Why are my pictures black and white? We should seek the answer in the “duality” word.
I do not take pictures in B&W color, but, as you undoubtedly noticed, my Dear Friend, I always edit them in Lightroom to the black and white photos. The clue to why I do this lies in my imagination. I often imagine the world as a fight of duals around us. Duality is the key to answering.
If ones believe in God, automatically, one must believe in the devil.
Why? Because good cannot exist without evil. They are inseparable. We can call it a balance. The equal balance we can find in other phenomena. For example, human nature also consists of duality. We all possess both light and dark parts of our souls. We all can both create and destroy. I believe everyone owns the dark and light parts of the soul.
Another duality we can find is in relations between the sun and the moon. Day and night have been integral parts of humans’ lives since the beginning of our planet.
The sun is evoking us to live. The rays of sunshine are waking us up after a night. On the other hand, there is a night. There are darkness and a dark void. Speaking shortly: duality surrounds us. Thus, in my B&W photography, I consciously (or maybe, especially during the beginning of my artistic activity, unconsciously?) refer to the dualism. Black and white photography helps to keep balance in the picture. Two colors* make the picture looks pure. I often say that the colors distract the essential things visible in photos.
To summarize, duality is everywhere, inside us and in our surroundings. Thus, my B&W photographs also possess a fraction of the dualism in symbolically, coloristic form.
*It is evident that B&W photography does not consist only of two colors. There is a vast palette of grey shades in it. Nevertheless, since the beginning of photography, people have conventionally described black, grey, and white photographs as “Black and white photography.”
