Bryan Schutmaat

Bryan Schutmaat is an American photographer whose work has been widely exhibited and published in the USA and overseas. He has won numerous awards, including the 2013 Aperture Portfolio Prize, Center’s 2013 Galllerist’s Choice Awards, the 2013 Daylight Photo Awards, and the 2011 Carl Crow Memorial Fellowship, among many others. In 2014 Bryan was chosen to shoot the cover of TIME Magazine’s Person of the Year 2014 issue, as well as being selected for PDN’s 30 new photographers to watch; in 2013, Dazed Magazine named Bryan one of Paris Photo’s “breakout stars,” and he was chosen as a Flash Forward Emerging Photographer by the Magenta Foundation. During his inaugural show at Sasha Wolf Gallery in the fall of 2014, his work was acquired by two notable institutions, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and The Hood Museum of Art, and he received press coverage from the New Yorker, Collector Daily, and the Wall Street Journal, among others.

His first monograph, Grays the Mountain Sends, was published by the Silas Finch Foundation in 2013 to international critical acclaim. The Washington Post and numerous other publications cited it as one of the best photo-books of 2013, it won the photo-book category in the New York Photo Awards, it was shortlisted for the Aperture/Paris Photo First Book Award, and it was acquired by libraries at the MoMA, New York and the Amon Carter Museum of American Art. Grays the Mountain Sends is currently in its second edition. Bryan holds a BA in history from the University of Houston and an MFA in photography from Hartford Art School. His photos can be found in the permanent collection at the Baltimore Museum of Art, the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston and numerous private collections. He lives in Austin, Texas.

Bryan Schutmaat, Ralph from the project Grays the Mountain Sends

Bryan Schutmaat, Trees from the project Grays the Mountain Sends

Interview by Joaquín Palting

I hope that you, and your family, and friends have been fairing well during the pandemic. How has the “new normal” of 2020 been affecting your life?

A lot of what I had been looking forward to in 2020 was delayed or cancelled outright, including exhibitions, assignments, conferences, and so on. But I can’t complain. The pandemic has affected countless people in terrible ways––sickness, death, financial trouble, etc. I’m grateful to be healthy and staying afloat. 

You grew up in Houston, Texas. Although people might not associate Texas with culture it does have a rich history, and it’s home to a great number of creative people and artists. Some folks who come to mind are directors Wes Anderson, Richard Linklater, and Mike Judge, and the photographer Keith Carter. How do you think coming from Texas has influenced how you see photographically and otherwise?

Yeah, some really exceptional creative work has come out of Texas. I can’t say how exactly, but I know I wouldn't be who I am without people like Townes Van Zandt, Terrence Malick, and many others from Texas. Encountering great work made close to home has been encouraging over the years, and a lot of stuff from Texas has a certain flavor that I’ve probably tried to emulate. 

I often talk about how formative cinema was for me. In my late teens and early twenties, a lot of the movies that really moved me were either set in Texas or made by Texans––Paris, Texas, The Last Picture Show, Days of Heaven, Blood Simple, Giant, A Perfect World, Tender Mercies, Hud, and plenty more. These kinds of films enriched my appreciation for Texas, its landscape, people, and stories. All of this has stuck with me and wound up in my work. Texas, both on and off screen, feels like home, and it certainly shaped my outlook.  

Bryan Schutmaat, from the project Vessels

Bryan Schutmaat, from the project Vessels

I lived for a number of years in the South, Florida to be exact. The South is a complex place with a lot of baggage. However, there is a degree of romanticism in the way people engage with each other there. In interviews of William Eggleston you get a real sense that he truly embodies that rich spirit. I heard you mention that sometimes you want to identify as a Texan, and embrace the state because of its “mystique”, and “strong character.” If you did that how would it manifest itself in the way that you live? In your photography practice? 

That sounds like something I’d say, but I don’t remember saying it! I probably meant it in more of a superficial sense, meaning that I’d like to embrace the style of Texas and its subject matter––cowboys, country music, wide open spaces, etc. But much of that is based in myth and doesn’t sum up the state’s identity. John Steinbeck said, “For all its enormous range of space, climate, and physical appearance, and for all the internal squabbles, contentions, and strivings, Texas has a tight cohesiveness perhaps stronger than any other section of America. Rich, poor, Panhandle, Gulf, city, country, Texas is the obsession, the proper study, and the passionate possession of all Texans.” All this is to say that among Texans there’s a high level of pride and loyalty in where we come from, which at times can be kind of ridiculous, since Texans tend to exaggerate and overrate the merits of this place. That said, I love Texans, most of whom are warm and friendly, and I’d like to be known as one. 

