People Profile: James Whiting

In his second year studying photography, this creative is moving from strength to beautiful strength. Capturing crisp and striking scenes, James Whiting's work makes scrolling through my Instagram feed a pure delight. 

In this People Profile, James answers questions about his craft, interests, and motivations, allowing us to better learn about the man behind the camera.

-Beth

What is one thing you are excited about right now? 

Right now I’m really excited to be surrounded by such an amazing community of brilliant
creative people who are pushing themselves and their own ideas and mediums. And I’m even more excited to have some time to try to collaborate and involve myself with these amazing people and just help wherever I can, or at the very least give out some well deserved high fives. 

When did you recognise that photography was something you wanted to pursue? 

It first caught my attention when my little brother was getting more attention for some pictures he was taking than I was for mine, so naturally I just wanted to shoot more and come out on top.. But it was really a few years later of being just interested, and after I had started carrying a camera everywhere I went, that I started to find myself up at three in the morning dating and annotating all of my negatives that I thought I might have stumbled onto something a little important. 

In what do you find inspiration? 

Inspiration is weird in a lot of ways because it’s pretty difficult to pinpoint or even recognise. And it never seems to exist in just one way. I tend to find as much inspiration in great artists work and a great patch of light as I do in what I see or hear when I'm out running or wandering around. But each just result in a different type of inspiration. Also I’ve developed a habit of just listening to people talk whilst I’m shooting studio work. Stephen Fry and David Chang’s Google Talk’s have been on repeat recently. 

Your work often depicts the common, simple and otherwise ordinary, why do you choose to capture these scenes? 

I think it’s more of a way to just be honest and purely communicate how I view the world, and where I assign importance or value. It’s a good way to challenge myself too. I read something a while ago and what I gathered or produced from it was that it’s easy to take pretty photographs of pretty things. But if you can make an interesting image from something not inherently attractive either, then that’s something pretty special. 

What do you find rewarding about your work? 

The most rewarding parts of my work are the parts I can look back on when I’m old and just tell a good story. Talk about who someone was a certain time. Or where they were, or how they felt, myself included. To just communicate the feeling of a moment or idea that I was subject to, that will never happen ever, ever again is what I really value above all else. 

What are you most proud of, in regards to photography or otherwise? 

Ah I’m not too sure. Personal progress would probably be at the top of the list I guess. Both in terms of art, and not. But I suppose more specifically I’m extremely proud of any work I’ve had published or sold and to just know the people all over the globe that have helped with that. 

What do you like most about living in Melbourne? 

Some days I really like it because of the resources and energy it has and how everevolving it is. And it’s recent essence of a DIY mentality is really great. But it does get pretty overwhelming sometimes. There’s so much going on all the time and it feels really difficult to break into any industry cliques or even be on their radar at all. Half of the time I wish I was just in the middle of nowhere working on a house or a farm. 

What is something you want to do more of?

I really want to make more decisions that the person I want to be would make. That’s been a crucial goal recently. And everyday I’ve been trying to read a book, play an instrument and break a sweat, so I’d like to keep that up. The short answer though is travel. All I really want to is travel. And eat. 

What is your most prized possession? 

I’ve never actually thought about a prized possession. I know what the most expensive things I own are, but that’s not right. (I’m going to actually find it right now, just to grow a little thanks to this interview.) I feel like it would have to be my pin-board which has little pieces of my last few years stuck to it. Things like tickets, badges, a lot of prints with personal notes I’ve been sent from strangers around the world and a lot of personal notes too. My notebooks and a specific negative of my friend Josh that concreted my love of photography are also extraordinarily important to me. 

When do you feel most creative? 

Mentally I’m definitely most creative when I’m on the road or running. Just out in the world I suppose. But not entirely focused on what’s in front of me. But physically, I’m definitely a morning person in terms of actually creating. I’ll take 6am over 6pm any day.

How can we find out more about you? 

You can check out things like my site which is cargocollective.com/jameswhiting , my instagram instagram.com/jameswhiting , jameswhiting.tumblr.com or just drop an email at jamesrwhiting@outlook.com. Wow, I think that’s the most I’ve ever written my name at once. Absolute overload.