Curating A Life - The Big Edit
on choosing 10,000 out of 150,000 photographs to save...350 images a day for 350 days
Hello my friends!
Welcome to Lyn’s ‘Big Edit’ in which I attempt to curate my Lightroom Classic photo catalogue from almost 150,000 images to a more manageable collection, say, perhaps…10,000?
My strategy: Delete 350 images (or so) for 350 days.1
Day 1, November 1 - - I turn 60 at 4:19am.
By 4:19 pm, I’ve started with the oldest images in my catalogue. Why not work forward, chronologically?
Humm. I guess I already edited these luscious images of my kids when they were little…back in the 2000’s…Back when they were my primary subjects.
Maybe I should start somewhere else. Say, 2017, when I’m helping my mother-in-law edit my father-in-law’s belongings after he died.
An edit of an edit. That seems fitting.
But it feels random and I’m not sure I want to spend time here.
I delete a few belts and duplicate undershirts.
What about an event, like that goodbye party for a Garden Club colleague in 2019?
Not feeling it either. I eliminate a bunch, but need to move on.
This scattershot strategy isn’t working.
What if I focus on the thing I’m currently working on - - Water? And the idea of flow.
Day 2: Yikes. Almost 14,000 images of water. Maybe I should start with a place? Tackle the 1-stars.
How many glowing red oak leaves do I want?
Do I need four images of Calvin looking off into the distance?
This still feels random.
By the end of day 2, I’m down to 148,436.
What to keep? What to delete?
A constant practice of discernment.
Like this glorious 3-star “Painted Sunrise” from October 13, 2024, there are some images that rise to the surface (pun intended), but only when you see them in context. Overwhelmed by the 1-stars, I checked out my 5-star Small Point images for water and knew that “Painted Sunrise” needed to be there.
And that it rightfully belonged with my 43 (out of 12,797 total) 5-star water images.
I remind myself to focus on the spirit of water’s flow. Whether in an angry torrent or a meandering mindful moment, I want to hold onto this feeling as I go through this project…and the rest of my life.
And why am I even doing this now - - I’m only 60, for heaven’s sake?
Because a few weeks ago, I decided that in order to move forward, some deep cleaning was in order. If something were to happen to me, my entire library might be deleted. Better to curate my narrative than burden others with it.
Like a sculptor carving an angel out of stone, it is my job to chip away at this block of granite that is me and reveal what I choose to reveal.
So here I am, entering my 7th decade on this beautiful planet, practicing discernment, falling in love all over again with this 2016 image of rivers, erosion, sand and sun where the water meets the land.
And noticing how some days are magic. Like these mists, created just 21 seconds after “Painted Sunrise” and 9 minutes before the emergence of the orange orb that ensure life on earth, says hello from Sequin Island in the Gulf of Maine.
Day 6: I’m down about 2,700 images, including 104 photographs from yesterday - - Woohoo!!
And you know what’s really cool? I already notice a difference when I am out with my camera - - there is focus and intention.2 Like Lilly playing fetch…
…A call and response, looking back so I can move forward.
Layered, like compost…and life.
Thank you for being in this place, at this time, with Lilly and me.
With gratitude for you being you,
Lyn
Let the waters flow, in whatever form, wherever you are. Take care, my friend.
Over the years I’ve read a lot about un-cluttering, including a recent article in the Washington Post (hope this link works, I got it through the Climate Coach newsletter) about Swedish Death Cleaning and of course there’s the cult of Marie Condo.
But because digital assets do not take up physical space, they are less obvious. But they DO take up space…somewhere - - like all those extra external hard drives I purchased over the years to contain every photograph or video I’ve created of my children, or the upgrading of storage space in ‘the cloud,’ which is actually not a cloud at all, but acres and acres of buildings ‘out there’ needing water and energy to keep cool.
And then there’s the mental energy it takes, knowing those images are out there…in my case, calling for attention, wanting to be seen, appreciated, and integrated, one way or another, into something more interesting than pixels on a hard drive.
Please note that all of my double exposures occur in camera, at the time of creation.
Lyn. Over and over, your words, your images, (and now these life-and-death contact-sheet compilations of same) generate lasting inspiration. Thank you. --Kelley