A Parallel Planets piece by Unknown
Parallel Planets presents Sean Lotman
in Running Across the Blue Sky
Story and Interview by Erin Emocling
Story and Interview by Erin Emocling
Mentioned: hyper-reality, tangential memory, and something called 'ja ne se quoi'
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I first met Sean Lotman, albeit only via email, back in 2011, when I used to write for Lomography Magazine. I had the privilege to talk to him about I Do Haiku You, his still ongoing series on Diana F+ film photographs and haiku poetry.
In the same interview, I learned about how he began taking pictures, his “surreal humanism” style in photography, and his admiration for iconic photographers like Steve McCurry and Henri Cartier Bresson.
I called Sean “a weaver of photographs and words” because in order to truly appreciate his artistic abilities, one must experience his moving mixture of images and poems.
Asked about his preference of traditional rather than modern, “It [digital photography] often has minimal substance and thus little emotional capacity to enthrall us. The great allure of film [photography], besides its serendipitous aspect, is its impressionistic potential,” he answered.
Unlike most writers who solely speak their minds through written words, Sean tells his short-lived stories through the accompaniment of his cameras. A writer by profession, he prolifically navigated the ropes of finding his photographic voice through “drawing out the poetry of the visual moment.”
Browsing Sean’s online gallery is like listening to a Happy End album: fleeting and soothing. His color photographs always exude a spectrum of mysterious saturation and vivid memories. His growing collection of pictures comes from his wanderings across the world; each image tells a different tale, but looking through them is like reading an unfolding novel.
Sean’s photographs and words have personified what he is now. He is neither just a writer nor just a photographer: he is a chemical reaction of both creative worlds.
Fast-forward to 2013, some sort of kismet took place, which led me to meet Sean for the second time. I was exchanging emails with a Japanese film photographer, Ariko Inaoka, for an interview on Feature Shoot when she told me that her husband knows me.
In a Polaroid instant, I immediately patched the obvious details together — Ariko is Japanese, Sean is based in Kyoto, Ariko and Sean are both analogue snappers — it wasn’t a difficult mission but it felt like discovering something new.
I was even thrilled to know that, even though I’m a million miles away from Japan, I still found my way back into Sean’s part of the planet, which he has been sharing with another talented human being.
I’ve always wanted to go to Japan. I’ve already listed a number of places that I’m dying to go to and things that I’m ailing to do when I finally have my chance to get lost in translation. It’s not enough for me to have met Sean and his wife through my computer screen only — I have to meet them in real life someday.
Read on to my interview with Sean Lotman and learn more about how he transformed his “bad poetry and terrible photography” into what he is known for today, how he intertwines writing and taking pictures, and a few of his favorite things.
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Parallel Planets: Tell us something about Sean Lotman as a photographer and a writer and before you became both.
Sean Lotman: "I've been a writer my entire adult life. It was an avocation I developed in my university days. Like a lot of writers, I was more interested in being a writer than actually writing. Learned the hard way over many years that this sort of attitude doesn’t cut it. Takes years to find one’s voice and develop a sense of narrative in fiction and constructive persuasion in nonfiction. I’ve been writing for fifteen years, but only in the last five, have I really begun figuring it out. There was a long learning curve.
I’ve been a photographer for the last five years. I only shoot with film cameras and I make my own color prints in the darkroom. Like writing, I believe a photographer should put together a signature style that is all his own. I’ve tried to do that with content and technique. Before college I was not especially artistic. In fact, I was quite normal, if a bit shy, though I’ve always loved reading and cinema."
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| photo by Sean Lotman |
Parallel Planets: When/How did your inclination with photography and writing begin?
Sean Lotman: "I got into writing in college after discovering the Beats. Kerouac, Ginsberg, and Burroughs made the arts seems like some terrific party (with admittedly bad hangovers). I started out writing bad poetry, moving to scripts (I’m from Los Angeles and lived there most of my 20s), and then prose, short form, later long form. Constructing narrative is not an innate skill; it takes years to develop.
