We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Scot Sothern a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Scot, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. It’s always helpful to hear about times when someone’s had to take a risk – how did they think through the decision, why did they take the risk, and what ended up happening. We’d love to hear about a risk you’ve taken.

As a writer/artist/photographer I’ve always been more concerned with politics and social issues than making a living. Granted that approach hasn’t been the wisest choice financially. I always thought, incorrectly, that money would come with hard work and creative execution. Thus, I have always taken a risk with the projects I choose and they haven’t always paid off.

In the 1980s, in my 30s, I worked as a free-lance optical cameraman, in and around Los Angeles. Freelance work in any business isn’t always the most secure way of earning a living but I was getting by and it left me time to pursue other projects. Looking at life in the United States at that time, I saw that many people were suffering. Homelessness was on the rise. Of all the people living desperate lives in places like Skid Row, the ones facing daily danger, violence, and humiliation were the woman selling sex from the street corners. I knew it would be a risk to start the project. Prostitution is not an issue most people are comfortable with. Street prostitutes are looked upon as criminals and drug addicts. I felt that it was something I wanted to present to the public at large. I began approaching the working women and paying to photograph them. I also wrote short stories about the experiences. I worked on this project for five years. It was difficult and a bit dangerous and sad. Most of the woman I met were victims of a society that cared little about their problems. These were not people who chose to live this way and every one of them had their story.
Going into the project I knew it was a risk but found it was even more of a risk than I had anticipated. After five years I quit the project, now called LOWLIFE. For the next ten years I approached publishers, galleries, agents, and anyone who could give this work a life outside of my file cabinets. I collected more than three hundred rejection letters before giving up. The risk had failed, the work was too dark, not something people wanted to read about or look at. It was just too uncomfortable.

In 2010, walking through a Los Angeles gallery I happened into a conversation with the owner/creator, John Matkowsky, about the work I had done in the 1980s, and he asked if he could have a look. Four weeks later I had a solo show at his space, drkrm Gallery. Within two years I had done interviews with scores of art and photography magazines. I published three books of the work both here and in the UK. My work has been exhibited in major cities here and abroad. Currently a young filmmaker is making a documentary about me and my life. It took a lot of years but my risk is finally paying off.

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

I grew up in my father’s portrait photography studio in the Missouri Ozarks in the 1950s and 1960s. I was groomed to take over the family business and so was taught photography while still a kid. However, being a product of the sixties cultural revolution I left home at 17 and ran wild in the late 60’s and through the 1970s while supporting myself as an itinerant portrait photographer. In the following years I took jobs here and abroad and remained behind a camera and in the darkroom. In 1990 I was knocked off my feet by a spinal injury, the result of a motorcycle mishap. I have since had five major surgeries and walk with the aid of a rollator or cane. By the 1990s I had always been a photographer but had always wanted to be a writer. I spent the next ten years reading and writing and by 2000 I had become an autodidact writer. In 2010, at sixty, my first solo exhibit, LOWLIFE, photos and stories of life with street prostitutes, was held at the notorious Drkrm Gallery in Los Angeles. My first book of the same title was published in the U.K. by Stanley Barker in 2011. The British Journal of Photography called LOWLIFE, “The years’ most controversial photobook.” LOWLIFE immediately found its way into the international art photography community. This work along with other photography projects has since been exhibited in Los Angeles, New York, Miami, London, and Paris. In 2013 I began two biweekly columns, Nocturnal Submissions, and Southern Exposure, for VICE Magazine. CURB SERVICE: A Memoir, was published by Soft Skull Press and STREETWALKERS, stories and photographs was published by powerHouse Books in February 2016. BIG CITY, a novel, was published in 2017 by Stalking Horse Press. In 2022, FAMILY TREE, Photos and Stories was published by These Days LA. Other books include SAD CITY published by Straylight Press, and A NEW LOW and LITTLE MISS by drkrm Editions.
Of everything I’ve done it is the novel, Big City, I am most proud of. It came to me in a two year period of inspiration. It defines my life’s ambition and it is the most creative thing I have ever done.

Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?

