The Flâneur

The photographer is an armed version of the solitary walker reconnoitering, stalking, cruising the urban inferno, the voyeuristic stroller who discovers the city as a landscape of voluptuous extremes. Adept of the joys of watching, connoisseur of empathy, the flâneur finds the world “picturesque”.

Susan Sontag, 1977

This morning I found myself writing the following in my journal, “I’m not a street photographer….” I immediately said, “Wait a minute dude, where did that come from?” I needed to ask what I meant by that, was that a true statement and what is a street photographer. I have over the years taken many images that are defined by Sontag’s definition of a photographer without the adjective of street or wedding or portrait or fashion, placed before it. The truth is I’m a photographer, period. When I have my photographer’s hat on, my camera and lens become an extension of me, and I am now the flâneur who finds the world “picturesque” whether that’s a street scene or sunrise on the prairie or a car show.

For any who want to know: Flâneur is a French term meaning ‘stroller’ or ‘loafer’ used by nineteenth-century French poet Charles Baudelaire to identify an observer of modern urban life. The above image of the statue of the dog was taken at a street car show in Little Rock, Arkansas in 2008.