The Dark Rooms of... Kees Molders
The Dark Rooms of... is an interview series in which a photographer talks about his or her darkrooms, the digital and the mental, or technical and inspirational. What makes you click?
In this fourth edition of The Dark Rooms of… we focus on Dutch photographer Kees Molders. If you haven’t read the other interviews, you can find them here.
Here we go.
Who are you?
Kees Molders, born and raised in Culemborg, the Netherlands (1955). Retired and busy with all kinds of things. I have been a hobby photographer since 1974. That means I grew up photographically with books on the New Topographics, the new American color photography and numerous magazines. I enjoy delving into photo criticism, photo reviewing and judging. I write articles about exhibitions, books and software, among other things, on my own website FotoCode.nl. My photo club is the Culemborg Photo Club Lek en Licht. I am also involved (off-topic) in historical cartography at a local historical society. When presenting the results of related studies, the knowledge of image editing comes in handy.
Technical
Do you think technique is important?
As an artist (cough) I am of course supposed to answer here that technique does not matter, or at least is secondary to the result. Which would be a falsehood, since in the 70s and 80s we swelled in primary and secondary imaging errors, achromats and Modulation Transfer Functions. I still have "The Lens Book" by Rudolf Smit of 1973 on my shelf. Surely our Panatomic-X of 32 ASA had to be processed in fine-grain developer. And many photographers are slightly gear crazy anyway. I can admire a nice body, although form follows function. Unsharpness in the corners - no thanks. I admit that smartphone photography is loosening me up from the craving for technical perfection.
What equipment do you use?
I had a time when full-frame was sacred; anything smaller than the 35mm format was basically not done. A credo from the analog era, I think. However, there is no need at all to lug around brick-sized cameras. I now have a small APS-C mirrorless camera with 56, 35, 14 and 8mm lenses. The latter is a fisheye; strange, by the way, that few people accept it. The whole stuff weighs around three pounds. Lately, I've been getting more and more interested in smartphone capabilities. Even budget mobiles these days have more lenses (wide angle!) and can shoot in raw.
And what software?
I still use Photoshop Elements (PSE) and for raw editing CaptureOne. I am definitely trying to get rid of Adobe because I have come to find it an unsympathetic company. I swore off Lightroom after the advent of subscription enforcement. The British Affinity Photo, which a reader of my website alerted me to, may well prove to be a replacement for Lightroom, PSE ánd CaptureOne. For less than thirty bucks without subscription. Furthermore, IrfanView is my file manager. I prefer to manage my photos myself rather than leave it to libraries and catalogs that bind you to a brand. On the smartphone, I use Snapseed.
How do you edit your photos?
Mostly the old-fashioned way, that is, in accordance with the darkroom of the past. I like to convert to black and white, using the color sliders as a 'filter'. Okay, a vignette will sneak in sometimes, but otherwise I'm pretty purist. I am not very 'creative', more like a craftsman. On the smartphone, by the way, I'm a little looser with fun filters and fake collodion stains, although I can't explain why one would imitate a wet plate in a digital way. Or now that I bring it up, contrarily why you would mess with chemicals when you are digitally ... well you get the point.
Inspirational
Where lies your heart?
With urban environments and New Topographics, followed at some distance by landscapes and portraits, although I still find the latter difficult because I don't tend to walk up to someone saying I want to do a portrait.
Do you have your own style?
Who am I to say so? Photography has its own vague language: style, imagery, handwriting. Everyone effortlessly adopts fashionable jargon from each other without being too precise about definitions. Anyway, the other day I found a nice description: Style is the sum of all creative choices you make consistently. I am happy when people recognize my work, but I fear that this recognition refers less to my creative choices than to my favorite subjects: there's Kees again with his cityscapes. So the answer is: I am not sure but secretly hope so.
Where do you get your inspiration from?
Mainly from photo books and exhibitions. From the Photographers Cafe Castle Woerden (red: a bi-monthly gathering in the Netherlands), where you are immersed in good photography and expert commentary. Sometimes from beautiful documentaries but YouTube is also a great source. Less from magazines. Don't ask about my favorite photographers? Neil Rantoul, Andrew Borowiec, Joel Meyerowitz, Stephen Shore, Gregory Crewdson, Thomas Struth, Stephan Vanfleteren, Sally Mann. Tomorrow may be different, but these are stayers.
Does your project start with an idea or with a loose image?
Well often with an extremely vague idea, I want 'something' with (insert here: rugged vegetation, urban landscapes with high-rise buildings, wide cityscapes, black and white shots of inner cities...). When I see someone else's fantastic picture, I perhaps avoid getting too frenetic in the same vein. While imitation is still a good school of learning....
When is your project finished?
When I get tired of the digital shuffling of photos. There does have to be an end to a project. You can take another look at your selection in a week, month or year and a different series is guaranteed to come out. Put an end to it. You have to learn to select, it's true, but for goodness’ sake don't take years... I also don't understand how people can spend decades on one project. If the series is not 'finished', at some point you are done with it yourself, aren't you?
During your project, do you already know how it ends?
No, but I don't find that very exciting. By the way, sometimes my projects only last one afternoon, projects is a big word and worrying about how it will end is not the highest priority. More important is to feel with your eye at the viewfinder whether you have a bite - you have to learn that too, by the way.
What is your favorite photo and why?
You don't mention whether it has to be your own photo. I choose the photo Church Street and Second Street, Easton, Pennsylvania, June 20, 1974, nicknamed Der Rote Bulli by Stephen Shore. For me, that photo illustrates what the New Topographics are all about: an extraordinary photograph taken in an ordinary place, where there is something to discover, that you haven't read too quickly. You can see the dentist's sign "DR. HARRY UNGERLEIDER DENTIST," a boy has made a wax stain behind the waiting room window with his breath. And then that red VW bus....
Of myself, I first wanted to choose a photo from 2018, but I figured I should have more recent work anyway... Hence the silo. A cutout from an industrial landscape along the street, with a windswept piece of paper - or whatever it is - that such a photo needs as an accent.
Future
What do you want to achieve
To submit a series to the Photographers' Cafe reviewers. Returning with red cheeks with new ideas. Enjoy photographing without compulsion or assignment, otherwise you are not an autonomous photographer. I mean: an assignment should feel like you came up with it yourself, otherwise you shouldn't start it. A few nice prints. Maybe make another photo book.
What do you want to know from others? You may ask one photographer one question. What would that be?
I'll come back to that one day 😉 The favorites we already know pretty well through interviews and documentaries, it would be strange if inspirational gems or worldly wisdom were left out there. Stephen Shore, for example, is not only a photographer but also a teacher, in some of the documentaries he shows well how he thinks and works. Two photographers in YouTube:
- Lecture Stephen Shore with Melanie Crane
- JOEL MEYEROWITZ Les Rencontres d'Arles 2017
Where can we see more
…and read: at www.fotocode.nl (in Dutch)
NOTE:
Kees is featured in the first issue of Darkrooms Magazine with his project ‘Rough Overgrowth’. You can read the magazine here:
That’s it for this newsletter
Do you like this interview? Do you want to see more? Send my some suggestions for photographers you like to see interviewed at Darkrooms. Of course you can suggest yourself if you have an interesting story to tell.