Alfred Von Tirpitz 1916

Nicola Perscheid took this photograph of Alfred Von Tirpitz sometime in the early twentieth century using I imagine a large format camera with a relatively long exposure time. I wonder what it was like to be Perscheid, setting up his equipment, arranging his subject just so, and then waiting for him to remain still as the image was captured on the plate. You can sense the weight of responsibility in Perscheid's work; the need to properly portray this important man, and the pressure to perform well in the moment. His work feels very different than what I do in my studio, but at the same time I often think about how we artists are all having a conversation with each other across time. From a certain point of view, he was doing what I do - trying to capture and fix something in time, maybe even find some truth while doing it. We are all just trying to figure things out as we go, aren't we?