Dave Poyzer
When I pick up a hobby, it pretty much sticks. Fly fishing, tying flies for fly fishing, roller hockey, mountain biking, yo-yos, camping, canoes, film, music, coffee, web development, cameras, business; it all started in my teenage years. The cameras turned into the main profession. Both as a cinematographer and photographer. First as a teenager making skate-style videos for the mildly angsty subculture yoyo scene, then as part of a 3 man crew that produced a PBS television show, and later on as a freelancer. I continue to freelance full time individually, with my wife, and as a team. And I’m always pulling in those other hobbies.
Landscape photography is my retreat and creative outlet.
Attempting to capture a fleeting moment of God’s creation in its fullness is a process of my enjoyment. Landscape photography is never perfect and never finished. It’s not a frame it’s a journey (that occasionally gets documented by a print).
In my journey I not only attempt to capture light and color but also a mood and a memory. There is more to a landscape than what is captured in light. There is sound, smells, tastes, and textures. It’s nostalgia.
Website Manifesto
This website has been hand coded and carefully curated. I do a lot of commercial photography with an amazing team at Canoe There but what people rarely see is my personal art. I take hundreds, if not thousands, of landscape photos each year. I walk the streets of Des Moines on foggy mornings snapping frames of local streetscapes. I always have a film camera with me while wading trout streams. Waterproof bags transport my gear across miles of water. And I’ve shot countless Polaroids in the last 15 years. All this, and I post just a few times a year on Instagram. Clearly I’m not socially-media outgoing.
The goal of the website is to curate some of my favorite photos into collections and create something that I feel is more controlled and permanent than a tiny image that is scrolled past within a few seconds, if the algorithm gods even allow it.
I also don’t love the idea that we are subsidizing the largest companies in the world with free content to fuel our attention addictions. (Yes, I still use social media and I see the irony.)
On a personal, artistic level, I would like to instead fuel something more constructive. Something that can be relational. That could be relationships built through photography experiences or relationships built between a viewer and an individual photo. I’ve been asking myself the question a lot lately, “why does this photo matter?” And outside of my personal photo experience, “can/how does this photo provide value to anyone else?” Those questions are easy to answer as a commercial photographer, but as an artist I do not yet have the answers.
In a world of digital distraction I am experimenting with the idea of the physical by creating an easy way for people to purchase prints. I’m curious to see what a physical photo might mean to someone else, if it means anything at all. Maybe it can inspire a sense of awe between them and nature, bring a calming presence, or remind them of “a time when”.
This website will be a long-form experiment of art and importance.
