25

Can I Use Symbols?

IN A PHOTOGRAPH, EVERYTHING MEANS SOMETHING, as all the words in a book mean something. Some mean more than others. Some are just necessary for holding it all together. And some carry impact on a level approaching the spiritual.

When an element in a photograph represents a larger idea or value, it’s symbolic. And using symbols in our photographs offers us a good way to say more with less. When symbols are juxtaposed with contrasting ideas, they can stir deep emotion and imply certain perspectives. The flag is one such symbol in many countries. The crucifix is another. Combine the two, and depending on the rest of the image, you are making a potentially powerful statement, not just about the flag or about the crucifix, but about the values they represent.

What makes this challenging is that not all symbols represent the same values to everyone. One country’s flag may mean one thing to its citizens and another thing entirely to the citizens of another country. Similarly, the cross, or any other religious symbol, is likely to have shades of meaning for many people, from comfort to its extreme opposite. Ask two people how they respond to the hammer and sickle symbol, and the reactions may be very different. This is, of course, true of any photograph as well, and I think this variety of interpretations of symbols is a strength, not a weakness. But it’s something to be aware of.

Symbolism is not limited to the obvious, the nationalistic, or the specifically religious. As I prepared to write this chapter, I spent some time online researching symbolism in photographs, mostly just looking at a variety of symbols and what I inferred to be their intended meaning. Skeletons and skulls represent death. Barbed wire, bars, caged birds, and ropes represent captivity and entrapment. Other meanings were implied with butterflies, eyes, crowns, hearts, trees, mountains, waves, marionettes, masks, tears, wolves, lions, the moon and stars—not to mention certain colours and implied shapes. And that was just in the first couple minutes of searching. Some symbols were used powerfully and well, while others not only bordered on cliché, but crossed that border and camped out. It’s not my place to say how you should use symbols, only to help make you more aware of them as visual tools and more able to perceive their presence.

Artists have been using symbols since early man painted figures on caves. Not only do we use them, we create them. While the list of established symbols is long, there is no reason the elements in your photograph cannot mean something more to you than what they are on the surface. It is your exploration of those elements and what they mean to you specifically that gives them power in your photographs.

In some of my photographs, sharks are just sharks. In others, they represent my fears. In some images, people are just people, but in others, they are silhouetted and abstracted, and symbolically, they represent me. They may never mean that to you, which is fine because I make my art first for myself. Making art gives you an opportunity to explore and experiment, and even if no one ever sees in it what you do, the symbol remains powerful. And, chances are, if it means something to you and you’ve wrestled with it to give it that meaning in the photograph, it will likely mean something to a viewer of your image. Here are a few questions to get you thinking about symbols in your photographs:

• What accepted or implied symbols might be present in this scene, and would including or excluding them allow me to say more about the subject?
• How can I juxtapose that symbol with contrasting ideas in order to say something unexpected or invite a reader of the photograph to explore an idea?
• What elements exist in my photograph that might function as symbols? Is a lone tree on a hill more than what it literally is? Could a rock symbolize stability?

Ultimately, there’s got to be a reason why you point your lens at some things more than others. What do those things represent to you, and can you explore the importance and meaning of those things by investigating them as symbols in your photographs? On a very basic level, you’re accepting and experimenting with the fact that certain things remind you of certain other things, and you’re playing with those associations.

Is there a place for this kind of play in your photography? I suspect that, without you knowing it, there already is. Continue to explore it. The more you look for symbols, the more you will recognize them and use them to give different meanings to your subject.

Lalibela, Ethiopia, 2017

Lalibela, Ethiopia, 2017

Varanasi, India, 2018

Varanasi, India, 2018