My earlier photography visualized street and documentary photography. Always lively, these photographs were mostly candid and oftentimes visceral. Nothing fancy, they depicted and conveyed life as a stage where people experienced firsthand its grandness right before their eyes. Exposures on the works of Garry Winogrand, Elliott Erwitt and Robert Frank brought further inspirations to me as they capitalized on the real meaning of life in America.
As time moved on, my desire for art photography grew as I further explored my inner spirit and life’s challenges. The work of Masahisa Fukase's The Solitude of Raven is not only very powerful, it is dark as well. He visualized and related his life’s challenges across while this one struck my inner core as I connected it with my difficult upbringing due to disability (hearing impairment).
Brent Washa Photography continues
My affair with photography continued when I studied under the instruction of Linda Connor at the San Francisco Art Institute. She taught a year-long course on sacred and profane photography. Spiritual photography was a totally new avenue for me that opened a new way of life. It was serenity and peace captured in every click of the camera. My night landscapes installation project was all about connecting with nature and finding peace and solitude within oneself. Working with nature and all its phenomena proved to be a liberating experience. And seeing how beautiful nature evolved before my vision encouraged me to practice meditation which helped me to let go of some of my deepest fears.
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After graduating from the Art Institute, I went back to documentary photography as I took on a project about Burning Man. A departure from sacred photography, my works here depicted diversity and all its uniqueness as Burning Man does not quantify nor qualify. It is all about creativity as one sees it. This Burning Man project is an awakening for me. Creativity knows no boundaries and I witnessed self-expression here that further inspired me to tackle photography in a totally different perspective. For anyone who is unfamiliar with Burning Man, it is an annual gathering of art enthusiasts in the Nevada Desert to commune and celebrate the arts. This is an art within the arts itself. It encompasses limitless display of creativity in all its grandeur.