Since arriving in San Diego about a week ago I have been streaming the Netflix political series starring Kevin Spacey called "House of Cards". It's not bad.

I am struck how pervasive photography is throughout the series. Every time we are taken inside someone's office or home there are framed photographs on the wall, usually black and whites. Is this because a Netflix producer is a fan of photography or is it that photography is now completely mainstream? I wouldn't be surprised if it was  both.

There is an archetypal photographer in the series named Adam; British, lanky and worldly, who's chasing Kevin Spacey's wife. He shoots famine pictures in Africa and he is much admired. This points to photography's legitimate place in the social hierarchy of political life in Washington, D.C.

Excuse the rambling but this thinking then led me to another inescapable truth and that is that with photography's place in the mainstream, we are all photographers. Think back to an earlier time, when black and white was art photography, that to make a good print in the darkroom was masterful and the print itself was magic. That using a big camera on a tripod with a dark cloth over your head was a sort of "validation" that you were serious, good and superior to those that used smaller amateur cameras. That print quality was its own validation of the quality of the photograph, however banal, boring and insignificant a thing it might be. (This last concept will be the object of a future post: Big Camera Bad Photographs.)

All that is so completely over it shocks me to think how fast it happened. When you read a post from me and look at an image I've put up it matters not one bit what it was made with. Smart phone, point and shoot, DSLR, 2 1/4, 4 x 5, 8 x 10. No difference. This screen-based world we live in now, at 72 dpi, is the great universalizer of our imagery and it levels the playing field, making it almost impossible to distinguish between the rank beginner and the veteran pro.

One would hope this might speak to perhaps a greater democracy in photographs being defined as "art". Excellence in imagery would presumably be the criteria. But this is clearly wishful thinking. The best photographs will "win out"? Probably not. There are too many people with positions of power with not a clue determining what will succeed and what will not. There are too many insider connections and favors being called in. Am I being too cynical? Visual art and photography specifically has to be way up there in "who you know-ism".

This brings me back to the "House of Cards" drama on Netflix. It is about how a senior congressman (Spacey) succeeds through  manipulaton, lying, scheming and scamming to get bills passed, friends into high office, or a library built in his name. 

Why would we assume that art would be any different?

To quote Kurt Vonnegut, "And so it goes".

I am headed off on a photo trip for three weeks to San Diego, CA. Those of you that know me know this is what I do. Go someplace, establish a base (usually a small house rental), hire a car,  and explore with a camera. I have no real ties to San Diego, but know northern California reasonably well and thought a trip to something new in February would be good. Besides, Boston isn't at its best in the middle of winter. San Diego is close enough to the Yuma, AZ area where I was last winter that I can get back easily enough. I plan on photographing the Imperial Sand Dunes again.

Will I post blogs while there? I don't really know. Probably, particularly if I get some pictures I care about. If you've been following, I have more Wheat picture posts to get out and I will finish those soon. I also have three photographer profiles to get out as well. 

An old friend and I were talking the other day about this trip. He and I have traveled together over the years many times to make pictures. I was saying that I might not photograph so much this time and he said, "yes you will" and he's right. 

I plan a future post on how to prepare for, pack for and organize travel so as to make pictures that are meaningful and contribute to your oeuvre. My fiend Lou Jones has written elegantly about this topic and he travels more than anyone I know. He has a great book on it called Off the Charts. This is something it is far too easy to do poorly... travel, take lots of photographs and come home with nothing worthwhile. I wrote about my own problems with this when I was younger in the the post Harry Callahan. I am thankful I learned this lesson early.

Next up: San Diego.

Many years ago, Bruce Davidson and I had a conversation about making pictures on the island. Bruce and his family have been coming to the Vineyard for many years.We agreed that it is a very very hard thing to do. Hasn't stopped me from trying, though. I have photographed on the island, on and off, for over 40 years. A long time.

