In praise of shadows

“If light is scarce then light is scarce; we will immerse ourselves in the darkness and there discover its own particular beauty.” ― Jun'ichirō Tanizaki, In praise of shadows

A few years back, a friend of mine mentioned his reading of this book of essay “In praise of shadows” by Japanese writer Junichiro Tanizaki prior to his travel to Japan. I read the book at his suggestion. During my recent mentoring sessions with Elizabeth Greenberg, she noticed my interest in photographing at night and had read the book herself. She suggested I read Junichiro’s book again to get some inspirations. I readily agreed and found myself relating more to Junichiro’s ideas of embracing the darkness.

Junichiro Tanizaki is praised by some Japanese as the greatest writer among them. In his youth he was fascinated with the West. Since his middle years, however, he has turned strongly back to the Japanese past, and more than one of his novels can be read as a lament for a tradition that is being diminished by influences from the West. “In Praise of Shadows” (In-ei Raison) is a long essay published in 1934, in which Tanizaki sums up what he feels Japan has lost in becoming modern. In brief, it is his view that the traditional Japanese arts thrived in the shade, and that the glaring light of the Twentieth Century is destroying them.

I enjoy photographing at night during winter since there are fewer daylight hours. As my photography progresses, I hope to make compelling images by introducing fewer elements into the frame. This applies to what I point my camera at, but at the same time how I capture my image. I simplify my compositions by holding those two goals in mind: having fewer subjects in a frame, and having fewer or completely eliminating distracting background elements whenever I can.

When I photograph at night, the darkness gives me a stage to pick and choose what elements to include in my compositions much more easily. The lack of strong lighting allows me to hide parts of the frame and eliminate the details I choose to be invisible to viewers. Usually during the day, a normal scene will be busy, full of people, motion, detail, cars and so on. This gives us lots of materials to photograph, but there are times we wish some of those distracting elements were not there to complicate the composition. I build my composition around the main subject having it in the light and expose for it. Anything in the shadow then becomes dark, less visible, if at all. Our eyes are naturally drawn to the brightest part of an image. Shadows, absent of any details will help accentuate focus on our main subject by limiting distractions coming from the background.

Subjects shrouded in shadows also generate a sense of intrigue. So is the case when the subject itself is a shadow or silhouette.  Occasionally I embrace shadow clipping.  If the clipped detail is not important to the image and when it meets my intentions, I often times choose to clip the unimportant shadows purposely.  I find an image much more intriguing when not every fact or details are in view. When you hide something from viewers, it encourages them to ponder what goes on in the darker parts of the frame. I like to let viewers’ imagination run by using shadows to hide part of the scene, or to hide the subject in it, position the shadow so that the viewer is forced to imagine what goes on without all the visual clues in plain sight. Creating a sense of mystery gives your viewers the opportunity to make their own conclusions as to what an image means to them.

While I embrace all the modern conveniences provided by electricity during the dark winter months, but perhaps we can also take time to immerse ourselves in the dark nights, embrace the beauty of shadows and marinate in the moments of not knowing. In Junichiro’s words in “In praise of shadows”:

“I have written all this because I have thought there might still be somewhere, possibly in literature or the arts, something which could be saved. I would call back at least for literature this world of shadows we are losing. In the mansion called literature I would have the eaves deep and the walls dark, I would push back into the shadows the things that come forward too clearly, I would strip away the useless decoration. I do not ask that this be done everywhere, but perhaps we may be allowed at least one mansion where we can turn off the electric lights and see how it is without them.”