I know that you have a great affinity for filmmakers and cinema. You mentioned that some of your earliest forays into visual making were shooting videos and short films. Why did you move towards photography? What is about the still image that is compelling to you? Why do you think the still image still resonates in a world filled with smartphones and other forms of media?

Photography doesn’t require much equipment, money, planning, or collaborators. Early on, I could go out and take pictures, then see results relatively quickly, whereas making movies is a more complicated ordeal that often entails setbacks. I love collaborating, but sometimes I feel held back by others and prefer the independence of photography.

I don’t have a good hypothesis about why still photos remain compelling, but humans are drawn to them and always will be. Gertrude Stein said, “The only thing, funnily enough, that I never get tired of doing is looking at pictures.” She was talking about painting, but the point remains. I don’t think anyone who shares this feeling will have it changed by the inundation of images on the web. I’ve noticed anxiety among photographers in the digital age. There’s a fear that the sheer quantity of photos and the ongoing deluge of images online somehow reduces photography’s expressive capability and its standing in the arts, but I don’t see the reason for concern. Instagram doesn’t dilute a book like The Americans any more than Twitter dilutes Moby Dick.

Bryan Schutmaat, House, from the project County Road

Bryan Schutmaat, Indian Blankets, from the project County Road

Foreign and Indie films inspire you…what are some films you’ve seen recently that have caught your interest? What about other forms of art making? Who and what have you been looking at recently?

With so much time at home during the pandemic, you’d think I’d be watching a lot of movies this year, but oddly that hasn’t been the case. My favorites of 2019 were Monos, A Hidden Life, The Lighthouse, and HBO’s Chernobyl series. I saw a Francis Bacon show at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston earlier this year that was stunning. Some recent photobook purchases include Das Auge des Krieges by Dieter Keller, The Living Mountain by Awoiska van der Molen, and Ciprian Honey Cathedral by Raymond Meeks, all of which I highly recommend. Adrianne Lenker just released a new album out that’s fantastic. I could go on and on…

You and I share a personal history with skateboarding and punk rock in our youth. Do you feel that the ethos of either of those interests influenced your approach photography, or the business of being an artist?

Yes, in my youth skating and punk rock were important to me and both interests represented a rejection of the mainstream. At an early age, I got it in my head that America’s corporatism and consumerism defiled the landscape and the human spirit. A lot of that thinking was naïve rebellion, but it’s amazing how  those attitudes endure, because I generally still carry those same beliefs. A critique of what America’s economic system does to the land and people is a prominent theme in my work. In terms of business, I think my DIY background and the ethics my friends and I embodied when booking shows and planning tours have undoubtedly influenced the way I conduct business and maintain relationships.

I know that photography really took a foothold in your life in the years between when you completed your undergraduate degree in History and the start of grad school. Since you were already actively photographing what motivated you to go to graduate school? What did you feel graduate school would bring to your photographic practice?

I don’t remember exactly why I wanted to go to grad school or what I thought I would get from it. I just had an enormous love for photography, I wanted to give it a serious try, and I figured that getting an MFA was the next step at that point in my life. Plus, I enjoyed the academic setting, so more school appealed to me. Looking back, I vaguely understood that my work wasn’t very good, but I couldn’t articulate why or what I needed to do to improve, so I sought guidance from a grad program––not to find answers, but to figure out which questions to ask.

Bryan Schutmaat, Joe, from the project Grays the Mountain Sends

Bryan Schutmaat, Abandoned School House, from the project Grays the Mountain Sends

You went to grad school at the University of Hartford, a school that has been producing so many amazing photographers as of late. Did you apply to any other MFA programs? If so why did you choose the University of Hartford?

I only applied to a couple of universities, and deciding which to attend was among the harder decisions I’ve had to make in life. With the Hartford program, I really liked the faculty and its emphasis on the photobook. I also wanted to live in Montana during my grad studies, and since the Hartford program is a limited residency commitment, it allowed that. 

Your first monograph Grays The Mountain Sends is dedicated to your father. He worked in construction, and as a kid you said that sometimes he would bring you to his job sites. Are the portraits that you took in that body of work a search for some of the male archetypes you encountered at his jobs?

