Meet Photographer
Melanie Pullen.

On Exhibit at Ace Gallery, Los Angeles

How old were you when you started photography?

I really started playing around with cameras when I was 8 years old. We had this Polaroid camera that I would take family photos with - I found it totally amazing that I could get 20 loud crazy adults from New York (my family) to stand still and listen to me as a child if I had a camera in my hand. This was something that I always loved about photography and have found super interesting psychologically speaking.

What inspired you on your recent project?

As I researched High Fashion Crime Scenes for years and gathered reference photographs to recreate I kept running across images from photojournalists during various wars. They really haunted me — it wasn't the project that I was working on but I started developing a new series at that point. I became fascinated with the way through the ages war has been glamorized through art and costume yet in the more current years we're really seeing the more true dark side of war as photography has advanced and our communication lines are so powerful with the internet.

I'm very interested in the portrayal of history when it comes to violence on a mass scale. It's a part of human nature and it's amazing to me that we can glamorize it so much and make it so beautiful. I don't know the answers as to why this happens but I do know that it's such an interesting thing to explore as an observer — my series is a commentary about the glamorization of war and the various elements involved. To achieve this I worked with both male and female models, film crews, famed costumers, war historians, etc.. This project has taken me years to create as I knew that I would have to really make it large in scale to create an impact.

What was your first big break and how did it happen?

I don't think I had one big break — it was really a series of things that happened and the ability to run with them. I mean I never studied photography and am fully self taught. So the way I did this was I would get jobs (before the digital age) and I would spend most of the money on film — as I had no idea what I was doing --- that way I was covered if I made a mistake. I got amazing shots this way too. I think learning this way really taught me that I love screwing up! It opens the door to great shots - I always do things the "right way" then I mess around with my camera settings and kind of close my eyes and shoot pictures. I always get amazing shots this way. There was some jazz musician that said it took him years to learn to play and then it took him the rest of his life to learn to undo everything he learned and this was when he became great. I believe this - you have to know your tools perfectly but then be open to doing things the wrong way! A lot of students intern for me and they're so caught up in technique that they loose the art in it. You have to let it all go!

What advice could you give emerging artists to get "exposure?"

I have this theory about inertia and creation. I believe that if you keep busy doing cool projects and follow through stuff goes right - the motion continues- and people come on board-it's not about waiting for money, approval, people, galleries, etc., it's about creating! I have never really waited for something to happen to me - I just think of ideas and follow through. I believe consistency is so important and really drawing a line and doing it. A lot of artists I meet like to talk a lot more about being artists than actually making work and exhibiting it and this is tough as it's hard work to really make art and follow through on a project - I always feel like I'm in prison half way through and breakdown — really there's nothing that I would like more than to abandon my projects but I know that I have to finish and I have to make it great (by my standards), I have to take risks financially, personally but I know that my art will outlive me and I really feel it's important to make it. I really make the work for myself and then when I'm happy I feel like I can let go and kind of give it away. Once I'm done I don't really want approval I just want to hear how people respond, I like to see what people infer from what I make and if it evokes some sort of reaction I'm happy, even if they hate it. I don't care if they don't like it or love it as I made it for a reason and it exists because it made me feel a certain way. I detach myself from my work once it's done and then I become my own observer.

But all that said I'm also a very lucky person and have worked with everyone that I love! It's the best job in the world.

To see more photography, go to http://www.melaniepullen.com.

GO BACK TO HOME PAGE>>