Teeners — Gratitude

Tell us a bit about yourself back in the day when you took these photos.

I am Denzil Bernard Jayasinghe. I have four children. At the time I took these photos, I was approaching fifty. Back then, three of my children were teenagers, and the eldest had left home already for University in Bathurst. I had two teenagers at home; the youngest was about eleven.

I am a creative artist by nature and was keen to develop my storytelling skills through photographs. Why not start with your own family?

How did you find yourself taking these photographs?

My father was a loving man, the best role model one could ever have. I followed him everywhere when I was young. It brought a lot of self-confidence unknown to me growing up. As a late teenager striving for adulthood, I became unnecessarily conscious of my father’s shadow. I wanted to show my independence. If my father put his hand around my shoulder in a loving gesture, I quickly got out of his grip. I now know he was showing his love while I was trying to assert myself as a youngster on the threshold of adulthood.

In 2005, some thirty years later, my eldest had already left home at eighteen. My father passed away in my arms a few years earlier, in 2002, just before I took these photos. His passing changed my outlook on life forever. My father’s love for me as a young boy reverberated in my head. It was gratitude felt afterwards. I knew I had limited time now with my remaining children at home, the best time of their life. One had left the nest already. My focus was on my second and third kids, who were still galloping teenagers. I was trying to immortalise them in this important stage in their lives.

So what happened?

Well, I went to art school to study photography first. Although I had a digital SLR, a $5,000 beast that was expensive then, I wanted to study film photography. I learnt the basics of light, aperture and shutter speed in the art studio using analogue cameras. I bought a film SLR camera and some Ilford black rolls for the course. Then I set out to capture my kids in these photos, which turned out to be some of my favourites.

You have thousands of photos of your kids. Why are these your favourites?

My kids were and still are a happy lot. When I took these photos, I was fascinated with film photography as part of my course at the art school. As part of the course, I had to do homework. Who else could be my willing or perhaps unwilling subjects? My kids, of course. The exercise was on capturing contrasts in characters.

I had to cajole them into posing to take these photos just before they left for their school in their uniforms. My son and daughter were getting impatient with my manoeuvres of settings, positioning them up, manipulating the camera and looking through the viewfinder. Little by little, their mood changed. It was one of the rare moments; I could see the anguish in their faces, getting fed up with a pestering dad, trying to take his perfect shot. But I loved those looks, which gave away their annoyance. It was such a historic moment in my life. I can still visually remember the day. It was their love towards their dad in their angst, something they could not refuse. It brought memories of my father’s gestures to me, which I sometimes took no notice of in my youthful ignorance.

The photos with my youngest are another story. My youngest, being young and around eleven years of age at the time, was more of a willing subject. She would do whatever her dad asked her to do. Those photos were taken on a backdrop of straight lines of contrast, another project from art school. You could see the sun coming through shades and making lines on her. Then there were lines on cushions and the wall picture. Her lengthy socks were lined too. It was one of those rare moments of creativity for me. She, in her innocence, raised her hands as I asked her to do various poses. Again, my love for my youngest is manifested in this photo. She is wearing her school uniform. Then there is a photo of us; while I was pretty relaxed, you could see the anguish on my youngest’s face. This, too is one of my favourites. The photos of my youngest were taken on another day.

Tell us about the post-processing part of these images.

I captured them in my Canon EOS 30, a film camera with a prime lens of 35mm. Then I developed the Ilford film roll at my art school as part of my assignment. When I printed them using chemicals and water in their darkroom, it dawned on me that I had a few gems in my hand. I was bad in the darkroom, with too many solutions and too much technical work to get an optimum image. I took the film roll to one of the rare camera houses that still processed them in their laboratories in Sydney. They gave me printed copies and a digitised version of these photos on a DVD. I am fascinated by the grain effects of these photos, something hard to replicate digitally.

Anything else you felt proud of in these images?

This photo series has two sets: one with my teenage kids and the other with my youngest. Both sets were picked up by imageopolis.com and were selected as a favourite series of photos in 2005. It is a website that has operated for twenty years but is losing its allure after the advent of Instagram and modern-day photo apps. I was stoked when they picked my photos, despite my amateurish attempts.

Did you learn anything while putting this series together?

Yes, my kids were in my care for a little while. I don’t own them. They have been given to me temporarily. I also learnt to appreciate what my parents, particularly my father, had done to me as an adolescent, teenager and young man discovering the world.

What do you love about photographing people?

I love the scene-setting, capturing moments in life. Life is a beautiful thing, and it is an enormous gift. Most of my photographs are of people, particularly my four beloved children. Photos create a beautiful way of storytelling. Most of my articles on djayasi.medium.com are filled with images. A photo says a thousand words. I am so keen for my grandchildren to grow up and capture their moments of happiness. I look forward to that very much. It is a privilege.

What else do you feel about your interest in photography?

Photographs are immortal. My parents had a relatively large number of photographs. I have managed to salvage many and capture them on digitally. They would tell stories for generations.

Where can you see more of your work?

My legacy portfolio is on imagepolis. Some of my other works are in photo essays on djayasi.medium.com, like this one.

Photo essay and story inspired by the awesome Frankie magazine Australia

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