10 Questions with Award Winning Photographer Simon Devitt

What do you feel is the most challenging part of being a photographer today?
‍For me the biggest challenge has and always will be having fresh eyes on the world. For me that's a certain headspace I occupy and that involves me thinking (and not thinking) about certain things while I'm on a photo-shoot.

I think about calm and quiet
I like that we know what music is because of the silence between each note. And how important it is to listen…. And wait.
I think about being present
And think about things like how we only see something because of its ability to absorb or reflect light.
And then I try not to think
And be present
I think about engaging my other senses. I think we trust our eyes too much. The other senses are profoundly important in how we view a scene.
My brief to myself always, is what does it feel like to be here.
I always spend time sitting still in the environment I’m charged with photographing. 
I listen as much as I watch. 
This is how I find what is really in the space.
I listen
I wait
I watch
My work is as much about the landscape as it is the people that inhabit the structures.
Nature is a container for these things.
It moves around it, underneath it and through it in unpredictable and curious ways.
I think about the concept that time adds a layer of depth that cannot be faked. Photographs are, by nature, made of time.
Started by the photographer and then exposed to the alchemy of time, to become charged with meaning.
I think about what I do is a lot like fishing or a treasure hunt. It can’t be about ticking off a list of shots. Photography for me is a lot about exploration and building a narrative.
I think about walking, and in a sense, getting lost. And how the pace of walking is in sync with the rhythm of our heartbeat. I walk on average 10km during a shoot day. I’d like to say carrying lots of heavy gear. But my assistant does that. Good on you Hamish.
I think about how I make it up as I go. We don’t know what we don’t know. Discovering knowledge through naivety. For me its always about learning by necessity, that naïve energy is really important. Learning, applying and absorbing what you need when you need it.
I think about story telling. And about how important it is to make pictures that aren’t too ambiguous or too descriptive. Too ambiguous and you risk confusing someone. Too descriptive and the viewer has nothing to engage with.
I think about sense of place.
And how where we have all come from and where we have been informs the sense of place we feel when we encounter somewhere for the very first time.
I think about beauty and how the last hard earned layer of beauty is decay. When people move, buildings remain, they stand and gain the mark of time. They decay and show age, they become embedded with signs of life.