Read: Things Become Other Things

Neil pulled up in a spicy little rental and said, “I brought something for you.” He dug around in the trunk, opened a roller bag, and pulled out this book. “Have you heard of this guy?” Yep, I’d heard. Met him over a decade ago, back when Blurb was just a baby and having issues printing my TMZ. Been following him ever since. Used to write on his old site, a “real-time writing community,” which to this day I still consider one of the best sites ever, and so much more than the communal nonsense most creatives bought into since then. I still curse him for shutting it down. The entire contents of the site were etched to the slick sides of a titanium cube, or something like that, but decisions like this are beyond me. I’m a ditch digger at heart. (This cube thing may or may not be true. It’s just something I heard.)

It only took fifteen years, but someone finally did it. Someone built the right book. Now I can rest.

If you are looking for creative conformity, look no further than the professional photography world, a once bold space crushed by the inanity of a billionaire’s algorithm. See if this sounds familiar. Spend too little time making a series of pictures, spend two years promoting the work, seek publisher, pay publisher between $30,000 and $50,000 for a book but somehow manage to claim this is not “vanity publishing,” get a book you may or may not want with zero marketing and distribution, then wonder how you are going to make your money back. THIS is what I see and hear every single day. Another reason why I drift further and further from the pack of mainstream photography. (A book deal like this, as bad as it sounds, can still be a win depending on where those books end up.)

When people ask me about what book to make, I reply, “Make the book you want to make, and not the book you think you are supposed to make.” Many photography books are built for other photographers. Preaching to the visual choir. Photography books, the classic coffee table style, are like Fabergé eggs. Everyone wants one, but you sure as shit aren’t going to leave it out on the coffee table when your friends come over to party. These books rarely get viewed while spending most of their lives in the dark next to other victims. Not good enough.

The “someone” who finally built the right book is Craig Mod. You’ve heard me talk about him before. Yep, that guy. The guy who feels like the future of creativity. The guy who went alone a long time ago and began his still-running marathon. The guy who built his own ecosystem. “Things Become Other Things” is, amongst other things, a photography book, but it’s built for them and not us, and this is the key to the whole damn thing. From a distance, this book looks like a novel. Mid-sized, hardcover, dust jacket. Thickish. Dishy. Open it up and prepare to hear a squeal you will eventually realize is coming from somewhere deep inside you.

Half and half, photo vs word. A story unfolds with a secondary character who comes and goes, adding mystery to how it will end. A memoir about walking, yes, yes, all true, but those photographs tied so specifically to the story. What must the author’s nights have been like? How much time was required to keep these items tied together while the effort was in progress? Anyone who knows knows. There is an essential relentlessness that unveils truths that most of us don’t want to unveil. There but not there. A shimmering layer of “what comes after,” that can easily poison the well if one does not tread lightly. The author feels in limbo, even after all these years, but so are the rest of us.

Non-photographic eggshellish paper, a healthy dose of ghosting, and sections of the horizontals lost to the greed of the gutter. It’s perfect. The photographs at first appear simple, and they are. Clean, composed, but there is a direction, a point of view, and a careful observation of what lives or doesn’t live around the edges of each frame. No fat. If you’ve been to Japan, you will instantly understand.

Ghosting, contrary to what most photographers think, is a GOOD thing because as you turn the page and see the looming shadow of the next illustration, you feel the pull to keep going. Reading this book feels like running downhill. The chapters are short and insightful. The theme comes and goes from the present moment to childhood. Speaking of childhood, his wasn’t as smooth as a titanium cube. His childhood reminded me of mine, at least in some ways. Kids with extra fingers and toes.

The beauty of this book is that it will be seen. Lots and lots of eyes of all shapes and sizes. This book will be passed from hand to hand, like my copy. It will pop up poolside and in the lobby. You’ll see it at the library and in your local travel bookstore. There will be signings. Instead of an audience filled with people wearing all black with scarves around their necks, and a worn package of Marlboros in their pocket, you will see a wide range of humanity. Old and young, dork and hip, foreign and domestic. Is the author a photographer? Yep. Is he a writer, designer, book builder, tech-guy, and community builder? Yep. Guilty. A modern five-tool player, or six.

It took fifteen years for a photographer to build the book I hoped I would one day see. A photography book where the photography is a piece of the overall pie, but comes in a form made for the masses and not just for fellow snappers. I’ve been saying this for the past decade, photography is more powerful now as a small part of a larger story than trying to be the story itself. So much of the work I see being published is rushed work, built for the audience and not for the author. Built for likes and views and subs, and it’s obvious. TBOT wasn’t the first. There were others. Memories of a Dog comes to mind, which was published by one of my favorite presses, Nazraeli. And there are others, but this is the first in a while that checks the boxes I was hoping to see checked.