Photographs by John Dolan

How bE Au feels John Dolan captures humanty frailty, joy, love and the good life in poetic photographs By Lorna Gentry

112 myclickmagazine.com myclickmagazine.com 113 Last September John Dolan experienced for the first time the vortex that is Week in Paris. The chaos didn’t rankle him. John takes it in stride.

In fact, the more anxious people around him become, the calmer he gets, a mosphere and translated on film the feeling of being there. Many of John’s photography by photographing the weddings of photo editors and celebri- He has a soft spot in his heart for weddings, though. “Weddings are a high personality trait that perfectly suits his profession as a wedding, editorial and photographs invoke emotion and genius loci, a feat he has perfected over the ties, among them Ben Stiller and Jennifer Lopez. Soon his work attracted the wire act, which makes it all the more precious. I’m trying to capture something commercial photographer. “A fashion show is like a wedding,” he observed years, and he credits the idea to a German photo editor. Twenty years ago attention of editors who started calling with assignments, includ- elusive. I don’t give them exactly what they’re expecting. The most impor- recently on the phone from the loft he uses as his studio and when he received an assignment from Marie Claire magazine to photograph a ing Martha Stewart Weddings, Real Simple, Self and Travel & Leisure. And it tant person to please at a wedding is not the bride but yourself; if you don’t office. “Instead of a bride you have a designer under pressure. It’s the same gathering of cowboy poets, the editor advised, “Don’t shoot pictures of what wasn’t long before he was booking jobs for corporate clients like American aim high enough you’re going to hit mediocrity. My wedding pictures succeed amount of chaos and beauty together.” it looks like to be there. Shoot pictures of what it feels like to be there.” “It has Express, Tiffany, Sundance catalog and Merrill Lynch. when they reflect the memory of the wedding, the heightened moments.” John was in Paris for Fashion Week to shoot behind-the-scenes photo- been my mantra for 20 years,” he says. “If you are shooting a wedding in a ball- Now John maintains a healthy, balanced diet of 30 percent each edito- graphs for Belgian designer Dries Van Noten, whose six-month retrospective room, it doesn’t look all that interesting. But what it feels like at that very mo- rial, wedding and commercial work. He likes the diversity, applying what he The good life premieres at Les Arts Décoratifs museum in Paris in February. Equipped with ment is thrilling and that is the core of what [the couple] hopes to remember.” learns from shooting weddings, like, “human frailty and interaction,” he says, John shares a home in the Berkshires with his artist wife, ceramicist Michele a few film cameras, John calmly metabolized the electrified, hurly-burly at- John began his career as an editorial photographer and glided into wedding and applying it to ad jobs. O’Hana, and two of their three children, ages 16 and 14. Their eldest, Olivia,

114 myclickmagazine.com myclickmagazine.com 115 to please at a wedding “ T he most is not the brideimportant but yourself; if you person don’t aim high enough you’re going to hit mediocrity.”

116 myclickmagazine.com myclickmagazine.com 117 “Don’t shoot pictures of what it looks like to be there, Shoot pictures of what it feels like to be there,” said his editor.

118 myclickmagazine.com myclickmagazine.com 119 John calmly metabolized the electrified, hurly-burly atmosphere and translated on film the feeling of being there.

19, attends college in Connecticut. He takes a train to his Manhattan loft a Consequently he has internalized his technical skills to the point that he never few times a week as work dictates. Mostly, though, he stays on the road. “I thinks about it when he’s shooting. “I heard this guy on the radio recently who don’t sleep in the same bed for 10 nights in a row very often. And I’ve been interviews grandmothers about cooking,” John says with a chuckle. “They doing this for 20 years.” never measure anything and don’t have recipes, which is great. It’s like me and Last September was particularly busy. In addition to flying to Paris for technical stuff. I kind of ingested it so it’s deep inside of me.” Fashion Week, he flew to Montana to shoot Kate Bosworth’s wedding for That frees him to be completely engaged and observant on a shoot, he the cover of Martha Stewart Weddings; photographed a destination wed- says. “How I am [affects] people. If I’m tense the images reflect that. If I’m ding in the South of ; flew to Chicago for a client ad shoot; took a having fun and I’m part of the party then I break the wall between photogra- portrait of a college professor in Northampton, Mass., for a design firm; and pher and subject, observer and observed. It’s how I interact with people that photographed a wedding in New York City for an old friend. really makes a big difference. As a young photographer I’d arrive intense and It’s a good life, he says, but it’s not for everyone. “I think a lot of people wanting to get to work. Now it’s more of a dance to make it relaxed. It should idealize the life of a photographer and it’s important to shatter that a little bit be fun. It shouldn’t be so serious, like brain surgery. My goal is to make it a

because, unless you like uncertainty, it’s not a perfect life. I don’t know what positive experience for everybody.” C having a paycheck is like or a paid vacation. And when the phone stops ring- ing you have to create new needs.” To see more of John Dolan’s work, visit johndolan.com. He shoots film and digital. “Sometimes I take a hybrid approach where I shoot a little digital and film, and sometimes I shoot all one or the other. I have a cabinet full of cameras, 10 or 12, and I have distinct relationships with each of them. I think it should be up to the photographer and not the client what camera is used for a job. Some of my clients buy that and some john’s Tools don’t. For ad work I shoot primarily digital, but I often take a film camera Camera : Rollieflex 2.8 E2 Lens: Pentax 67 and shoot some film.” 105mm f/2.4 lens Film: Kodak Professional Portra John is expert at film. In the 1980s he worked in the darkrooms of New York 400 & TRI-X Bag: An old leather satchel with a fashion photographers before going to work as a printer for New York photo- Tenba foam insert. journalist Sylvia Plachy. “I didn’t start making money until I was 30. I spent 12 or

Portrait photograph by Holger Thoss Holger by photograph Portrait 14 years diving deep into the film world before I made my first dollar.”

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