Life as a colorblind (photographer)...

Usually I am an open book…

An old book by by now… Well not that old. But let’s say old enough to know better and young enough to still make mistakes.

But there is one subject matter I actually I don’t talk about that much. And that is that I am literally colorblind.

I don’t know why I don’t talk about it that much, because in general I am happy about who I became as a man. So it is quite strange. Maybe it is because it sometimes still bothers me…

I made peace with it the same way I did with most parts of my life. But sometimes the nagging still arises.

And sometimes the nagging and the bother even hurts.

I remember that one night I was sitting on my couch and I was looking at the work of Tania Frano Klein and a tear rolled down my eye because I realized I could never ever create something like that in my life. Even if I summoned all of my Dutch strength and pulled the heavens and earths and the rivers and mountains together to create a new world it still wouldn’t matter.

Or when I look at the photographs of my friend Thana and I see her color work. And it makes me happy because they are beautiful, and makes me sad at the same time because I can only explain to her how it makes me feel but not what I see.

My eyes are my eyes and they will never change…

It sometimes even makes me feel guilty because I want to honor what the artist has intended.

And even if you want to explain it what you see, you just can’t. Because everyone else does see color. So no one will ever understand you.

Well that is a bit of a depressing start of a story isn’t it?

But hey, it’s 2021. So that means as a man you can talk about your emotions as he pleases. Even when you were a strong spandex wearing Olympic Weightlifter at one time… A man should be allowed to have big muscles as well intellect.

So what color is this?

The story get’s better. No worries… Or, at least I hope…

Most likely haha.

The one question I always get the first time when I tell someone that I am colorblind is: “What color is this?“. I can tell you right now, it is the most annoying question in the world!

What color is this pen?

I don’t know…

What color is my shirt?

I don’t know…

What color is this strawberry?

Red…

See, I knew it! You are not colorblind!

No dumbass. I know that strawberries are red like everyone else in this world…

One of the tricks that you learn how to deal with it is indeed memorize what color certain objects have. Grass is green, strawberries are wild. And red of course… And with traffic lights I need the bottom one and the brightest one.

In Lightroom and Photoshop you use values. Because digitally everything has values. And if you need red you just use #FF0000 or 255, 0, 0…

That helps a lot with commercial work.

My ego…

When I started out with photography I forced myself to shoot color. But I should have known better… During the weird but interesting journey that has become my life I learned plenty of lessons and one of them is never force yourself to be someone you are not. And that means as a human, or a certain situation that you are in. Remove yourself from it or it will eat you up alive.

And I still did. I wanted to shoot color soooooo bad. I looked at books of Joel Meyerowitz, Jamel Shabazz, or Martha Cooper and I was like I want to do that too!

But it was no use.

It didn’t fit me.

No matter how hard I forced myself. It just wasn’t a good match… Not even when I discovered film photography and setting your white balance suddenly became less important.

Luckily I learned though and I embraced it in my art. No more color photography for me…

Embracing my weakness and seeing it as my strength gave me the same results as it did in previous situations and parts in my life. It gave me a better standard of life…

No more stressing out.

No more looking for things that aren’t there.

No more chasing a unicorn.

If there is a god he wants me to be happy and not sad. Especially not because of “rules”.

It feels very good to not to have to pretend anymore that you are happy with what you do or who you are. Just being unapologetically yourself… Paradiso.

The beauty of the whole situation…

Contrast… That apparently I can see very well. Most likely in my own way… But shooting black and white photography has so many layers….

Black and White photography has become the one and only thing that matters to me. And when you learn how to use that contrast you can put the techniques of the old master painters to use and you instantly have another dimension to work with. Originally used in color, but works very good in Black and White.

That doesn’t mean that color sucks.

But what you see a lot in color photography is that is used as a crutch. Especially now that a lot is online. Social Media and all of your smart devices are designed to release dopamine. And most color work has the same effect. In some galleries they even curate like that and it looks more like an Instagram feed now.

Fun fact: People spend an average time between 15 and 30 seconds at an artwork in a gallery or museum. And you need around 4 minutes and 8 seconds to actually get it. The average dwell time on Instagram for a picture is less than 3 seconds and even shorter for your story. That’s around 0.3. So what the fuck are we doing?

