940’s shows a
lobster on a table with a picturesque New England village in the background.
Skip ahead to the 70’s and it’s just lobsters, and a whole of them. They revisit the scenery aspect of food
photography during the 80’s and 90’s but that last shot in 2009 is the epitome
of food photography today--just the food with a washed out background. It
coupled well with Ruth Reichl’s decision to add more politically minded
articles about food to Gourmet’s repertoire, thus divorcing the glossy from its
previous reputation as a magazine that’s only concerned with travel and
lifestyle. It elevated the meaning of good living, the magazine’s slogan, to
include the good living of those who are producing our food. It’s a touch
similar to Petrini and his Slow Food-eat-better-to-help-out-the-poor-peasant-farmer, but less elitist and exclusive; you
could support their shift in consciousness by picking up the magazine for four
bucks.
Gourmet magazine’s approach to food photography was
truly influential in shaping the way food was looked at over the years. Under
Reichl, they began hiring photographers who didn’t specialize in food. It was
like a breath of fresh air. Their covers have become iconic—at least to
me.
[1] Restaurants
are for eating and flashes going off when your trying to dig into the dim sum
is super mega annoying.
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