I have said that the travel book should ‘try to establish a narrative’, without giving much thought to what that means. Narrative relates to the idea of a story, an account of incidents or events, perhaps with a beginning, middle and end. That would be easy if the photographs were the result of a coherent project, which they are not (it’s not journalism). So what is the story to be here? Is it:
– A collection of visual accounts of individual journeys?
– A theme (topic) linking all the travels?
– A story of personal discovery through travel?
– An exploration of the nature and purpose of travel and tourism?
– A catalogue of journeys in search of images?
– The embodiment of an approach to photography?
– A personal chronology, a diary of wandering (and wondering)?
There are challenges in the creation of a narrative. It is not likely to emerge from a selection of only ‘good’ photos, they will need to be relevant to the story and may be boring individually. How is a narrative to be shaped from a magpie collection of pictures taken largely on holidays (holiday snaps?), as opposed to dedicated photographic trips; and taken over an extended period of time during which interests have changed? Is it merely an album by another name?
Maybe it is an undefined story that is created anew by each viewer through their person interpretation of the images.
A key to this will be the structure: by place, by theme/topic/subject or chronological? Whatever the structure, the sequence of images will be critical.
Consider the photographs below – the order is intentional.
Photo: Damascus, Syria, 2010
Photo: Venice, Italy 2003
Photo: Varadero, Cuba, 1998
Photo: Washington, USA 2011