Towards the end of December I finally got around to seeing a wonderful exhibit at the Philadelphia Museum of Art … Multitude, Solitude: The Photographs of Dave Heath.

I will admit it, I never had heard of Dave Heath before and that makes me sad. He made some remarkable black and white photographs, notably from the Forties through the Sixties, which this retrospective focuses on, and it closely tracks those images contained in his masterwork A Dialogue With Solitude published in 1965.

Somehow he seems to have been forgotten by many and unknown by many more (me obviously included!). Thankfully that injustice is now being remedied!

I won’t go into reviewing the show; there are plenty of reviews that can be found on the Internet, as well as discussions concerning the companion book by the same name, published to accompany the exhibit. Suffice to say I purchased the book and so should you!

What I do want to discuss are some things I took away from the exhibit that you might find of value for your own work.

First, I was struck by the size of the images. As best as I could tell, they were all around 8X10, some slightly larger, some slightly smaller. I was forced to get close and look into each photograph to discover all that it had to tell. Very similar to the size of photographs seen in the recent Strand and Weston shows. It’s the size I favor, as previously discussed in an earlier entry, and I’m becoming more and more convinced that the smaller size really works when the photographer truly has something to say.

While Heath chose to print his photographs somewhat dark, nothing is hidden. I think this too relates to the size of the final print and again forces us to look more closely.

There’s drama in Heath’s pictures of people going about their daily lives — simple, tightly framed and wonderfully composed. Mostly “quiet” images of small crowds, couples, or close ups. You’re viewing compelling moments in time captured with great compassion … so different than much of the street photography that is posted on the Web today. Perhaps I am a hopeless romantic (I have been told that a few times) but there is a beauty to be found when we slow do and take the time to truly see — and of course ruthlessly edit our work.

Most of the images were made at just several locations in New York City — Washington Square, Central Park and the Seven Arts Coffee Gallery. Each one continually mined for photographic gold! Knowledge of the environment and an obvious comfort level while being there definitely paid off with powerful and poetic images. There is something definitely to be said for this!

Many think it’s essential to continuously travel to new and distant places in order to make good photographs. Wrong! Look at Heath’s work, and that of many others who continued to concentrate on familiar places and subject matter. Adams came back so many times to the Yosemite wilderness, Edward Weston to the beaches of Point Lobos, and Milton Rogovin for decades to Buffalo’s Lower West Side to do his social documentary work, just to name a few. The results speak for themselves. This isn’t to say that we shouldn’t venture out and look for new opportunities and inspiration, but there are many great pictures for all of us to make wherever we are. Think about the opportunities and you will be rewarded.