Most of my life I was a terrible photographer, mostly because I wasn’t interested in the mechanics of what went into a good photograph. But I live in Japan and travel often so it became obvious to me that I should invest my time in learning the fundamentals. Again, it took some years to build my style and develop my “eye” but it’s been worth the effort."
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| photo by Sean Lotman |
Parallel Planets: What defines your artistic style? What are your trademarks?
Sean Lotman: "Generally, in my fiction there is some kind of personal crisis. My characters tend to make disastrous decisions in love and career, which is the meat and potatoes of classic literature. My main concern is telling a good story and doing so beautifully. In criticism, I tend towards a more caustic style.
I cross-process my photos, which means I develop positive film (slide) in negative chemicals. This has an effect of making colors particularly vivid. It’s risky to be sure, but in the darkroom I can adjust the colors and brightness to the picture as I would like it to be. To be honest, I really don’t like most cross-processed images at all, as they look unreal. I am more interested in a hyper-reality."
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| photo by Sean Lotman |
Parallel Planets: What influences your work? Who inspires you?
Sean Lotman: "I’m influenced by my environment. I travel a lot and have become interested in the cross-junction of developed and developing world mindsets. I am often reading, watching films, and looking at photo books. Not to be influenced necessarily, but I believe in the power of osmosis-- the more we absorb the quality work of great artists, the better our own sensibility might perform.
Because many of my photographs might seem exotic, many think I’m a travel photographer. And though most of my photos are on the street, I don’t see myself as a street photographer per se. Because of my color scheme and the fact I’m hoping to present something honest about our condition, I’ve described my aesthetic as psychedelic humanism. Most of my subjects I’m drawn to have some 'ja ne se quoi,' an inexplicable charisma of which I must take back with me. If I’m lucky they are in an interesting environment that makes the photo all the more worthwhile.
I’m inspired by films, books, and paintings. My friends and their own trials to acquire recognition for their work is an inspiration. Most especially, I am inspired my wife, Ariko Inaoka, without whom I most likely would never have become a photographer."
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| photo by Sean Lotman |
Parallel Planets: How do pictures connect and coexist with your words (and vice versa)?
Sean Lotman: "Because I take a lot of notes (and keep a journal) I would like to publish essays with my photos in the event of finding a major publisher for one of my projects. One of my inspirations herein is the photographer, Danny Lyon. His memories, digressions, words often draw out the poetry of the visual moment. Purists would say a good picture doesn’t need embellishment. They are right, of course, but a back story or tangential memory can often augment a photograph’s meaning, making the moment that much more immediate.
The most obvious connection between my images and words is my ongoing project I Do Haiku You, in which I pair haiku and senryu poems with images shot from a Diana F+ camera. Haiku may be short, but it can be very difficult to write a good one!"
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| photo by Sean Lotman |
Parallel Planets: What is your mantra in life?
Sean Lotman: "Just to be the best possible man I can be."
Parallel Planets: What project(s) are you currently working on?
Sean Lotman: "Well, I’m always developing short stories, either sketching or writing them. There is always my haiku project. I’m working on a photo book about the Japanese people. I want it to be one of the greatest color photo books ever published about Japan. Working on it entails traveling, which is great!"
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| photo by Sean Lotman |
Parallel Planets: What other creative pursuits are you into?
Sean Lotman: "Writing and photography take up nearly all my available time. I fantasize about learning a musical instrument (usually it’s keyboards) or learning how to paint properly. I went through a brief phase where I was crazy about collaging. But knowing the learning curve of writing and photography, I feel I should focus on what I’m already good at."
Parallel Planets: Mention three of your favorite things.
Sean Lotman: "Love, truth, beauty."
Parallel Planets: Do you have any fetishes or weird habits?
Sean Lotman: "Honestly, not really, no. I’m really quite normal, whatever “normal” means."
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| photo by Sean Lotman |
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super !
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