Interview Jeff Luker

Being around other artists helps you understand your own work better.

Name: Jeff Luker
Hometown: Plympton, Massachusetts. I live in Portland, Oregon at the moment.
Style of photography: Magical realism.
Type of camera(s): Contax G1, Nikon FM2, Bronica 645, Yashica T4.
Website: www.jeffluker.com , stealinghorses.blogspot.com , Flickr

What gives you inspiration?

Things I see day to day, I find the most inspiring. The other day I saw this woman all alone playing a trombone in the rain…very surreal. Things like that make me remember why it’s important to make photographs. Life is filled with all these moments and images, mundane, sad, beautiful, but it’s the collection of all of them that you can draw inspiration from.

What are your influences?

I have been lucky enough to be surrounded by amazing creative people. So in some ways my friends are my biggest influence, being around other artists helps you understand your own work better. I was living in New York and working with Ryan Mcginley for a while, so that had an impact on me. I went to film school, so I kind of learned image making through that process. I also grew up in a skateboarding culture, so that whole atmosphere of art that came from that scene I was really influenced by, people like Ed Templeton, Mark Gonzales, Harmony Korine and so on.

Why did you choose these photos?

These are photos that span some different work, I like images that can work together, regardless of content.

What does photography mean to you?

Photography means everything to me. It’s a way to share with others the way you see. The world is a weird place, it’s not one thing or another, art is basically choosing which parts of the experience you find necessary to make a representation of.

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