Whitney Otto

I absolutely loved this book. Not because Whitney Otto is a brilliant writer, but because I was fascinated by the women photographers who were the subject of this novel -- which was really a loose collection of short stories. From the beginning, I wanted to learn more about the real photographers and their lives. The young women, born between the 1880s and the 1920s, shared some characteristics. Most were from unconventional families, where women were encouraged to find careers and a show more passion. The photographers -- Imogen Cunningham, Madame Yevonde, Lee Miller, Tina Modotti, Grete Stern, and Ruth Orkin -- all fought for a place as artists. Ruth Orkin epitomizes the woman who has a husband and a family, but also strives for a career and artistic expression. Unlike some readers, these women didn't blend together for me at all. They shared similarities, but even today, the lives these women built for themselves would be remarkable. They shared a drive to create and express themselves. show less

I found this an odd book. Not just the format- vignettes loosely bound together, styled after a Japanese courtesan’s ‘pillow book’ from the Edo period , each vignette featuring a different member of a group of friends. Set in 1980s San Francisco, these friends are late 20 somethings, all well educated but none working in the field that they are educated for. They float through life; drinking, smoking pot and sometimes doing coke, attending art openings and going to restaurants but show more mainly meeting at the Youki Singe Tea Room, a North Beach dive where pot smoking is allowed- but only in a small room.
Elodie is the woman who sets the tales down. She writes only when in the Tea Room, leaving her notebooks there. The characters- the collection of beauties- seem to have no ambition, content to simply live like butterflies, pushed by the winds of life. Connections between them turn to love, break up, and realign. There is no real plot; it’s just events happening in the vignettes.

While reading the book, I didn’t much care for most of the characters. Which makes it odd that I later found myself thinking about them, and going back and rereading sections of the book. The prose is beautiful.The vignettes are like little jewels. The book is physically beautiful, too, illustrated mostly with old Japanese woodblock prints but with a couple of 20th century works. To read this book is enjoyable, even if I didn’t connect with most of the characters. show less

This is a really nice book. It seems to be somewhere between a collection of short stories and a novel. Separate stories with shared characters and places. The author's tone is very comforting and comfortable to read and can very gently sneak emotions up on you.

Based around a diverse group of women in a California town we see each of them growing up and living with changing attitudes to gender and race and the expectations and judgement of society. This is the kind of really thoughtful book show more that subtly highlights how easy I can have it as a white male without pushing anything. It's great to see those different viewpoints in a way that is quite easy to connect with.

I didn't finish it thinking "wow, I need to read that again" but I'm glad that I have read it. show less

Eight Girls Taking Pictures

This was an interesting book for me. One because I am a professional portrait photographer, and 2 because I am also a woman.
But
I, did not lead an adventurous life or really break any new ground like each of these women did.
When I began my career in 1978, I was only one of a hand full for girls in my college for photography. The guys in my classes did not seem to mind or think it was weird for us to be taking photography and when I started looking for a job I found show more many professionals were excited to have the female perspective in their studios. I love to read about history now but then I really did not care about the beginnings of photography and was not familiar with what was done before the 70’s. I am also fairly conservative so most of the work these women were doing would not have interested me at the time. I have since became a digital scrap booker and also enjoy mixed media and really like playing digitally with my images much like some of these women did in the darkroom which now fascinates me how they made their photomontages.
There were many times when Mrs. Otto just blew me away with her understanding of the artist/photographers mind. I underlined many places throughout the book that inspired me. One of the most profound insights she put in her book was “Women seem to possess all the natural gifts essential to a good portraitist...such as personality, patience and intuition. The sitter ought to be the predominating factor in a successful portrait. I just screamed “YES” and was stunned a non-portrait photographer should grasp such insight. And then this one “if your interesting snapshot is an accident, you aren’t controlling the outcome as much as something simply caught your eye and, snap, snap, there you are. But, when you learn about light, you learn that light is everything. We photographers are lashed to light and time, and we must make the most of both. Wow, she really showed me she knows her stuff with that quote. I also learned something about myself by reading this book. As a mother I often felt I failed my girls because I was often short tempered with them. I felt selfish and never really understood why I should resent giving them my undivided attention after work until I read this quote, “What no one tells you about having children is that it isn’t the physical demand they make in your life that affects your art, it’s the emotional space they fill, crowding out your art. So even when you have the time to work, your still mentally occupied. Wow what a revelation for me and I still feel irritated when I cannot spend uninterrupted time with my creating. One more important quote for me was, “Art required solitude, a disengaged mind, free to sort through the inconsequential and the profound, sifting through the mess in the mind until it found what it sought.”

Some of the women’s stories were a bit racy compared to my simple Midwestern upbringing so some may find the book objectionable but I have to give it 5 stars because I related so much to each woman as an artist, woman and mother. I learned more about the history of my profession and the history of the world. I spent a lot of nights looking things up on the internet which is always worth 2 extra stars if a book inspires me to dig deeper. If you are artistic and a woman I think you will find by the end of this book you have been inspired and enlightened. show less