Why Photography?
as featured in And SOns Magazine.
Life Through A Lens.
By Ian Helmcke
As a photographer I would say the most important factor to capturing beauty in an image is the subject and search for beauty itself. In the movie The Secret Life of Walter Mitty, Sean Penn’s character states “beautiful things don’t ask for attention”, meaning beautiful things are not flaunted, pushed in your face, or shown off. Beauty as the essence of things must be sought after, pursued, and searched for. This is something I did not learn in a university but during a time of physical injury and healing. The art of searching for beauty through a lens allowed for my damaged brain to discover color, joy, and life again.
In my 23 years I have suffered a total of 19 concussions. Some came from running into signs, stunts gone wrong, or once trying to impress a girl I admired which backfired in a humiliating way. I suffered the most of my head trauma during my junior year of high school when I had four severe consecutive concussions in nine months, that resulted in harmful TBI’s (traumatic brain injury). I spent most of the year stuck in a dark room with extraordinarily little social contact and simple tasks in life, like reading or walking, became incredibly exhausting. My balance suffered and I recall having to depend on a cane at some points for help. My broken brain was trying to function normally when it felt like only 25% of it was actually working. Any energy I would have at the beginning of the day would vanish in a snap and I could feel my brain crash. My physical health was bad, but my mental health suffered the most.
With head trauma it is easy to forget about the mental health of a person and during this time my depression, despair, and anxiety skyrocketed. I observed the world with no beauty and no color. Imagine looking at a glorious sunset and not being able to register the warmth of the suns rays on your skin or connect the smell of fresh rain with peace and tranquility: my brain could not perceive or register the beautiful things of life. When I would see a red flower, I could process it was red, but I could not comprehend its essence, its beauty was blocked from impacting my life. I was so frustrated because I felt my own head was robbing my heart. This is a very helpless place because my brain, the thing I depend on for thought, reasoning, and rationality, was failing me and it was becoming my worst enemy. There would be many sleepless nights leaving me feeling lost and quite hopeless.
This story however does not conclude with hopelessness, in fact it is quite the opposite for as I write this, I look back and see how hopeful this story can be. I went through medical therapy (both mental and physical) for my brain trauma and saw some small and minor improvements. The changing factor came when one of my therapists recommend a radical idea. He said I should grab any type of camera and try to take a single picture on a daily basis. This would challenge me to search for beauty and color when all I could see was mundane hopelessness. This was hard- not going to lie because my despair saw no point in renewing my mind. I did not expect to see beauty, I did not expect to be able to hike or climb or adventure in the same way ever again. I reluctantly grabbed my dad’s point and shoot camera and began to delicately look for beauty through a camera lens. It took time, a lot of time but I found healing from a damaged brain through the pursuit of beauty in God’s creation and the world around it. The day did come where I remember registering color, warmth, and smell again. It was wonderful! I bought my own DSLR camera and started to document this amazing discovery on a more professional level. What amazed me was the fact I was not only capturing beauty through a lens, but I was able to observe its nurturing tendencies in my own life. When I could not form a full thought, beauty caused my mind to begin to build itself back up and awakened my heart again.
I say all of this to be able to share something I think is quite quintessential to the human soul: beauty has a way of healing a broken man in a way no technological tool or advancement can. God has designed beauty in such a way when all seems lost or hopeless one can observe a shooting star or a warm sunset and subconsciously begin to let it nurture brokenness. Beauty does not flaunt itself, during my concussions I had to search for and seek it. I have now had the opportunity to travel many places nationally and internationally for photography. I have had the blessing to experience the impact of designed beauty upon a broken soul. I still suffer from some minor post symptoms of concussions, like memory loss or dyslexia but through the art of photography I am reminded of why I love making pictures: that there is beauty in this world, and its worth fighting for.
One of the first photo’s I ever shot.
The photo in the Austrian Alps.
ABSTRACT DRONE IMAGE FROM 2021