“I prefer to work
in black and white if it
has to do with poetry
or anything other than
specific reality.”
–Leonard Nimoy,
American actor, director
and photographer, most
famous for playing the
character of Spock in the
Star Trek franchise.“I just have such a
love of the tactile and
sensuous quality of a
black and white silver
gelatin print.”
–John Sexton, American
fine art photographer“When you
photograph people
in colour, you
photograph their
clothes. But, when
you photograph
people in black and
white, you photograph
their souls.”
–Ted Grant, known as
the father of Canadian
photojournalism.“I like B&W
films. I don’t
exactly know
why—probably
because there is a
stylisation which
is removed from
actual life, unlike a
colour film.”–Norman McLaren,
Oscar-winning
director and
animator.SHOOTING TECHNIQUEAPRIL 2015 BETTER PHOTOGRA PHY75
Nostalgia and Why We’re Drawn to B&W
The medium has a classic, timeless quality to
it. Why does it evoke such nostalgia? Why do
we hold on to the past?
Frank Lentricchia, an American critic,
novelist and film teacher in The Sadness of
Antonioni, a novel set in the vein of director
Michelangelo Antonioni’s films, wrote:
“Our personal past is only available to
us now through black-and-white film, it’s a
medium for communication with the dead,
including our dead selves, the way we used to
be, which is why we’re drawn to it.”On Slowing Down
Frank Miller, an American artist and the
creator of Sin City, a graphic novel and also a
film made almost entirely in B&W thinks:
“Working in black and white, I realised
that the eye is less patient, and you have to
make your point, and sometimes repeat it.
Slowing things down is harder in black and
white, because there isn’t as much for the
eye to enjoy.”On Choosing Mediums
Paul Outerbridge, noted for his experiments
with colour photography said:
“One very important difference between
colour and monochromatic photographyis this: in black and white you suggest;
in colour you state. Much can be implied
by suggestion, but statement demands
certainty... absolute certainty.”
And as Sir Ridley Scott, the creator of
films like Blade Runner, American Gangster,
and Thelma and Louise said:
“Life isn’t black and white. It’s a million
grey areas, don’t you find?”Lewis Hine Gaspard-Félix TournachonRoger Fenton