QUYEN 'S SPACE

"A photograph is the pause button on life." 

                                                                                        -Ty Holland

        Click… churrr. The photo of the beach in the morning comes out from the Polaroid camera to your hand. The sun peeks up over the waves; the blue color of the ocean stretches endlessly, reflecting the clear blue of the clouds in the sky; the sand sparkles in the sun like it's hiding gems; and a group of seagulls flying over the horizon. By just looking at the photo, you feel everything is stopping at the moment, and all your thoughts are focused on the photographs. Are you feeling lonely standing in the middle of the vast beach? Or are you feeling peaceful in your mind? When you are in an endless cycle of worries and noises of everyday life, you realize that a photograph can help you slow down, look more closely at every movement of life, listen to the breath of the world, and then carefully capture every precious moment making it become eternal. 

        Have you ever wondered why we need art for life and why is art important to our culture? Art in one form or another has existed in our society for a long time and has great educational meanings. Art has a great influence on our souls and emotions, which shape our moral values. Art in the simplest terms is a way to communicate and it is also another means of expressing ideas and sharing information. In the modern era, we find ourselves saturated with ideas through different art forms like painting, drawing, but we seem to have forgotten that polaroid photography is also a form of art that brings much help to life. While Polaroid photography may not be the first thing that comes to mind when you think of art, it should take its rightful place in that world because it is a form of self-expression and has high memory value since it records the history and preserves memories of the present, and also can be used as a form of therapy. 

        The value Polaroid photography brings is not only in an art form; it is also a way to express self-expression. Each Polaroid photo may not mean much by itself, but when we look at them all together, they can tell a story - the most realistic story that the photographer wants to convey. Helen Kantilaftis, in her article "The Polaroid," asserts that many of "[David Hockney's] larger images are made up of a collection of smaller Polaroid photographs, which he connects together to create one cohesive scene." David Hockney used Polaroids to assemble more established forms of art. Each Polaroid photograph is not only a representation of life, but it also has a significant story behind it. These photos were created with the purpose to show the viewer the scenery and the meaningful stories through the artist's eyes. In addition to their inclusion by modern artists, Polaroids are art because they are different and unique. According to Julia Scully's article "Can you take out insurance against the hazzards of self-expression?," it indicates that many photographers have "used the street as the subject for [their] life's work: Henri Cartier Bresson discovers moments of lyrical beauty there; Harry Callahan finds loneliness and anonymity; Weegee recorded violence and human folly; Stephen Shore sees a featureless landscape of signs and ugly buildings." These Polaroid photographs have a high potential transmission. The photographers here all look at the same scenery and build photos of the same subject, but they evoke different meanings because they view it through the filter of their own emotions, experiences and personalities. The effectiveness of communication between photographers and viewers basically depends on the photos themselves and a lot of the established world of photographic art included Polaroids as legitimate artworks to express their feelings and ideas in our society. 

        In addition, Polaroid photographs have high memory value since they record the history and preserve memories of the present. According to the article "The life of the party," if photography "indeed concerns issues of time--life and death, memory and forgetting--then the radical repositioning of time by the Polaroid cannot be overlooked" (Trotman 2002). Since each moment only happens once, Polaroid photographs directly represent the value of an important moment in our lives as it emerges immediately after being captured and lasts only once. With a Polaroid, we can capture a subject or a moment with its own characteristics that can be somewhat meaningful and memorable. According to the article "Take a Picture: Polaroid Captures Brand Licensing," Polaroids "bring people together and enable them to make meaningful connections around shared experiences… with our families, friends and loved ones in the modern world" (License! Global; London, 2020). I myself have had valuable and unforgettable experiences with a Polaroid camera. I love using Polaroid to take photos, and I always take advantage of taking photos when traveling, at work, even when eating because I want to save those interesting things to share with my family. For me, my family is very important, and I believe family is the solid spiritual support of many people. Family is the place where each person's love resides; this is also the place where members share joys and sorrows, as well as a cradle to protect us from the storms of life. Understanding the value of those moments, the "moment" of all members of the family together, is a wonderful moment. And to preserve these precious things, I always choose to take family photos whenever we have the opportunity to gather together. In the face of the hustle and bustle of everyday life, family photos have great power. Family photos are probably pictures that no matter how many times you see them later, you still don't get bored, and the older you get, the more you feel the value of these photos every time you see them. For me, taking photos is a way to permanently preserve what I want to keep, and using a Polaroid helps me discover more things that seem normal but incredible and love this life more. 

