“If you want to really hurt your parents, and you don't have the nerve to be gay, the least you can do is go into the arts. I'm not kidding. The arts are not a way to make a living. They are a very human way of making life more bearable. Practicing an art, no matter how well or badly, is a way to make your soul grow, for heaven's sake. Sing in the shower. Dance to the radio. Tell stories. Write a poem to a friend, even a lousy poem. Do it as well as you possibly can. You will get an enormous reward. You will have created something.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, A Man Without a Country
It's estimated that approximately 880 billion photographs will be uploaded to the internet this year alone. That's 126 photos for every human on the planet. We're drowning in a tsunami of digital photographs. It's clear now that the budding photographic artist hoping to have their work seen is up against impossible odds. Photographs that do garner wider attention tend to be either garish, shocking, or controversial in some way. Quiet photos that require time and contemplation, float by unnoticed in the collective photostream, like a single drop of water in a raging river. Now, more than ever, the only answer is to do the work solely for your own enjoyment and edification, or as Vonnegut so eloquently says, “to make your soul grow”.