I’ve been a photographer, in one guise or another, for the better part of 20 years. When you put that on paper, it sounds harrowing to someone who still very much sees themself as a kid. A bigger kid with cool toys, but a kid nonetheless.
Thinking on it a bit more, I’ve always been more, as is everyone that is forced to define themselves by just one activity. No one is just one thing, but to put a word on it seems necessary, yet always reductive. I guess I have always been a “creative”, though that umbrella term doesn’t explain much. As part of a creative species, it just somewhat suggests that I am alive, which as of writing this happily I am.
If this preamble sounds familiar, hey! You just found a member of your tribe welcome. If it doesn’t sound familiar and you are still reading for some reason, I assume you are trying to get to the point of all this. As are all of us. Such is life. But I won’t keep you waiting, you have of course humbled me somewhat by sticking around long enough to read these words.
I’ve been wanting to do something, everything and also not that much all wrapped into one, as a place to create, share, instil and distil interesting and potentially important work. Using multimedia avenues to reach as many minds as possible, with narratives that move us into collaboration and action. At any point in time, there are a thousand and one things you could do with your time, so much so that you regularly do nothing. I too regularly do nothing. But I always think about doing something. Anything.
The issue with having a subjective interesting thought, then letting it fester, and then slip away is a sadness I think we all have experienced. I’m sure the German language has a neat word that encapsulates it perfectly, but I’m going to call it “the indecisive moment”. The photography nerds out there will appreciate the Cartier-Bressonism, but I think it lends itself to the concept at hand.
This will be a place where a lot of my mess will land. I feel like the clean “this is my best work” type of website is perfect for landing clients and jobs, but it doesn’t tell you much about the person behind the work. One of the most interesting parts of any creative process is the journey in which you take to get there. The sketchbook of photographers across the profession has always been the most eye-opening part to me.
I present to you, my ongoing and active public sketchbook.
One of the best photographs of me taken by one of the best photographers I’ve known that was lost too soon.
My Beginning
The idea of RockDoveRehab (as opposed to RockDoverEhab, which was read this way many times on Twitch for some reason) came from the want to confuse and explain at the same time.
The common pigeon is only common because we gave it an easy win. The rock dove’s habitat is naturally a cliff, one of the most inhospitable yet fairly abundant landscapes in the world. And we gave them one in every manmade structure you see.
Their success is our success. It gives us a powerful, yet invisible mirror that shows how far humanity has come. With a little bit of luck and better leadership, than we seem to have at the moment, we’ll get to see how bright the future can be.
But the person behind all this was someone who performed incredibly poorly at school. Not because I didn’t like it, quite the opposite, I quite liked school. I was just bad at it. A straight C student. Dyslexia and a system that has over a hundred years to create better workers didn’t go together very well.
The first B I got was in photography at the tender age of 18…yes it took me 18 years to get a B in something. Like I said, school was not great for me.
Fortunately, the ability to look at the world through multiple lenses, other than the piece of glass you were looking through to take the picture, was given to me by mechanically recreating reality in front of me.
I was allowed to break things down to a speed I could understand, and then break them down further. Rebuilding notions from what I had, quite lovingly at times, broken.
I think there is power in dismantling things because you can. It allows us to understand things better. And with things like society, it is pretty hard to break stuff without endangering people.
This ability can conjure up potential futures in which things can be brighter. But it’s useful to see how things can be darker, and with humanity, things can always be darker.
It’s a flip of the coin which side of the shadow we’ll end up landing in.
“It is sometimes possible to change the attitudes of millions but impossible to change the attitude of one man.”
— edward bernays - (he did however go on to say stuff like…)
“The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organised habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in democratic society. Those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country.”
— Damn, Bernays…you cooold.
Projects: past, present and future
This is going to be the active space where you can see what I’ve done in the past (where you can see the journey), stuff the I’m currently working on (feel free to back seat and give me suggestions on the discord or by email!), and the future projects I want to be working on (by all means, if anything jumps out at you, let me know and we can figure out a way to collaborate.)
I want this space to be forever evolving.
conceptual trappings
My Mission
You know the saying “Be the change you want to see in the world”, it’s a great saying right? What does that look like? I don’t know.
One thing I do know is that if you use a little bit of theory, it’s easy to do. Apparently.
Ideological state apparatuses are pillars of society that prop everything up by soft force, largely using us [THE PEOPLE] as our social self-policing force. This governs what is socially acceptable without too much thought in your day-to-day life. These sets of assumptions and beliefs can be updated and changed.
Social movements, ad campaigns, political agendas, getting your co-workers to do their own bloody washing up. They all use the power of the people to affect change.
The mission, the goal, the life well spent using interesting projects to live vicariously though, while attempting to change my corner of subjective reality, is to try and bring as many people up with me in a world we all want to be a part of.
Join me.
20%
of the work creates
80%
of the outcome
100%
is currently potential.
The thing about this is it’s currently all potential, as is everything because it is conjured into existence by its creators.
The fact is, I am only one person, with limited time. The more time I can spend on the interesting things in life that could potentially change lives, maybe one day even the world (or at least a nuanced part of it), the more I can do the same for others. One can dream, I mean I pay for the website, get off my lawn!
“HOW!?” I hear you scream in existential agony. By addressing facts. As lame as that might sound. When something “is”, IT is tangible.
On the facts page, I want to collate things I find out in the wild to be true. Once it lives there, it is in the open. Whether it is good, bad, ugly or beautiful. We can look at it together, we can come up with a way to use it, change it, share it…stop it.
trouble in paradise
Get Involved
The party’s not over, it’s just beginning! If ANY of this sounds intriguing I welcome you to join me! You can hop on the discord, jump into the comment section of the YouTube channel, or email me to get straight to the point. Better yet get involved in the website itself!