        Furthermore, Polaroid should be considered a form of art since it can be used as a form of therapy. Although many might think that taking a photograph is simply a way to entertain, nevertheless, it can help develop children's cognitive skills. According to the article "Learning to be: A look into the use of therapy with polaroid photography as a means of recreating the development of perception and the ego" by EllenNelson-Gee, "Polaroid photography can be used as a means of concretizing the various components of the perceptual/cognitive process and organizing these components in such a way that the process can be recreated mechanically within the damaged child." Polaroid is considered as one of the ways of aesthetic education for the comprehensive development of children through which children develop their perceptual, senses, cognitive, and creative abilities. Polaroid is also the expression of children's attitudes and feelings towards the world around them. In addition, Polaroid photography is also a great way to recover or treat people who need to get back on track in life and recover from psychological damage. According to Kimberly Chou's article ''Polaroid Memories of the Pines; Tom Bianchi's Fire Island Photos Finally See the Light of Day,'' Tom Bianchi, "After shaking his initial shyness about taking pictures of his friends, [he] began documenting all aspects of life in the gay Pines enclave where he spent his summers--the love, the partying, and the natural splendor of the barrier island 60 miles east of the city, where a deep sense of community was available to many who felt closeted or stifled in their everyday lives.'' Back in the day, many people gave negative attitudes, prejudice, and discrimination toward bisexual individuals. Tom Bianchi's works using an SX-70 Polaroid camera criticizes contemporary controversial attacks toward bisexual individuals appealing to create a community that was based on affection and respect and the support for the LGBTQ community. Everyone has different ways of expressing their emotions, whether it's happy or sad. Sometimes, just by using Polaroid to create specific photos reflecting the right mood, many people can find solace and share. 

        Although there are a lot of advantages of Polaroid photography to be considered an art, opponents agree that it is dangerous to use Polaroid to take photos, and it is nothing more than just a private picture. Opponents believe that Polaroid photography should not be considered a form of art. According to the article ''Instant gratification: Florian Kaps celebrates the magic of Polaroid-- and describes how he rescued it from oblivion'' by Florian Kaps, it is dangerous to drop Polaroids' films and everybody "had to accept the disturbing fact that their images were shared with strangers the moment they dropped their films at the counter." Despite the fact that it will be very dangerous if a stranger gets our Polaroid photos, we must also consider the uniqueness of Polaroids. In Florian Kaps's article "Instant gratification: Florian Kaps celebrates the magic of Polaroid-- and describes how he rescued it from oblivion'' she asserts that "Polaroids are a one-of-a-kind painting" and "For decades the police force was one of Polaroid's best friends. Every police car and insurance agent carried a Polaroid camera to document crime scenes and insurance claims. Because of their incorruptible character and their unalterable originality, Polaroids have always been accepted in court." Polaroids have a deep impact on our society. It is not intended to guide wrongdoing or dangerous action in any way, indeed, it is simply to help our society and people to create a mood, to express one's mood, and to find understanding from others. 

        Undoubtedly, Polaroid photography is a form of art. As the quality of life is improved, people pay more attention to spiritual values, so moments of joy and happiness with family, friends, and communities are what everyone always wants to retain. These significant values make the Polaroid camera gradually become an essential device in today's life that we cannot do anything without it. However, I couldn't help but think about the era of modern technology where many people are now paying attention to their phones and using them to take pictures but forget about the reliability and convenience of Polaroids. In the future, where the art of Polaroid will go, developed or forgotten, all are things that we can not predict.

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Works Cited

Chou, Kimberly. "Polaroid Memories of the Pines; Tom Bianchi's Fire Island Photos Finally See the Light of Day." Wall Street Journal (Online), May       30, 2013. ProQuest, 

   https://libproxy.csun.edu/login?url=https://www.proquest.com/newspapers/polaroid-memories-pines-tom-bianchis-fire-

   island/docview/1356167122/se-2?accountid=7285.

Kantilaftis, Helen. "The Polaroid." Student Resources, 10 Nov. 2014, 

   www.nyfa.edu/student-resources/polaroid/

Kaps, Florian. "Instant gratification: Florian Kaps celebrates the magic of Polaroid--and describes how he rescued it from oblivion." Spectator, vol. 

   332, no. 9823, 3 Dec. 2016, pp. 38+. Gale In Context: Opposing Viewpoints, 

   link.gale.com/apps/doc/A472354874/OVIC?u=csunorthridge&sid=bookmark-OVIC&xid=4cb838e9. Accessed 8 Nov. 2021.

Nelson-Gee, Ellen. "Learning to Be: A Look into the Use of Therapy with Polaroid Photography as a Means of Recreating the Development of

   Perception and the Ego." Art Psychotherapy, vol. 2, no. 2, Elsevier B.V, 1975, pp. 159–64, 

   https://doi.org/10.1016/0090-9092(75)90017-4.

Scully, Julia. "Can you take out insurance against the hazzards of self-expression?" Modern Photography, vol. 49, Mar. 1985, pp. 8+. Gale General

   OneFile, 

   link.gale.com/apps/doc/A3660066/ITOF?u=lausdnet&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=abd69c3c. Accessed 3 Nov. 2021.

"Take a Picture: Polaroid Captures Brand Licensing." License! Global, 06, 2020, pp. 12. ProQuest, 

   https://libproxy.csun.edu/login?url=https://www.proquest.com/magazines/take-picture-polaroid-captures-brand-licensing/docview/2413580262/se-2?

   accountid=7285.

Trotman, Nat. "The life of the party." Afterimage, vol. 29, no. 6, May 2002, p. 10. Gale In Context: High School, 

   link.gale.com/apps/doc/A87130446/SUIC?u=lausdnet&sid=bookmark-SUIC&xid=9e36ab58. Accessed 7 Nov. 2021.

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