"Through his bug-eye lens, the fly-on-the-wall photographer witnesses history, even when he buzzes too close and lands in the soup. 
    "This is the popular perception of photography. It’s far from the truth. A photographer sees with more than one eye. He sees through his film, through a dozen lenses, through the chemistry of the darkroom. He experiments with tradition. 
    "Yes, pictures are historical windows, to the vision of their time. 
    "The 1969 New Comix Show at the Phoenix Gallery in Berkeley featured Robert Crumb among the cartoonists. The highlight of the opening though was Janis Joplin, arriving late in her psychedlic Porsche. 
    "Painted in bright swirls, the car was its own show, on display outside the gallery’s glass door. A white fur hat marked Janis herself, inside the dimly-lit gallery. The only light was on the art. Janis, however, with her casual ease and enthusiastic gaity, brought a sense of party with her. She made Robert her center. Several cameras took notice. 
    "'What about photographers?' Robert asked quickly. 
    "'Ignore them,' Janis said freely. 
    "Sure in his art, but anxious in the public eye, Robert tried. 
    "Given the gallery’s darkness, I used surveillance film, ASA 4000; the grain on enlargement is the size of buck-shot. But what I saw was colored by the art on the wall, and the people around me. After all, an opening is a revealing, a public relations event to be sure, but also a celebration, among fans and friends, a crystallization of time in place, to applause. 
    "To convey the vision, I’ve used extra-ordinary techniques, sometimes overlapping. For if a photographer is a fly on the wall, his eyes have two hundred views. And Janis and Robert that number of personalities. In this spirit, I’ve produced as many variations, as they evolved, consistent with my sense of photographic moment, so that every eye-well opens."
 

© 1990 Elihu Blotnick, all rights reserved