The independent student newspaper of Northeastern University

The Huntington News

The independent student newspaper of Northeastern University

The Huntington News

The independent student newspaper of Northeastern University

The Huntington News

A photo is worth one single word

By Danielle Capalbo, News Staff

‘Silence’ is a jet black car parked at the edge of the forest. The lot is big and empty. ‘Motivation’ is a handwritten reminder above your mirror: ‘[D]o three things today.’ ‘Exhaustion’ flops on the bed face down, wearing all its clothes ‘- not according to Merriam-Webster, of course, but The Photographic Dictionary (thephotographicdictionary.org), a conceptual photo album pairing conventional written definitions with visual interpretations of those words.

Iowa native Lindley Warren, 21, said she launched the project last year. Since then, she’s culled more than 600 user-submitted images, she said, sifting through submissions to choose which to add to her growing collection. Some contributors take a straightforward and expository approach: ‘ ‘Lemon’ is a halved fruit sitting face up on a cutting board. Others abstract their definitions for an artistic, sometimes intimately personal photograph. In Clara Canepa’s ‘heaven,’ for instance, a 20-something crowd surfs at a party.

Via e-mail from her apartment in Amsterdam, Warren fielded The News’ questions to illuminate the project’s origins and what it reveals about the artists it features.

Huntington News: ‘ What inspired your project, and how did it start?

Lindley Warren: ‘ To be honest, I can’t remember where the idea came from. I had created We Projects [a photography website at weprojects.org] a year before I started working on The Photographic Dictionary and I wanted to do something new. Part of the reason I decided to start a new project is because I was wanting to share the responsibility of running and creating a project. I began working on it over last summer with someone else, but it didn’t end up working out. It slowed things down to be waiting for help from another person, I decided to work alone on the project and was finally able to launch it [Nov. 1].

HN: ‘ What’s your source for the written definitions?

LW: ‘ Dictionary.com, baby.

HN: How has the volume of submissions changed as the site’s gotten older? And how do you choose which photographs wind up in the dictionary?

LW: ‘ I would say that the flow of submissions has been quite steady apart from the first couple of days following an update, people always send in more then. As far as standards go, I just try to keep a certain look for the photos. In contrast to We Projects, for the dictionary I wanted more of a ‘snap-shot’ look for the photos. Luckily, there are a lot of young photographers who are making great images with that approach.

HN: ‘ Have you noticed a universal theme that generally drives people’s decisions ‘- their choice of words, in particular ‘- or a pattern to submissions?

LW: ‘ I would say that a lot of people like to send in words for colors. Also for ‘Reflect,’ ‘Light,’ ‘Summer,’ that sort of thing. I’m not sure if there is an exact ‘theme’ for their decisions, but I would say most people approach each photo they submit in the same way. It seems that people are very literal with their approach or completely abstract.

HN: ‘ Do some submissions stand out in your memory as particularly funny or poignant?

LW: ‘ I really liked Jan Postma’s submissions, especially the one for ‘art,’ [which depicts a man in a museum with his nose to a painting]. A lot of his photos seem to have a certain humor in them, as well as his brother Leo’s. I think there are a lot of people that sent in really clever photos. I think each viewer has a different approach to the dictionary. I have received some e-mails saying ‘Oh! This photo has absolutely nothing to do with that word!’ But that was the point of the dictionary, to also tie personal, hidden meanings between the word and the image.

HN: ‘ The project has Facebook page, a newsletter and a growing network of contributing photographers. How do you see it developing in the future?

LW: ‘ I would like to get to a place where I can update easily. I’ve thought about making a book, not necessarily a wide-release type thing, but maybe even just one for myself. The dictionary is also now going to be a part of the [web-based] Appendix magazine [at appendix-mag.com], which is exciting.

HN: ‘ It sounds like you’ve struggled at least once to meet your own challenge. What have been some hurdles?

LW: ‘ Time! In the summer I’m usually busier than normal, but this summer has been non-stop going. I feel crammed even now sitting in front of the screen to answer these questions. There have also been annoying problems with the program I run the site on. I have to completely transfer the site into a new program, which I haven’t had any time for. I look forward to having time again to work on it, and once I do I think it’ll be moving in the right direction.

HN: ‘ Aside from providing literal and interpretive definitions, what does the dictionary reveal about people and their understanding of the world?

LW: ‘ I think the dictionary has a lot to do with interpretation. It’s just working with the concept that everyone views words differently, people think of an apple and think ‘red,’ ‘juicy,’ ’round,’ etc. However, there are other connections to that word, such as teachers or Adam and Eve. There are a lot of things that can relate to just one word; your personal memories, the concrete facts, the connotations.

HN: ‘ How much can you learn about a person from their submission?

LW: ‘ I think you can get a glimpse of how people look at things. Are they literal or not? What is their humor like? Do you color in the lines? And if you do, do you mix colors or make lines that shouldn’t be there? That sort of thing. You can also learn a bit about their past from the words they choose for images. How they view certain people or moments or places can be told by their selections, I think maybe that’s something that makes the site fun, being able to look at a word as someone else does.

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