in dialogue

conversations between the editor and artists featured in dialogue.

FEARLESS, pg. 15

REBIRTH, pg. 28-29

nathan devries

April 9, 2024

Nathan Devries is a Freshman studying Engineering. He works in film photography with a concentration in black and white film. He was featured in Dialogue 56.1 with two visual art pieces, FEARLESS on pg. 15 and REBIRTH on pg. 28-29. Dialogue’s Editor-in-Chief, Levi Huizenga, spoke to Nathan about his work in last semester’s issue, his entry into film photography, and his work style today.

This transcript has been edited for clarity.

Levi: Hi Nathan, thanks for sitting down with me to talk. Let’s start at the beginning here. How did you get into photography? Where did that start for you?

Nathan: It started during the pandemic. I was really bored and I was living in Turkey, so I felt like it was a great opportunity to express my creativity and engage with the culture. So I just bought a cheap used camera and went out in the city and I started shooting stuff. Over time I just got better and better at it, and it was so much fun. It was such a good way to engage with people and with the environment, and create memories and art. It’s a beautiful form of art.

L: I’m looking at the cover of Volume 56.1, which you titled “rebirth”, and I’m thinking, ‘This doesn’t look like Turkey.’

N: No, you’re right, this is Azerbaijan, which is nearby to Turkey. What you’re looking at is this $400 million kind of propaganda building. It was full of stuff about anti-Armenian propaganda. Crazy stuff, but it's an absolutely beautiful building. It was a Soviet country before, so a lot of the architecture is very Soviet and very communist. Just the way it contrasted this beautiful organic shape with all the very Soviet, blocky kind of architecture – it was just so beautiful to me. And then of course this just happened to line up, which was wild, the mother with the two kids.

L: So when you're wandering around the city, to what degree are you kind of looking for moments like this? Are you kind of lining yourself up with the shot? Or do things just kind of fall into place?

N: I think it's a mix of both. I feel like there will be things that catch my eye and I'm like, OK, I need to get that thing lined up and really capture this moment. But there's times like this when it's just random and it just happens to line up and, I don't know. I guess maybe it's like the creative eye or something, but I’ll just notice that it’s a beautiful moment and I’ll just immediately go to capture it, and then it turns out amazing. Sometimes it'll just turn out like crap. But that's part of the fun of it, it's just kind of messing around until you get something beautiful.

L: So it seems like there's a lot of different levels of photography. Would you kind of characterize yourself as somebody who is working very technically? I mean, the way you're describing what you're doing is kind of just like, wandering around, exploring, and kind of just letting things happen.

N: Yeah, I think it's more so that than the technical side of stuff. The technical side of stuff is very interesting to me, but, I mean, I'm shooting on like a 30 year old film camera, so I don't feel like I can get super technical, a lot of the time. It’s more about shapes and colors and contrast. That's most of the technical stuff that I'll look at, especially when shooting on black and white, because you lose so much, but then you also put a lot of emphasis on the shapes, which is why this shot really turned out well. They're beautiful shapes and beautiful contrasts and shadows. Even like the jacket contrasting with the background, it wouldn't pop on color like it does on black and white. So I think it's a lot about knowing your format.

L: How long do you think it took you to kind of develop that intuition? How long have you been shooting, period?

N: I've been shooting film for 2-ish years now. I think it took me probably at least a full year to even get some idea of what looks good on what format, because it is very finicky. Each film roll turns out differently. I started on color, which is this whole realm on its own, and then switched to black and white, which I had to learn again. So it's been a long process and even now I'm not confident when I shoot something. I'm not confident that I'll get a good result in the end.

L: What led you to experiment with different stuff? Have you switched cameras a couple of times? Why switch to black and white?

N: I think a big thing was just the aesthetic of film. It just really intrigued me, because I was shooting on a pretty crappy DSLR and like, you're not going to get amazing photos with that, so unless you want to invest like several $1000 in a really good DSLR, the only other option is to just go into film, which I've found much more intriguing anyways. And I wanted to experiment and see what looked good, because I shot a lot of color and you know, you just get bored and you want to try stuff out.

L: I’m looking at another piece of yours in 56.1, “fearless”. What's going on here? How did we get to this interesting location?

N: It's an island off of Istanbul. It takes like an hour-long ferry boat ride. You can just take a public ferry -– it costs like fifty cents. I went with my friends and then we kind of went deep into the forest to this spot that they knew where you could access the beach, and there were these rocks that they would always jump off of. They took me there, and it was right at sunset. I just found a good spot to take a picture of him as he was jumping off it. It turned out to be just absolutely beautiful.

L: So, you decide to go out and take photos. What does that look like for you? Are you organizing trips for yourself? What does that look like when you're in school?

N: I mean, this year it hasn't happened really at all. I don't have a car, so I’m just stuck here. But in the past, I think I've just kind of integrated it into trips that are already happening. Or sometimes I would just ask friends to, like, go hang out, and I just have that in the back of my mind that this would be a great opportunity to get a good photo shoot in. I think a lot of times it does just work seamlessly into other outings, because we got to explore this whole building and like there's a museum in there and tons of stuff. And then I also got to have a really fun photo shoot because of all the beautiful architecture.