When making Grays, I was thinking about my father more than the other workers I encountered on the jobs back then. In fact, I think I attempted, in a way, to make portraits of my father through the guys I met in small towns out west. I’ve mentioned this before in lectures and prior interviews. Sometimes someone's flannel-shirt or dirty fingernails might remind me of the early memories of my dad. These details would call something to mind that got me reflecting on my father, the work he did in my youth, and how it related to the world I saw around me while shooting. 

All of the men who were portrayed in the book seem like they are enveloped in a kind of heaviness, the word that comes to my mind is forlorn. Can you speak to that?

I’m interested in men’s emotions and internal worlds. Men are often told from childhood that they need to be tough and to never show weakness or talk about feelings. These narrow confines of masculinity limit men from a range of human possibility that would benefit them. The archetypal western male tends to be strong, resilient, and ruggedly individualistic; he’s a fierce man who says little and always overcomes the odds, but this of course isn’t reality for so many men whose lives are filled with struggle and disappointment. A lot of guys I photograph appear hardened by the culture and landscape around them, but on the inside, they’re not stoic.They’re complex people with hopes and needs and sometimes painful emotions. To photograph them in nice light with sympathy and a tender approach was important to me. 

Bryan Schutmaat, Fire, from the project Good Goddamn

Bryan Schutmaat, Creek #3, from the project Good Goddamn

Much of your work depicts landscapes of the West, and that is why your portrait photography stands out to me. Susan Sontag in, On Photography, addressed photographic representation very powerfully by stating “To photograph people is to violate them, by seeing them as they never see themselves, by having knowledge of them they can never have; it turns people into objects that can be symbolically possessed.” As a photographer who, on occasion, takes photographs of people what are your thoughts on the power and responsibility of representation?

Photography can do harm, yes, but generally I don’t think that photographing people is tantamount to violation. To aggrandize photography’s power to that extent doesn’t make sense to me. Photography is a tool and it isn’t inherently flawed, but as humans, photographers often are. An ethical outlook is required when taking pictures, which is complicated by the fact that compelling work and powerful stories sometimes reveal sorrow, conflict, and vulnerability. Great art is seldom just about life’s bliss. The poet and the painter speak truthfully about pain and human experience without using material that directly depicts the real world in the way that photography does, so perhaps the photographer’s responsibility is greater. To make a portrait of anyone who isn’t seen as confident and content has its dangers, but photographers have to navigate the territory thoughtfully and responsibly while still taking necessary risks to say what they want to say. I just think you have to believe in what you’re doing enough to take those risks, and at the same time stay kind. 

Your follow-up monograph is titled, Islands of the Blest. That book is a collaborative effort  between you and curator Ashlyn Davis, and it’s a collection of historical photographs. I have always strayed from from both collaborations and utilizing archival images only because I think I have control issues (laughter). How did you find that process? Was it as rewarding as working with your own photographs?

It was a satisfying process. Working with archival photos definitely differs from taking one’s own pictures, but searching is essential in both pursuits. It’s not the same thrill as coming across subject matter in person and clicking the shutter, but to find a great image in some forgotten corner of a public archive feels really good. And then to put it into a book sequence of other photos for context and expressive purposes is also exciting, especially if it’s a photo that’s gone unseen for many years. Although there are some famous photos in the book, Ashlyn and I decided that bringing lesser known or virtually unknown images into the edit was really important. 

Many landscape photographs that were taken during the 19th century by Timothy O’Sullivan, Carleton Watkins, and others, were used to sell the idea of “the West”. If you think about your own work in that historical canon what role do you hope it plays?

I love the work of O’Sullivan and his contemporaries, but there’s complexity to their photos and the messages they conveyed. Hired by the US government and private industries alike, those photographers made images that beckoned settlers, and their work helped to create a myth about the West and its promise of prosperity. If you fast forward, following photographers who have worked in the region have refuted the promise and exposed the myth of the West by representing a contemporary reality that starkly contrasts the glory that the American Dream and American exceptionalism were meant to achieve. The idea of the West is important in my work and a source for much contemplation. It’s a window to look into American history and character, our pride as well as our shame.  

Bryan Schutmaat, Kris #3 from the project Good Goddamn

Bryan Schutmaat, Kris #7 from the project Good Goddamn

You formed a publishing company called Trespasser Books, and released your third monograph Good Goddamn through it. What prompted you to jump into publishing? How would you like to see Trespasser evolve?

