max s. gerber(the latest shot)

i love shooting editorially, but it does have its downsides. aside from the obvious economic problems, you usually only have one day with any given subject. sometimes only fifteen minutes. it doesn’t allow for much time to really get to know the people in front of the camera, and that’s too bad. afterall an interest in and a care for people is actually what makes this job engaging and interesting. on editorial jobs i often wonder what becomes of people once the picture is done and the article is published and life goes on as normal. it’s too easy to lose track of things, which is strange, too, because i have to admit to feeling a certain attachment to each of the people i photograph. (wasn’t it hitchcock who said something along the lines of “you have to fall in love with your leading ladies”? then again, he also said to film your love scenes like murders and your murders like love scenes, so there were obviously other issues at play here. . .) it’s very rare that i get to revisit the same subject more than once.

[one exception, though: i did get to photograph stan lee twice. that was, of course, a big thrill for me, being the big nerd that i am. but it was also a little disappointing because stan lee didn't remember me. i did get to go to his house, and it was around christmastime, and the house was really decked out with decorations - kind of crazily so. it was intimated that this was stan's wife's doing, and it seemed that all his comic book stuff was shoved off in to one room, which i thought was kind of unfair. two funny things about the second stan lee shoot (i don't know why i'm getting off on this tangent. . .): 1) when his assistant called my answering machine to give me the particulars of where to go and when, he happened to be on a conference call with stan and didn't hang up when he thought he did, so i got an extra five or six minutes of eavesdropping on their conversation. 2) when the shoot was done i told stan i could get everything cleaned up and out of there in ten minutes so he sat in his chair and timed me with a stopwatch, occasionally announcing how much time was left.]

initially a desire to spend more time with my subjects led me to begin work on what eventually became a book project, my heart vs. the real world. this solved a great deal of the sometimes-creative-dissatisfaction that can come with working editorially. i was able to pick the subjects and subject matter myself. i was able to shoot exclusively in black and white. and most importantly i was able to revisit the same people repeatedly over a long period of time. and because i was dealing with kids and families an unexpected side effect of this was that i was able to watch my subjects grow up right in front of me. we all became very close, and it was nice to feel like a role model of sorts.

i once went to sea world with dylan and mario. i think they were around eleven or twelve years old at the time. we were walking along through the crowd, dylan was holding my hand and mario was holding on to the strap of my camera bag so as not to get lost. mario stopped and thought for a second and then said “hey, we all have pacemakers.” and we were all very pleased by this. it was a nice sense of belonging, or of being in the right place with the right people.

now mario and dylan are sixteen or seventeen years old. i got to spend an afternoon with them over the summer at mario’s house, when dylan came to visit from arizona. ali came to visit for the afternoon, too. they’ve grown up a bit. dylan got more rock and roll. he plays guitar and sings now. mario took all that childhood rambunctiousness and energy he had as a kid in karate class and transferred it to being a teenager. ali ditched the rollerblades in favor of a camera and punk rock music. she takes pictures now, and they’re good. she says she wants to be a photographer when she grows up, and i wonder about my influence - if any - on this decision. she writes me wonderful emails with lots of question marks all in a row, and wants to go on photo tours of hollywood.

[ex: "max we want to see you and i want you to help me with my camera. we should go to hollywood and take pictures of the town who worships their stars by putting their name in stars so we can walk over it and dogs can piss on it..sound good????"]

and all of this - regardless of the photos - reminds me of the point of what it is i spend so much time and energy trying to do. it’s really nice to feel like i’ve had an influence on people’s lives, and really nice to see the influence they’ve all had on mine.