Yes, there have been shows on the island (one with my mom, who was a painter, in 1978), but in recent years only a print or two here and there. Imagine trying to make landscape pictures, good landscape pictures, in a place like Nantucket, Bermuda, the Bahamas or Jamaica. Something done to death everywhere you turn. Quaint little fishing village? Check. Beachside sunset? Check. Seagull on horizon? Check. Quaint gingerbread cottages? Check. So, yes I shoot a lot but only very rarely get something worthwhile. To be honest, the only time I think I've done anything innovative of the island is the new ones from the air (MV Aerials). The  book we are working on now will be the new aerials of the island, out in early 2013.

At any rate, as the book will only be aerials, that makes anything shot while I was standing on the ground unusable. So, I am presenting some here that are made while being grounded, so to speak.

I've restricted what I am showing you to either 2011 or 2012 as a start but may go back farther in future posts.

Squibnocket Beach Parkng Lot, Chilmark

Middle Road, Chilmark*

Middle Road, Chilmark*

Vincent's Beach Parking Lot, Chilmark

Philbin Beach, Gay Head

Middle Road, Chilmark

Menemsha

Chilmark

Chilmark

Middle Road, Chilmark

I used to think of the pictures I made on Martha's Vineyard as a way of photographing that spoke to constancy in a changing world, with the premise being that by shooting on the island each year over a whole career my approach would change but the place would stay much the same. However, the island has changed so radically over the past twenty years or so that much of it is definitely not the same. The industry of fishing, for instance, has been devastated by decreasing yields and strict catch limits. Tourism is what drives the present day Vineyard economy and if you've ever been caught in a traffic jam in mid summer at Five Corners in Vineyard Haven you'll know exactly what I mean. I avoid the island during its high season July 4- Labor Day. 

So, while I think of Martha's Vineyard as being home and it is very beautiful it is not a paradise nor a place without its complexities, problems and challenges. This is true for its residents as well as those that own summer houses there. 

* Is that two photographs by Neal Rantoul that are blurry? Yes, it's rare but true. These were made with a Lensbaby. I am a big fan.

My last post on Portfolios (Take 2) ended with the beginnings of advice about what you can learn when you show your portfolio to someone. Please know this: "Portfolios" is a very big topic. I can really only scratch the surface here. It feels like this is worth a full chapter in a book.

Let me start with: study the person as they look at your pictures. What does their body language tell you? Are they tuned into your work or carrying on multiple tasks at the same time? Are they talking? Are they not talking? Are they fielding telephone calls? Are they talking to others while looking at your work? Are they bored? Are they really looking? Are you connecting with them? Where are they looking? At your work or somewhere else? Are they asking you questions? How are you responding? Conversationally? Are you providing context or anecdotes or are you working to set a tone of quiet contemplation? Are you nervous? Are you someone who talks too much when you are nervous or maybe you become too quiet? 

You get my message, I'm sure. Each time you show your work yes, you are bearing your soul, but you also have a responsibility to get what you can from the experience. This is the part where you learn whether your efforts are working or not. Do the people you show your work to agree which images are key and the stars in the portfolio? Do they "get" your sequencing? What about when they are finished? Does your time with them end well? Are you expecting them to give you the show, publish your work and give you a  MacArthur Genius Grant right on the spot or are your goals perhaps a little more realistic?

Notice how I'm not referencing who you are showing your work to here. Why? Because I don't think it matters.  If the person is the head of the National Gallery or someone you've just met, a friend or a partner, someone who knows everything about photography or nothing at all I think it is always the same. They will tell you, perhaps not always in words, something from looking at your work. Your job is simply to be sensitive and responsive to their message. 

Okay, so there are differences. If you are showing your work in a portfolio review session with 20 minutes for each review and you're showing six or eight times a day this is vastly different than sitting at your dining room table over a beer or a glass of wine showing new work to a trusted friend and fellow photographer. One is likely not supportive and the other probably is very. 

