from the eMusings Archive...

Volume 13 • Number 2 • June 2020

Negotiating a Creative Path

by Huntington Witherill

The map is not the territory. –Alfred Korzybski

Given the wide-ranging aims of most creative endeavors, it should come as no surprise that the roadmap to artistic achievement tends to be, at best, a sketchy one. Owing to the fact that individual artistic journeys often require one to abandon previously established routes – the pathway to success is neither well defined, nor affirmatively assured.

Yet, despite the indeterminate nature of the route, itself – and not to mention the ongoing uncertainty of predictably reliable success – a well established and singularly optimal strategy for negotiating a pathway to artistic growth and accomplishment continues to persist. That strategy suggests that one endeavor to focus on the journey, rather than the destination.

Reflecting upon the lofty goals that I originally set out to accomplish with my own photography, it’s easy for me to look back to see that my chosen route – leading to what I initially perceived to be my ultimate objective – involved of a series of questionable paths which, due to a concurrent lack of real world experience, would invariably deliver me to a variety of false destinations. As it turned out, it wouldn’t be until after I began to reject the idea of having to know precisely where it is that I might be headed with my photography, that the idea of concentrating on the journey, rather than the destination, would be given an opportunity to prove itself as being the most effective way for me to negotiate the overall creative path, itself.

Metaphorically speaking, negotiating a predetermined creative path seems not completely unlike the act of driving down the road in an automobile that has been outfitted with an opaque windshield. With an inability to see what’s directly in front of me, the only way to gather usable information about where I’m headed will be to pay close attention to the rear-view mirror as a means to inform myself about where I’ve previously been. I could then, presumably, use that gathered information to suggest where it is that I might be going. OK… probably not the best navigational strategy (nor the most elegant metaphor) but, I trust you get the point. With photography, as with most things in life, what lies ahead is at least peripherally informed by what has occurred in the past.

In photographic terms, paying close attention to work that I’ve previously accomplished will, normally, be the only practical way to obtain clues about where that work might be headed in the future. Though obviously not the most reliable gauge, through the benefit of hindsight I’m given at least a rough indication about whether or not I’m sticking to whatever specific path I may initially have set out to negotiate… if that’s of concern.

Now of course, even with the benefit of hindsight, it stands to reason that any creative endeavor which does not, in some way, deviate from previously established routes will be an effort that fails to meet the basic aim of the endeavor, itself. The very definition of creativity prescribes the use of skill and imagination to produce something new. To me, that means that no previously travelled route will be sufficient to adequately inform what turns out to be an individual and ongoing process of self-discovery and personal reflection. When all is said, and done, it appears that artistic endeavors are predominately centered upon the act of creating a roadmap… for ourselves.

When I first took up photography, in 1970, I was predictably clueless in relation to the extent of my own naïveté. Like many, I suppose, I had my heroes and simply wanted to experience and emulate their various accomplishments. My understanding and appreciation for the journey I was about to undertake was, not surprisingly, shallow. When it comes to art, emulation is obviously not the loftiest of ambitions. It may be a good practice in the beginning (as a learning experience) but it’s not really a serviceable long-term goal. Candidly, my visionary plan (you know… the one where I become rich and famous, overnight) had been to see how quickly I could negotiate the learning curve so as to most expeditiously arrive at what could best be described as my own hazily perceived final destination. Prior to setting out on the journey, itself, I had given precious little thought to what that journey might ultimately entail. And to be fair, there’s probably no way that I could have known what was in store because, at the time, I had no direct experience from which to draw.

Nevertheless, and to no one’s chagrin but my own, I proceeded to engage a ten-year long snipe hunt before coming to the realization that my initial goals had been both short-sighted, and properly unrealistic. Given a full decade of having affirmatively achieved neither fame, nor fortune, I began to re-focus my efforts and attention on the process of simply being a photographer… rather than worrying so much about what turned out to be an accumulation of poorly conceived and personally illusive long-term goals.

It had become painfully clear that despite whatever modest level of talent, skill, and/or salesmanship I may (or may not) have possessed, those oft lamented worries about whether or not I might receive exhibition invitations, book offers, workshop teaching positions, and all the other trappings of what I perceived to be the spoils of a successful photographer – those worries had proven to be a pointless exercise. Such rewards, while sporadically gathered in small measure along the way, would continue to remain, for the most part, just beyond my own personal ability to specifically control, or effectuate.

Much like that elusive hundred-dollar bill tacked to the top of a greased flagpole, the rewards of fame, fortune, and notoriety that may (at first) have been anticipated would continue to remain just beyond my reach. And of course, that makes sense because, aside from the self-perceived accomplishment that we all must affirmatively attach to our own work, the communal success of any artistic endeavor remains largely dependent upon the overall judgment and purview of an audience of curators, critics, gallery owners, publishers, and otherwise discriminating (and perhaps not so discriminating) viewers and tastemakers who continue to maintain their own personally developed aesthetic sensibilities. They, of course, will (and must) continue to consult their own creative roadmap.

Suffice it to say, it wasn’t until after I came to the realization that free exercise of the artistic process, itself, was to be the only lasting (and meaningful) goal that I could affirmatively negotiate on my own, that I was able to let go of a lot of unrealistic expectations. By concentrating on the rewards of the journey, rather than worrying so much about the perceived circumstances surrounding what had proven to be a particularly vague and presumptuous destination, I was able to become more confident that the work I was doing was the work that I was supposed to be doing. And not surprisingly, that ongoing work continues to be the work with which I am most comfortable and familiar – and through which I am able to maintain the requisite level of passion that is absolutely necessary in order to sustain what has become a life-long pursuit. You see, as it turns out – it is the ongoing process of doing the work, itself, that has proven to be the greatest and most reliably attainable reward of being an artist and photographer.

In the final analysis, most long-term goals in life tend to be routinely revised in order to accommodate ongoing circumstances that simply can not be envisioned at the time those goals are initially charted. After all, if first inclinations truly were the rule of the road, I’d currently be an aging concert pianist – or if not, at least playing second base for the New York Yankees.


Huntington Witherill