L: So are you saying being in Grand Rapids has really hurt the photos that you shoot?

N: I got nothing going on right now. It's kind of miserable. I went back to Istanbul over winter break and I took like four full rolls of shots because I missed it so much. I wanted to take up that opportunity because I know that when I'm here, I don't have anything to shoot.

L: Will we see some of those photos submitted then?

N: Yeah. I think all the ones I submitted for this semester were from that break.

L: Great! I’m excited to see them. Thanks a lot for doing this, Nathan.

N: Sure, yeah, thank you for inviting me.

Cozy Cabin, pg. 27

B/W Cottage Sketch, pg. 41-42

mori ismond

February 27, 2024

Morrison (Mori) Ismond is a senior studying Architecture and Graphic Design. He works in analogue architectural concept drawings, buildings sketched with pen and paper. He was featured in Dialogue 56.1 with two visual art pieces, Cozy Cabin on pg. 27, and B/W Cottage Sketch on pg. 41-42. Dialogue’s Editor-in-Chief, Levi Huizenga, recently spoke to Mori about his work in last semester’s issue, his process more generally, and his broader aspirations in architecture concept illustration.

This transcript has been edited for clarity.

Levi: Where did architectural drawing start for you?

Mori: I grew up drawing art, not a whole lot, but just a little bit to get me to the point where I started to enjoy it. I guess, further back, in terms of architecture I remember playing with Legos early on. And you know, you were a kid, just enjoying your time with Legos and playing with them. And eventually one thing develops into another, and it's a snowball effect, which gets me where I am today. Like I'm still a kid playing with Legos. It's just pens now. And yeah, it's still a creative process. You're using Legos like 3D modeling when you're younger. And now I have AutoCAD and Blender, and other tools to help create new processes and new designs that are unique to me.

L: How do these tools fit together? Are you saying that the work in Dialogue 56.1 was modelled in Blender and then drawn?

M: I do most of my stuff analogue, just pen and paper generating ideas, where one line informs another. You make a box on the page, and then say ‘OK, let’s add another box over here.’ So you’re trying to figure out the golden ratios of the houses, and how the whole thing balances. You think through the whole thing like an engineer, or you look through the eyes of the consumer, and ask ‘Why would I want to live in this House?’ I go through a lot of why questions, like, ‘How do I use this House effectively?’, and ‘Where does the light come in from?’, ‘How does the water work?’, just all the nitty gritty stuff. Really I’m just trying to encapsulate what a house is and then draw it.

L: Would you be able to speak about any design influences? Are you inspired by any particular architects or movements?

M: Everything is in reference to something else that’s been recreated, so nothing is built in this world that's new. Everything is just refreshed, from a new lens. When I look at my pieces, these sharp buildings informed by wood and concrete, there’s purpose to it, like form follows function. That goes back to the Bauhaus movement and how everything in an environment is combined. So in those pieces, it's going to be hard lines, that’s just what it is. I can do curved lines if I would like, but that would make it more natural, and in that environment, buildings are not natural. So you have to make it more ‘civilized’.

L: You’re saying that you’re thinking about the environment the house is in as you’re designing it, and that actually informs the design of the house?

M: I mean, it has to be functional. It has to be built in a place and in a way where it can last. Everything is affected by it. It's hard to articulate, but everything influences the building. No matter what it is, from the design, to the terrain it’s in, to the animals that are there, what’s in the ground, what's in the water like, the weather patterns, and so on. Where is the door frame, and where does the sun come up? How does that influence where that light goes through the door? It's a huge list you have to think about.

L: Speaking about the issue as a whole, I was really grateful to have your work in there, it’s so different, your pieces really stand out. Do you have any thoughts about your work in reference to other pieces in the journal? What do you think makes your work special?

M: I wouldn’t really be able to speak to what other people are doing, but one thing that we think about is that it's a digital age right now, so if you're doing analogue stuff, it's it goes against the norm in a sense. Most digital renderings of houses in the last, say, 20 years have been all through Blender, through like a digital modelling program. But in 2001, 2005, analogue was the only way to go. It made sense and it looked good. Then once the digital age came, it started to transition out of fashion. But now it's starting to come back. It's a useful skill.

L: You see what you’re doing with your architectural work as countercultural?

M: Yeah, for sure. Analogue is awesome. It will always be around because it attaches you to the paper. It makes you feel at home. It’s like the idea that I’m not building houses, I’m building homes. I'm drawing homes that connect to the person, and if it doesn't then I haven't designed it to fit your needs. What we want in a home goes back to the function and aesthetics of the building.

L: I’m looking at Cozy Cabin, thinking about these guidelines that are kind of half erased, all these details that make it feel really natural, really human.

M: Right, and that’s totally part of the process. So it's like if you can see part of the process, you become part of the story yourself, of understanding how it was made, and understanding that it's just a box next to another box with a couple of triangles. Like, it's just geometry, it's just oriented in a different way that you’ve never seen before.

L: That seems like a great place to end. Thanks for talking with me Mori.

M: Sure, blessings on you man.