On Hollywood Boulevard, I have set out to photograph not the homeless, but rather the public reaction to being accosted by the homeless. I’m walking with the aid of a second-hand walker with green tennis balls on the hind feet. I’m wearing beat-up Levi’s and a hoody. I have an old army green canvas backpack tied to the walker. I have an orange plastic bucket which I flip over for a place to sit. I scrape the walker over sidewalk stars and come face to face with humankind. I am seventy-three years old and crippled by time and old spinal injuries. I fit the profile of a vagabond. I yell at people, HEY, LOOK AT ME, and make reaction pictures with plastic disposable film cameras.

I’ve found a nice spot below an overhanging tree and next to a plywood wall of music posters. I yell and take pictures of party girls having a night on the town. I make an exposure of a guy on a Segway and a woman on the edge of the frame shows me her middle finger. “Hey, look at me!”

A cutie-pie in a leopard coat with a flower in her hair gives me a big happy smile. A Hispanic guy with a shaved and tattooed head passes by and ignores me. A two-ton couple stroll by and I do my thing and she turns away and he scowls at me.

I’m ready to move along when the guy on the Segway pulls up and looks down at me. He is tall and lean and about thirty years younger than I. He is not smiling. He parks himself in front of my urban duck blind. The Segway gives him four extra inches and it hurts my neck to look up that high. I covertly drop my camera into my bag and take out a virgin camera. Past experience has warned me.

He has an accent I can’t place though maybe it’s Jamaican. “I didn’t say anything,” he says. “When you took my picture because there were women around and I respect the women. You can’t take pictures of anyone you want, especially the women and you don’t never take a picture of me.”

“Okay, sure. Sorry. I’m going to get going anyway. I don’t think I got a picture of you.”

“You did,” he insists. “You took my picture. I saw the flash. You need to take that picture off your camera.”

“It’s not that kind of camera,” I explain. “You can’t delete pictures. It’s just an old plastic throw-away camera. I don’t think your picture is there but if it is, I’ll punch a hole in the negative.”

“You can’t be taking pictures of anyone you want.”

“Well, actually, I kind of can. And besides, look around, surveillance cameras are on every building on the Boulevard? Take a walk from here to La Brea and your image is going be captured on about a hundred cameras. None of us have an exclusive of our images anymore. Anyway, I’m sorry, and I’ll be going now and not taking any more pictures.”

“Take the picture of me off the camera.” he repeats.

“I can’t, Dude. See,” I show him the camera. “Look, it’s not that kind of camera.”

He bends and reaches down, telling me he wants to see the camera.

“No man, I can’t really do that. I’m going to go.”

“Give me that camera,” he demands. ‘Or I’m gonna take it.”

I’m not letting go of the camera but he jerks it from my hand and pushes me back down on my bucket. I’m thinking I’m going to buy a canister of pepper spray before my next outing, and I might just come looking for this jerk.

“You can’t take my camera. It’s mine, I paid for it. I told you I won’t use your picture.”

“You the one stealing. You take my picture, you steal my soul!”

“Your soul is not in that camera. You’re just trying to justify being a bully.”

He looks at me with a combination of anger and victory. He smiles and holds up the little camera like a game of keep-away. He turns and rolls away. I hope he takes the camera in for processing and discovers I made a switch. There are no exposures or people or souls on the film he took, but I’ve got his image on the other roll. I take another plastic camera from my bag and yell, LOOK AT ME, and make exposures. I am determined to continue doing what I do. I guess that’s resilience.

How about pivoting – can you share the story of a time you’ve had to pivot?

In 1990 I was suddenly physically handicapped at the age of forty. I had always been in good shape physically and enjoyed exercise. I found that walking with a cane or walker automatically adds about twenty years to your age in other peoples eyes. I had worked as a photographer and optical cameraman for most of my life. Companies I had worked for in the past would no longer hire me and I was unable to do the kind of work and long hours. Except for my art & photo projects and writing I effectually became retired. I was fortunate that my wife had a good job and would support us. Thus I was able to throw myself into my work projects and writing books. It was difficult and humbling to become handicapped at such a young age. I also had chronic pain to deal with. Over time I have learned to overcome my frailties and build a following. Such is life.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.scotsothern.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/scotsothern/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/scotsothern/

Image Credits
Author portrait credit Andy Romanoff