Image Of The Month 7

IMAGE OF THE MONTH (7) March 2010
We now travel to Ireland for our latest featured photographer.

A Big Welcome To: Joe Tully

"Born in Dublin, I have been making photographs for a little over 40 years. Purchasing my first camera with the early proceeds of a summer job, while still at school I immediately began to learn the art of photography. That first camera was a simple East German "Beirette" 35 mm. machine, with just three shutter speeds and a triplet manual focusing lens. Simple the camera may have been, but with its completely mechanical operating system, it led to many discoveries, some happy and others somewhat less so, about the process of image making.

I still use conventional cameras and films, although only very occasionally making forays into the darkroom. My love of photography has not diminished, quite the reverse in fact. After a lull of a couple of years, I discovered, through my interest in computers, the world of digital image making. Much argument is made, questioning whether this "new fangled" thing is, in fact true photography. I can only say that digital work has re-kindled my entire enthusiasm for the photographic medium and I now regularly have six cameras in use, all at the same time, three conventional and another three digital. The final word in the argument is, I believe, the image on the gallery wall.

Photography is a technical craft, which in some hands, becomes an art form in its own right. It is all about image making and was never meant to be an exercise in technical discussion, nor in the perfection of technique in isolation from the completed image. I therefore make no effort to describe the equipment used in the production of my images, nor to go into the fine details regarding their production. After all, who would ever ask a painter to describe the size of the brushes used or the technical qualities of his paints?

My images hang on the gallery wall, for what they are in themselves. If any one of them excites within you, emotions of happiness or surprise, tranquillity or unrest, joy or sadness, then in some small measure they have reached out to your "soul" and I shall be content with that, for, is not this the task of the artist?"

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