de-clutter

A wise woman once told me that in order to know who you are, you have to take inventory of your life by taking everything out, in a sense re-examining, and asking yourself what you want to put back "in." What do you want to keep as your own? It is kind of like cleaning a cluttered room. Sometimes the best way to know what needs to be there is to take everything out, and put only what is needed back. Negative to become positive again...A lack of everything else to focus on what is most important.

Negative space in photography can serve a similar purpose - leaving all else out to focus on just one thing or part. It is one of composition's most powerful tools. What ISN'T there is what draws your attention to that which is! In the photo above I used it, in conjunction with the lights, to kind of draw an arrow right to the center of the action, which is, as the other musicians also allude to, David Grisman on the mandolin. I'm so glad we did this theme so that I could see such well done negative space shots...I get very excited about quality examples of well used negative space, and greatly admire photographers who master the concept.

One of those photographers is *esra* and it was very challenging choosing just one to feature here from her collection of shots that employ negative space so ideally. I chose the one below but please do check out her flickr stream for many shots that exemplify the concept so wonderfully.

untitled by *esra*