I had been talking with friends about starting up a small imprint for some time, so when Good Goddamn came about in 2017, it was a perfect debut project to give publishing a try. It’s a book that has that punk and DIY approach we talked about earlier. I run Trespasser with Matthew Genitempo and Cody Haltom. We honestly haven’t given Trespasser a ton of thought and it isn’t some grand or ambitious endeavor. We just want to put out a book or two per year and use our voice to show people some great work that meets our ideals. 

Good Goddamn seems to be a very personal project with a much smaller geographic footprint, as opposed to the epic scale of Grays The Mountain Sends. How does your approach to storytelling differ when the focus is much tighter? 

Yeah, Good Goddamn is about one man and it’s set in one place, and the pictures are a bit different than my work out West. In central Texas, where Good Goddamn was shot, much of the land is wooded and doesn’t have striking geographic features––no grand mountain vistas or endless plains. To make interesting pictures, I didn’t look to the horizon; I looked at what was at arm’s length. For this story, the close proximity also served a narrative purpose. I photographed branches, beer cans, tire tracks, and other details to help define the world Kris knows and what he experiences. I think those features of the land and surroundings help to build a kind of intimacy, and they show the viewer Kris’s physical and emotional world. 

Being a photographer can be a very isolating endeavor. Often you are working out in the field alone, editing alone, marketing alone, etc. Do you enjoy that aspect of it? Or do you prefer to participate in broader art or photography community?

I’m ok with being alone a lot of the time. Townes van Zandt said about his time on the road, traveling by himself as a touring musician, “Aloneness is a state of being whereas loneliness is a state of feeling. It's like being broke and being poor. I feel aloneness all the time and loneliness I hardly ever feel.” I know what he means. But I also meet people pretty regularly when I’m on the road shooting, and I get social fulfillment from that––talking to strangers, sharing stories, exchanging experiences, and so on. Taking pictures is a good excuse to move about the world and interact with interesting people, so I’m probably less alone when in the field than people might think when they envision a photographer roving the West. When it comes to other aspects of photography back home in the studio, I’m ok being alone then as well. I like being at my desk unbothered. I also like hanging out with friends and fellow artists and being social too. I definitely value community. I suppose it’s all about balance.  

Bryan Schutmaat, from the project Vessels

Bryan Schutmaat, from the project Vessels

There is a great deal of physicality involved in the way your images are created. You are outdoors working with large format gear. Do you consider how your labor factors into the work? Is there something added to your practice from working in that way? For example, I work in a similar manner and for me the tools, and the energy I expend using them, help facilitate a moving mediation while I’m working. That meditation, I believe, helps me focus and opens up channels of creativity when I am out in the field.

I haven’t thought about this too much. I admire your meditative approach, but I don’t think I share your feelings about this. I think the large format camera’s optical and aesthetic benefit is all I’m interested in. At times, perhaps it can help with portraits of strangers, because the camera’s presence is special. It’s an odd, impressive, wooden gadget, and it can disarm people and help sitters to take a portrait session more seriously. But I generally find the 4x5 pretty cumbersome every step of the way. If I could get the same quality from a smaller camera, I would absolutely ditch it. 

This year you were a recipient of a John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Fellowship. How did that come about? Was it always a professional goal of yours? Is there a particular project that this will help fund?

There’s not much to it! I just applied for the fellowship and fortunately got it. It wasn’t a longstanding goal of mine. I’ve been doing photography a while, but it wasn’t until recently that I felt qualified or bold enough to ask for a Guggenheim. I applied with a proposal to continue my project, Vessels, which is about travelers and hitchhikers among the drylands of the American West. 

What’s on the horizon for you personally? professionally? Any new undertakings or project releases that you are excited about?

I’ll just be keeping steady and shooting work out west when I can. I have a show called County Road that’s up right now at Lora Reynolds gallery in Austin, and some variation of that work ought to be a book next year. Vessels will be a book someday, too. 

So if I don’t see you at the next FotoFest, where should I go for the best BBQ in Houston?

Burns Original is my favorite. But I think the best barbecue is in central Texas outside the Austin area. I love Black’s in Lockhart. 

You have done a lot of driving all over the west and Texas…have you ever seen a *Chupacabra!?

Haha, I’ve seen countless stray dogs and prowling coyotes, but never a chupacabra.

 * The Chupacabra is a mythical creature in Texas folklore that is said to embody dog-like characteristics. It is said to be bloodthirsty and have a particular penchant for draining the blood out of livestock. Much like the legendary Bigfoot the Chupacabra remains elusive and their existence is yet to be scientifically proven.

Bryan Schutmaat, Wes, from the project Grays the Mountain Sends