Stories in the Eye of the Beholder

Sometimes when I see art or photography described as great storytelling, I wonder if I’m supposed to see a really obvious story that everyone else sees.

More fruitful, I think, is to imagine one’s own story to go with each image.

There’s plenty of fodder in two sets of photos on the theme “Trouble in Paradise” by Christoph Martin Schmid. One set is labeled “Day,” the other, “Night.”

In fact, one of my favorite storytelling activities is to use an image or set of images as a story prompt. Without considering artistic intent, I like to conjure my own story for each image.