On August 30, 2014 the Martha Otero Gallery in Los Angeles held
a showing of photographs from Scott Caan’s most recent book, “Vanity.”
It was an absolute treat to be able to view some of the
actual photographs from the book. For those who are curious, I’ll include a
list of the photographs on display at the end of this piece.
I have always been drawn to black and white photography,
which is partly why I enjoy Caan’s photography. The other part is what he
chooses to shoot. It’s not surprising, really, that the majority of Caan’s
pictures are of people. As both a writer and an actor, I would imagine that
people must fascinate him, and Caan’s portraits certainly fascinate me.
One of the photographs included in the gallery was “Joanna
in the pool at the Oakstone, 2007.” Joanna is in the water, her back against
the edge of the pool, staring straight at the camera. The camera’s focus is
entirely on her, her eyes the focal point of the picture, the physical
background a blur. Her gaze is unflinching. Her eyes capture mine, hold mine,
and yet she is unreadable, despite how desperately I want to know what has put
that look in her eye, the set to her lips, the tension in her shoulders. The
photograph is a story, every detail a piece in a puzzle, the answer to which is
tantalizingly unknowable.
It’s easy to forget the photographer in this equation, that
the subject of the photograph is actually sharing a gaze with the person taking
the picture, filtered through a camera’s lens. Quite a few of the people in Caan’s collection
are staring straight at the camera, just like Joanna. Their faces are a study
in diversity, young and old, wrinkled and smooth, smiling and resolute. The
number of times I find myself staring straight into their eyes reminds me of
how often in life I don’t.
To meet another person’s gaze is to risk vulnerability, of
opening a door and inviting communication. Acknowledging someone else’s
existence or by contrast, having your existence acknowledged is not always a
safe or comfortable space. You may not like what you see or the attention you
might get. There is power in a gaze: Even that brief exchange of glances is
laden with cultural assumptions and expectation. We are taught that staring is
rude. We learn the hard way that it can be confrontational. But by staring at the ground instead of sharing
a glance with each other, we miss too much of the life that is constantly
swirling around us.
That Caan’s subjects feel safe enough to share that gaze
with their photographer ensures that his photographs never feel voyeuristic.
Caan does not shrink from his subject’s gazes and they don’t shrink from him.
Caan does not demand they smile for the camera, and it’s not just traditional
ideals of beauty that catch his eye. His photographs are not slick or artificial.
They are intimate sketches of humanity.
On page 105 is a picture titled “Medicine 6th and
San Jacinto LA 2007.” It’s a photograph of a man sitting on a sidewalk, staring
at the camera, as he shoots a needle into his arm (of what I’m assuming is
heroin or some other drug). His
expression is resolute, and like Joanna, unflinching. It makes me wonder so
many things. How Caan inspired this man’s trust to allow him to shoot it in the
first place. And by allowing to have his picture taken, what did this man want
us to see? What is his story? What happened that placed him on that street corner
and drove him to put that needle in his arm? When I look at that picture, my eyes keep
coming back to his eyes, to his face, and thus to a reminder that his life is
big and complex and that one moment in time, captured for eternity in that
photograph, is only one small piece of it and even that one moment, I cannot
fully know.
The beauty of “Vanity” is the way each photograph, each
captured piece of time, invites you to linger, invites you to marvel at another
person’s existence, and invites you to fail at guessing who they really are.
I marvel, too, at Caan’s abilities with the camera,
especially considering the way he explained his process to interviewer Mac
Sandefur: “I dig the idea of not knowing
what I got and hoping it’s good. I got 36 chances with a roll. If I’m out and about running and shooting on the street, if
I get one picture out of that I’m like, ‘I got something. We got a good
photograph.’ That whole thing is rewarding.”
In this digital age, it’s eye opening to remember that when
shooting film, you don’t know what you’ve captured until after you develop it. What
a wild dance it must be to see something that catches your attention, to snap a
photo or thirty, and then only after the moment is long gone do you know
whether you really had something…or nothing. Photography is life in 20/20 hindsight, and
one that can only be appreciated when it is no longer anything but a memory.
As for the opening itself: it was small and intimate,
populated largely, from what I could tell, with family and friends. I’ve seen a lot of book signings in my day,
and I’ve seen many when the numbers of friends the authors expect to come don’t
show up. Scott Caan’s friends showed up. And that says a lot. In fact, in my
book, it pretty much says everything.
List of Photographs:
Page 7: Christiana and Leopard at the Oakstone, 2009
Pages 12/13: Liz and heater at the Chateau, 2008
Page 24: Amsterdam Red Light Walk Alley tho, 2004
Page 26: Clear Port going somewhere
Page 27: Shallow Lane Museumplein Amsterdam, 2004
Page 33: Eight Hours Straight Prague, 2006
Pages 38/39: Jefe El Salvador, 2006
Pages 52/53: Going to California, 2012
Pages 60/61: Joanna in the pool at the Oakstone, 2007
Page 62: Mickey Avalon The Viper Room, 2007
Page 81: Camping Trip
Page 83: Steve Rudy Bagel Ford P16, 2010
Page 90: Lake Bird Chateau Hollywood, 2009
Page 117: Cloney Shoot Melrose Alley 2011
Pages 118/119: Duane Peters 80s Contest, 2010
Pages 130/131: Bird shoot in the Belushi Suit, 2009
Page 147: The one that got away on her Nikon, 2005
Page 153: Last Frame Ipanema Beach Rio, 2008
Pages 154/155: Atlantic Ocean 2005
Pages 158/159: Back lot super sport, 2008
Pages 166/167: Trailer Park Jacksonville, 2005
(My apologies to Mr. Caan for any errors in my very non-photographic memory of the photographs on the walls that night.)