Finally, what is the take away here? I can't tell you specifically but can share with you that frequently what I think is a new but just finished series or body of work gets revised, some prints get reprinted, I will resequence the work and perhaps even change its title or rework it conceptually after I have shown it to several people.

Finally, finally. Don't expect unreasonable things from showing your work to someone. You might think the earth should stop turning when you show your work. It did for you when you made it, right? Well, not bloody likely. People can only give you what they perceive and they didn't make the pictures, you did. So no one is as close to the work as you are. Also, again from a career's worth of personal experience, no gallery director, publisher or curator is going to do much with your work the first time they see it. They need to know you are in for the long haul. They certainly are. 

Thus endeth the lesson. Whew! I hope this has been helpful. Let me know if it has, and even if it hasn't. I am new to this blogging thing and feeling my way as I go along. I know I would have loved reading some of this material when I was newer to the profession of being an artist. My intention is to share some of my experience with you to aid you in the process.

Update: Keep an eye out on this blog for notice of upcoming workshops in portfolio preparation I will be teaching through Digital Silver Imaging in Belmont, MA.  These will be day long sessions. You also will be able to find dates and course descriptions on their site (Digital Silver Imaging) about the first of the year, 2013. 

Once again, feel free to email me with questions, comments and suggestions: Neal's email

In this second installment on portfolios I will write about different kinds of portfolios and different forms of presentation.

But first a story. Back in August I met with Katherine French and Jessica Roscio, the head of the Danforth Museum and its curator, respectively. I had just returned from photographing wheat fields in Washington and we were meeting to flush out the show coming up in April, 2013, which, you guessed it, is Wheat. I had thrown in about 150 files from the recent trip to the Palouse of wheat on my iPad in case they wanted to see them. I had also made a couple of prints to show them. We looked at the prints and then Katherine asked if I had anything else to show. I pulled out the iPad, set it in front of them and let them start sweeping through a great many pictures. After looking at a few, Katherine turned to Jessica and said, "Don't you just love the iPad?"

To someone like me whose whole career has been print based, I heard her say this with some dread. But look at it from the museum director's point of view. What better way to get through a large quantity of images to choose a show? 

So, things change. When I review portfolios either one on one or at NEPR (New England Portfolio Reviews, held every spring in Boston, is a collaborative effort of the Photographic Resource Center [PRC] and the Griffin Museum of Photography) I will only look at prints. Why? Because prints are still the ultimate determiner of quality. Make a good print and you show that you know what you're doing. 

However, there are clearly circumstances where an iPad,  a website, an on-demand book, a screen-based slideshow are excellent ways to show your work.

My point is here that it is most important that you do your homework. Know who you are about to show your work to and research their preferences. Also, know what you want from the person you are showing your work to. Want a show? Want to know if the work moves them? Want to get the work published? Want their advice about what to do with your work? Want to know how to make it better?

So, I've written about different forms of presentation and, somewhat peripherally, about different kinds of portfolios but I probably should try to be a little more specific here. Foremost is usually the question about what to include, one body of work or representative examples of several groups. Again, this can only be answered by considering your intention and who you are showing the work to. As a general rule, think of a time frame of 20 minutes or so in which to show someone your work.This means that 30 or 40 prints is way too many. Think in terms of 20 or so. Play it through as a kind of rehearsal: introduce yourself, open case, explain the work, give him/her some time and space to look at the pictures, perhaps with asking you some questions along the way, some time for a conclusion, a conversation about what could be next, a thank you and a good bye. That's a lot to fit into a short time.

I am going to end this installment here but want to add one more thing and this is perhaps the hardest pill to swallow. Photographers suck at knowing what their best images are. We are too close, too involved, have some silly anecdote about how hard it was to get this picture or what we had to do to get that one. So what we need to do is to show our work to anyone that will look at it and learn from that experience. Their reaction to your work is key. This will give me a good place to start off in Portfolios Take 3.