We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Patrick Kinchsular. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Patrick below.

Alright, Patrick thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Can you talk to us about how you learned to do what you do?

Most of what I learned has been self-taught. I find that the most enjoyable thing for me to do is just play around with my camera and see what I get. Every camera feels a little bit different and there’s so many little adjustments you can make to make each shot feel special. One of my favourite aspects of urban photography is how limited you are in the types of things that you can manipulate, and how much you can do even with so few things that are in your control. I don’t get to decide what the street looks like, what the weather is, whether an area is crowded or desolate, or really anything else. I like that when I get put into an environment, I just have to work with what I have and focus on what’s in my control. I can’t change the scene itself, but I change the framing, the focus, the shutter speed, the angle at which light hits the camera, etc. I’ve found that to be immensely helpful in my learning. I focus on the very small set of things that I get to play with, and just do so until the shot feels right.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

I’m actually not a full-time creative. In the day, I’m working on my PhD in linguistics at NYU. Photography is mostly just a hobby for me and a form of stress relief. I like to have some form of creative expression that is entirely outside of what I do for my job and to keep it that way. I’ve dabbled a little bit in some gig work and I won’t necessarily turn down an opportunity, but I’m also not actively looking to become a professional photographer. This is something I really do just for myself, and I like to have that. It’s a very personal thing, I think. Not every shot is going to be transparently meaningful, but every shot is going to be some reflection of my current state. What I think looks visually interesting or elicits emotion depends entirely upon how I’m feeling whenever I go out for a photo walk, even if I don’t quite understand how whatever I’m feeling at that time translates to a shot. I like to have no instructions for my art, so that it stays my own.

What can society do to ensure an environment that’s helpful to artists and creatives?

I think the best thing to do is just to encourage doing arts along with something else that fulfills you. I feel there is too much expectation that for one to engage in a creative pursuit, they have to dedicate themselves to it entirely. I think this is unhelpful and unrealistic. For those of us who want to do an art but don’t have the time or motivation to make it our lives, it’s more useful to have support for what we can do.

What do you think is the goal or mission that drives your creative journey?

Not really, no. I just like taking photos of things that make me a feel a certain way. It’s therapeutic. There’s not much more to it and I don’t think there needs to be.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://kinchcaptures.com
• Instagram: photrickinch
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/patrick-kinchsular-b01b38179/

Image Credits

All images are my own