I think it was Richard Avedon that said something like: ”Anything is an art if you do it at the level of an art”. And what he means by that is that everything that is done in excellence is beautiful. Good photography, good BBQ, good dancing.

So good color work is good and beautiful color work. It means that the entire purpose of what color is being used is thought of and has a function to, for example: let you feel a certain feeling. Too bad I can’t see it tough.

But there is something about the rawness of black and white. It is just you and the photograph. You need to make an effort to understand it. You have to take your time. You need to decipher it.

And if someone or something makes an effort for you.

Or to understand you…

To understand your art.

That is priceless!

I cannot think of a higher honor than that.

Good life lesson as well btw. If someone in your life makes an effort, keep them around… Those people are rare… It means it’s good folk.

So what can you see?

I have no fucking idea…

I stopped matching my socks a long time ago…

The interesting thing is that I am sure I am not the only one with this condition, and 1 in 11 men has some sort of a form of color blindness. Maybe not as intense as my version, but that is still a lot of color blind dudes.

Hopefully me writing about it helps other men talk about it and deal with it. Not only in the artistic field but men in all professions.

But from what I discovered is that not everyone knows that they are because most cases are mild…

I can honestly say that color is the least important thing in my life…

Having my eyes is not something I chose. I was born like this… And all the fancy glasses and apps cannot solve it. The only way how I will ever properly see color ever in my life is when Elon Musk hooks-up the Neuralink device to my brain and I get camera sensors in my eyes…

And that is I believe where the beauty comes in.

When I see a beautiful old car I can describe it in full detail.

I will tell you about the passenger who was in it. The chrome. The buttons and the buckles…

The leather seats and the rims.

Even if it was driving fast or slow and if the window was cracked…

And that is how I look at people as well.

I was at a BLM rally last summer, and one of the speakers said: “And even if you are colorblind you can still see the difference between white and black!”

And I was like: No man… That is not how it works…

You have never seen the world through my eyes…

Same as I never seen the world though yours…

Not to dilute anything about your message and and the cause and make it less meaningful. But color is literally the least important thing in my life because I have never experienced it like a normal human being.

I have never ever experienced the green of the grass…

I have never ever experienced the beauty of the autumn leaves…

I have never ever experienced the color of someone’s eyes…

I just know that they are beautiful…

I just know that they make an amazing sounds when I walk through them and I want to roll in it…

I just know that it smells nice when it is freshly cut…

If you are a man with a hat… Or A woman in a dress…

And most importantly. If you were nice to me… It is all I care about. And if we ever cross paths and I like you, I can describe your entire soul.

*P.S.

I am writing this pas a bit later than the rest of the post but I just read an interview with one of my friends in Myanmar and it really broke my heart. She send it to me today and it took me a while to digest and I felt the need to address it.

The situation is really bad over there and unfortunately there is no hope that the Junta will leave soon. A lot of people are dying and a lot of people are worrying about their food.

The sucky thing is that I am powerless…

I want to do so much. And I wish nothing but the best for the people of that beautiful country. But I just don’t know what to do… Except to talk about it and hopefully it lands somewhere where it needs to land.

If I had a magic wand I would make all the troubles go away… I would make the proxy war in Yemen go away and made sure all the people would have food. I would help the people who went through the Gulf war and later Isis as well because I have friends in that region like Iraq as well. I would help the people who had their homes take away by natural disasters and are trying to rebuild everything. I would help Tibet preserve their beautiful culture. I would get rid of all walls including all firewalls…

There is so much shit going on in the world on. It goes beyond words. So let’s find a way to make this world a better place.

People just need to be free…

~ Cristian

Here you will have a photograph that is already published in my project page of “Memories of a man once there…“ The thing is I not getting much enjoyment out of posting my photographs on social media anymore… There are many reasons for that. But one of them it seems to be diluting hard work. There is a difference in making art or content. And I don’t make content. One day I will write an article about it. But that too needs to be done well otherwise it will be become quickly become a complain piece instead of something that adds to the conversation. Plus like I always say: A photograph is not a photograph until it is printed.

Some work in progress… Started trying out new papers instead of the ones I regularly use. Satisfied until so far… A photograph is not a photograph until it is printed.