Photographer based in Birmingham, Alabama
Devin Lunsford, Portrait of the photographer
Tell us about yourself, what's your background?
I am a photographer based in Birmingham, Alabama. Growing up, I did not consider myself a creative individual or even capable of doing anything creative. I spent most of my youth crammed in a basement or dank DIY venue, shouting lyrics at punks with other sad boys, caring more about beating The Legend of Zelda than school. I picked up my first camera a little over ten years ago after being laid off and having too much time on my hands. I was hanging around some creative people, including a few photographers, who encouraged me to pick up photography and give it a shot. My grandfather gave me his old Pentax Spotmatic that he bought while in Vietnam and I taught myself the technical aspects online through various forums and message boards. After discovering the immense joy and sense of purpose that creativity brought into my life, I enrolled into school at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, where I pursued a BA in studio art.
Untitled image from the project "When We Break, How We Shine", 2022, Archival Pigment Print, 16x20
"The series focuses on the connection between blight, beauty, trauma, and the awe-inspired quietude of the American South that's been exacerbated by the pandemic."
Untitled image from the project "When We Break, How We Shine", 2022, Archival Pigment Print, 16x20
What are you currently working on and where did the inspiration for it come from?
I just wrapped up my most recent project, "When We Break, How We Shine." The project is a series of landscape photographs made throughout Alabama from March 2020 until September 2022. The series focuses on the connection between blight, beauty, trauma, and the awe-inspired quietude of the American South that's been exacerbated by the pandemic. The project sits in a photographic area between documentary, autobiographical, and metaphor. These images came from a place of necessity. They were something I needed to make to cope, endure, and keep myself mentally alive during a time of immediate change and uncertainty.
Untitled image from the project "When We Break, How We Shine", 2022, Archival Pigment Print, 16x20
Innovation does not only happen in the field of technology — it occurs everyday in a creative practice. What do you do for inspiration?
I love the photobook as a physical medium and I have an ever growing wall of them that I rotate out onto my coffee table from week to week. It's a great way to engage with photography, not just to see the images physically printed but to also see how artists play with sequencing, spacing, and sizing.
Untitled image from the project "When We Break, How We Shine", 2022, Archival Pigment Print, 16x20
Describe your practice and process. Where do ideas start for you? In the studio or being in the world?
I actively enjoy the act of exploring and photographing so I spend a lot of time driving around, listening to music, and searching for pictures. I regularly utilize a strategy developed by the French theorist Guy Debord called the deríve to discover locations to make work in. It is a method used to explore a landscape, an unplanned journey where you remove yourself from everyday concerns and engage with the terrain. Since the trip is based on impulse, it typically involves random, instinctual choices in direction instead of utilizing GPS or a reliance on familiarity. This method works for me as I have found that it leads to more serendipitous discoveries and allows me to see the often overlooked aspects of my home state. If a trip is particularly fruitful, I will save the location and return regularly to fully immerse myself in a particular area.
Untitled image from the project "When We Break, How We Shine", 2022, Archival Pigment Print, 16x20
How do you make your work, does it start with a sketch?
A project goes through various sketch-like stages for me. I rely more on the act of shooting and exploring during the beginning phases. Then it is more about finding a thread I can latch onto that connects them. Sometimes these threads can start from a song lyric, a book passage, a movie, a news article, or anything that gets the brain turning. I can then begin editing, shooting, and sequencing specifically for the idea.
I think my work has a very post-rapture feel to it and I like to make landscapes from the perspective of someone who was left behind. I am drawn more to the natural and to the marks people have left on an environment than I am to highlighting any set group of individuals. I find pictures that ask more questions than they answer to be the most alluring so my goal when making a project is to leave it more open in structure so it is in line with something like poetry as opposed to a purely documentary approach.
As to how I arrived to this style of shooting, I don't really know how to answer that as it is something that has gradually evolved over time. There are definitely influences that I work through that are subconsciously driving my choices and I have experimented a lot with different photographic mediums and editing styles over the years to discover what I find appealing.
Untitled image from the project "When We Break, How We Shine", 2022, Archival Pigment Print, 16x20
Do you have your own studio ritual? What does that look like for you?
