Northwest Institute for Social Change: The Blog

The $50,000 Camera

Today is the day. Rather than blog about my anxieties or expectations, summaries or thoughts, here is a piece I wrote at the beginning of our NWISC summer. At Timberline Lodge at Mount Hood, Phil and Erin asked us to interview a stranger:

When Robert Capa, the famous war photographer who stormed the shores of Normandy, was asked why he was a photographer, he merely replied, “Because I like people.” But John Kelly does it for the freedom.

Photographing his great black dog at Mt. Hood, under flocks of Tibetan Prayer Flags whispering beneath a great blue Western sky, photographer John Kelly fidgets with different buttons and dials. He searches up and down for the perfect angle, desperate to seek the perfect shot.

I soon found myself holding his surprisingly heavy Contax camera, photographing him and his two companions. I snapped, he looked, and didn’t like it, so I took another. Then he walked back, approved the shot, thanked me, and said, “You know, that is a $50,000 camera you’re holding.” All of the sudden it felt like a huge rock in my palms; this camera weighed more than several years of my college education.

He took his camera back and cradled it in his arms as he told his tale of fighting in the Vietnam War and climbing the Himalayas, all the while seeking solace through his lens. “It gives you a reason to be in a place and also it gives you an unbelievable entrée to meet people,” said Kelly. “You want to make pictures that other people will enjoy . . . and buy.”

Kelly wore a brilliant blue cowboy shirt with white diamond snap buttons, Wrangler jeans, and black and white soccer sandals that exposed his pale feet and overgrown toenails. His blue eyes sat deep under his faded red baseball cap as he lifted his camera to his brow to adjust the aperture.

Later, leaning coolly against a hollowed out tree trunk as a particularly long piece of prayer cloth above caught on the brim of his worn out cap, Kelly boasted about the celebrity photographs that have funded his savvy lifestyle. He mentioned the time he shot Bjorn Borg’s victory at Wimbledon, or when Robert Redford, a good friend, hired him to be the official still photographer in both The Horse Whisperer and A River Runs Through It. Kelly did not hesitate to describe his perfect portraits of Mick Jagger, Kevin Costner, and Princess Diana.

Yet, Kelly finds peace in his work. After discussing lifetime aspirations and feats, he looked once more upon the Tibetan Flags against the vivid Western sky and added, “I’m still looking to take a better picture, like I’m going to take a better picture right now, because I realized, this was the better angle,” and so he clicked once more.

We remained atop the snow-capped mountain swayed by a warm July breeze, but as my interview came to a close I had time for one last question.

“Why are you a photographer?” I asked.

He looked right at me and said, “It’s free. It’s freedom. I’m a free man and I do what I want to do.”

Be sure to come to the show tonight, there are some really captivating, inspiring pieces to see and hear.