The Audience Will Come from Doc League on Vimeo.

I just came across this documentary about Tod Papageorge. I’d heard the name before, and had seen some of his photographs, but I didn’t really know much about him. I really enjoyed the video (it’s largely him speaking to an unseen/unheard interviewer).

A couple of scenes caught my attention:

About 17 minutes in he tells a charming story about his encounter with a dapper man, who turns out to be French, in Central Park. He attempts to strike up a conversation and through a little trickery eventually manages to do so. Towards the end of the conversation he says (in French) to the man: “Because of you I’m a photographer”. It was Henri Cartier-Bresson who Papageorge clearly admires saying “But Cartier-Bresson was one of the supreme beings. A totally realized human being. He was beyond most people in his capabilities. So that’s the level he was operating at I believe.”

Papageorge says this right at the end of the documentary:

None of my pictures are in any sense about the viewer. I never think about the viewer. I don’t care about the viewer. I’m really only interested in myself exploring the process of making what I consider to be a challenging, complex or simply interesting photograph. There’s never an audience – never an audience, which may be why, one reason why my career was in the shadows for a couple of decades. Because I never had that concern. I know you don’t believe me, but its true. The audience will come.

Well said Mr. Papageorge!