Deafness and Photography

Someone asked me recently whether I would be so keen on photography if I had perfect hearing. I found it rather hard to answer that question as I've been deaf all my life and have never had perfect hearing. We all do things in life, the things that shape us, through our own experiences, some that aren't of our choosing, and we all tend to bend towards those that we are good at or are easy for us. If we have some sort of ability for something in the first place, then we tend to hone in on that ability and perfect it.

I'd like to think that I would still be involved in photography if I wasn't deaf, but I can't help think that if I had hearing, my life woud be totally different to what it is now. If I were hearing I'd probably have a university degree, married with 8 kids, living overseas, and doing something musical.

All those things I'd have liked to do, but in some small way each one has been affected by my deafness. I didn't go to University because back then I wouldn't have heard the lecturers, and notetaking was considered a form of cheating.

I'm single because (amongst other things) the men I have met haven't been able to cope with deafness that well, and I tend to get the feeling that men would like their females to be perfect, even if they're not that perfect themselves. Thats fine by me, I'm happy with my own company and I would rather be single than be with the wrong person.

I'd have loved to live overseas, somewhere other than New Zealand, but the opportunity never really presented itself, and I wasn't confident enough because of my lack of hearing to uproot and try.

And lastly - I would have loved to be a music performer, as I played the piano well, but I realised from a very young age I would one day be totally deaf, so I didn't pursue it hard enough. Sure Beethoven was deaf, but remember he went deaf much later.

So I can say with certainty that deafness has shaped my life to what it is today, and part of that shape includes photography which I'm passionate about. In fact, I think deafness and photography go really well together and I'm surprised not more people in the deaf community aren't serious photographers.

Being Deaf/deaf/hard of hearing/hearing impaired (whatever you see yourself as), makes us very visually aware. We become in tune with our surroundings whether it is with a group of people we communicate with, with sign, or visual clues, body language and lirpeading, or whether we are in quiet surrounding with no one about. For the latter we then became aware, for example, not of the bird singing, but of it's movement and behaviour. We will often see what hearing people don't. A hearing person may hear the bird, but not look, just simply knowing that the bird is there. We will see the bird, and often watch it to see what it does.

I'm aware of two instances that are clear in my mind today, as if they happened yesterday, where I became convinced that people with good hearing, are simply oblivious of what is around them. The first was I was walking up our main street many years ago when it was busier than it is today. It was a summer evening and we had finished work and on the way to the pub for friday night drinks. I was with a group of my workmates, all with good hearing. In front of us, was a 'golden couple'. Impeccably dressed with expensive clothes (you could tell), the male and female had their arms around each others waists. She had a perfect figure, and was very tanned, and was wearing white shorts - very short shorts so you could see where the top of her legs ended and her backside started. We were all watching them as they walked in front of, each admiring the view that was personal to them, when the female reached around to her backside and scratched it. Yet I was the only one who saw it. I cracked up because the then 'perfect' scene was ruined. Not one of the others in my group had seen it, yet they were all 'looking'.

Perhaps I was the only one admiring that particular view which is a bit of a worry in hindsight!! But it was really mind boggling to me that no one else in my group saw it happen.

A few years later I was at the zoo in the New Zealand Rainforest Aviary. There was a rare NZ parakeet were feeding up in the tree right above the pathway, yet I was the ONLY one who saw it. The other people within the aviary were completely blind to the fact that they walked under a branch with one of these gorgeous birds right above them, yet they never saw it. As an experiment, I called one back showed them, and asked if they had seen it before then - but no - they hadn't and were grateful I had showed them.

So my photography is like that - I capture things that people aren't aware of, or they are aware of, but try and present it in a different way, or angle. Or maybe I take something that people see every day, and they take for granted, and I present it so they are able to see that something in a different light.

When out with my camera, I don't have to talk to anyone, or converse with anyone which is great - it's me and my camera, although more often than not, strangers will talk to me about my camera gear and email addresses might be exchanged. I will often be given a camera by complete strangers to take photos of them in the current surroundings, these people are nine times out of 10 Japanese and no words need to be exchanged to what they want.

Photography doesn't come easy to me. I look back at the images I took ten years ago and cringe, but then remember that through trial and error and looking at work online, I have improved slowly and surely.

I will never take the world by storm. I doubt that anyone will remember my work in my lifetime or after, but it gives me a great sense of pride and achievement when I get something right and makes others look at an image and go 'wow'. More often than not, I'm surprised to get that kind of reaction but I have realised over time that art and images are very personal, and what one person dislikes intensely, another will love it. I now find the reasons why one loves or hates an image, more interesting than the image itself, and enjoy reading the reactions of people on my two art sites - deviantart and redbubble.

If you would like to see my images, then you can go to my photography blog. I upload one image per day so it's ever changing.

Cheers
Robyn