"Let life enchant you again." - Fernando Gros
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Blog // Images
January 20, 2012

Slow Down

I’d like to share with you one of my all-time favourite movie scenes – from the somewhat overlooked 1995 film, Smoke. In this film, Harvey Keitel plays Auggie, the owner of a tobacco shop. Auggie’s pet project is to photograph his tobacco shop. Every day he goes across the street and takes, what is basically […]

I’d like to share with you one of my all-time favourite movie scenes – from the somewhat overlooked 1995 film, Smoke. In this film, Harvey Keitel plays Auggie, the owner of a tobacco shop. Auggie’s pet project is to photograph his tobacco shop. Every day he goes across the street and takes, what is basically the same shot, from the same location, of the same street-side at the same time of day – he has a collection of over 4000 images taken in this way.

In this scene one of his regular customers, Paul, a grief-filled writer played by William Hurt, comes into the store one evening and they start talking about Auggie’s photographic project.

There’s a lot that can be said about this scene – it speaks evocatively to the power of photography, to capture not just a moment (that’s such a cliche), but to capture life. The lesson we could all learn from Auggie is to slow down enough to see what we are photographing, what is living in our images.

Tonight I’ll be boarding a flight for Adelaide and taking a few days rest over Chinese New Year. It’s been a tough few months and I’m looking forward to slowing down. As Auggie says, “You know how it is, tomorrow, tomorrow, tomorrow…”

Responses
leonie 13 years ago

“Things take place there too, just like everywhere else.”

Love that line!!

I often forget that I don’t need to travel to ‘exotic’ locations to find things taking place… That the simple act of slowing down and noticing what is going on around me as I go about my daily life is important.

Hoping you get the rest that you need.
Safe travels and happy new year to you Fernando

Fernando Gros 13 years ago

Leonie – thanks. Looked at from a certain perspective, I’ve lived my whole live in exotic locations, places that tourists travel to for their postcard moment.

But, I’m certainly coming to believe that everywhere and anywhere can be amazing and photogenic, given the right frame of mind.

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