After shooting and editing, I like to make physical objects out of my photographs and will regularly make prints at home. It's a good time to unwind, put a record on, and play with sequencing and sizing for a while.
Who are your biggest influences?
My wife and our home are a constant source of solace and reassurance for me. I don't think I could function as an artist if I didn't have her to help quell the doubt that I linger on from time to time, and a home that I find true comfort within.
Music has been a significant influence and major outlet since my teens. The path that led me here began with going to shows and having long drives with friends where all we did was listen to music. It is what introduced me to creative people, creative ways of thinking, and perspectives far outside of my own. Nearly every photograph I have made has had some musician blaring in my ears while I was making it.
Untitled image from the project "When We Break, How We Shine", 2022, Archival Pigment Print, 16x20
I was very lucky to take a class in undergrad years back under Jared Ragland called Photography in the South. I formed much of my photographic identity in that class and so many of the required readings, films, and lessons are ones that I still reference regularly.
William Christenberry and Walker Evans are synonymous with Alabama photography and it is difficult to make work here without indirectly referencing them in some way. They created the blueprint for what it means to make work here particularly in the rural South. I enjoy making trips out to visit Christenberry's Red Building in Hale county and the Sprott Post Office that Evans shot. It feels like hallowed ground in a way as the area surrounding these subjects is largely untouched and unchanged so there's this obscure energy you get from being able to stand exactly where they stood.
Robert Adams is a major influence and I love how he speaks and writes about photography. He has an intelligent but romantic point of view that I align with closely. His books "The New West" and "Summer Nights, Walking" were major turning points for me when I was starting to do deeper dives into the medium.
Over the last few years, the landscapes of J. M. W. Turner, Edward Hopper, and the painters of the Hudson River School, are aesthetically some of the largest sources of inspiration. They have such a deep affection and appreciation for light and depict it so masterfully.
Untitled image from the project "When We Break, How We Shine", 2022, Archival Pigment Print, 16x20
Are there books or films that are an important source of inspiration?
I love reading all genres of books but in particular all of Flannery O'Connor's short stories and her novel "Wise Blood" are huge sources of inspiration. Her words eloquently describe the South, with all of its humorous and horrifying contradictions, in such a clear and precise way. There are so many scenes that I have stumbled upon that feel like would come straight out of her stories.
There are way too many films to list out but I love the aesthetics of good sci-fi and horror, especially when it comes to how they handle a scene at night. Also anything by Stanley Kubrick, Andrei Tarkovski, Hayao Miyazaki, and Akira Kurosawa.
Untitled image from the project "When We Break, How We Shine", 2022, Archival Pigment Print, 16x20
Not a film, but video games have been an endless source of inspiration. A game I completed recently called "Norco", is one of the best Southern narratives I have ever experienced and you can tell the people who made it have a very keen sense as to what makes the South amazing but also troubled. It goes beyond what outsiders think makes the South fucked up and touches on the ways it truly is fucked up, particularly in how it highlights how institutionalized religion and big business have manipulated and decimated so much of the region.
Nude in Bedroom, 2022
What’s the best piece of advice you’ve been given?
To read the Paul Graham essay "Photography is Easy, Photography is Difficult." It's such a great essay for anyone that is starting out or who have found themselves stuck in a rut.
A choice quote from it:
"How do I make sense of that never-ending flow, the fog that covers life here and now? How do I see through that, how do I cross that boundary? Do I walk down the street and make pictures of strangers, do I make a drama-tableaux with my friends, do I only photograph my beloved, my family, myself? Or maybe I should just photograph the land, the rocks and trees – they don’t move or complain or push back. The old houses? The new houses? Do I go to a war zone on the other side of the world, or just to the corner store, or not leave my room at all?
Yes and yes and yes. That’s the choice you are spoiled for, but just don’t let it stop you. Be aware of it, but don’t get stuck – relax, it’s everything and everywhere. You will find it, and it will find you, just start, somehow, anyhow, but: start."
What is the best advice you would give to other artists?
Don't wait around for the art world to come to you because it's not going to be waiting for you. Make work, share it, ask for feedback, reach out to artists you respect, and go to museums and galleries.
Stay up to date with Devin Lunsford
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