Anton Agalbato

A complete amateur with little to no technical knowledge pertaining to photography. My only camera is a very simple "point and shoot" Lumix which I treated myself to about 5 years ago when my passion for photography was re-kindled (a passion which began in 1955 when, as a teenager, I saw the first Family of Man exhibition at MOMA in New York). I have no other equipment, not even a tripod, nor do I have photoshop. Any editing I do is by using the very basic editing tools that came with my Microsoft home computer package, and, unfortunately, any editing that I can do has to be done universally on a photo. Oh how often I have wished I could edit just a portion of a photo, saturate just one colour in a photo...but, alas, I cannot. After my Family of Man experience, I was gifted with an old Ricohflex that had a superb lens, and I shot a portrait of a young fellow actor friend. Next thing I knew, I was getting calls from other actors/actresses/models asking if I'd do their portfolios. Despite my panic because I knew how little I knew about photography, I agreed. When I say I knew nothing, I mean "nothing". An F stop to me meant a subway station where the IRT F train stopped at. I used Kodak monochrome film that came with a little folded paper pamphlet that said "If it's sunny, set your camera to such and such...if it's cloudy to such and such." That seemed easy enough and pretty soon I was making guesses that always seemed to work. Then I really panicked when I was asked by a young actress friend to do a series indoors using lights, which her father had. I still marvel at how well those photos turned out. I never charged for any of the photos I took; I would have felt like a charlatan if I had, being so unknowledgeable and working only by instinct. Happily all those jobs produced great results for those I was shooting (they all got calls from agents and agencies praising their photos). It was a gratifying experience. As they say, "life happened" and I moved onto other things, mostly theatrical (acting, directing, producing, writing book and lyrics for musicals). I even opened a 500-seat theatre on NY's Lower East Side (which had been derelict) to give theatre to audiences who couldn't afford to go to a mainstream theatre. The price of admission was nil. I did it at age 22 when the teacher of a TV production night class I was taking at NYU told me to go out and "do something...make a film, start a theatre." So, encouraged by my fellow classmates (art directors, tv production workers, actors, etc.) I did, but only after those classmates agreed to join me in the venture. Letter writing resulted in donations of money, and ABC Television sent over a truckload of old TV flats which my crew of 7 female stagehands converted to theatre flats, and we were on our way. All of us had full-time day jobs but that didn't stop us; castings, rehearsals, production meetings took place between the hours of 6 pm and 1 am. Though at times (well, probably at all times) panicked and lacking confidence, I ran on enthusiasm alone and learned from all my experiences life's greatest lesson: Never let fear stop you. If you do, you'll do nothing and joy comes from doing. I've moved around a fair bit (NY, where I was born and raised; Ohio; California for 12 yrs, where I was owner/director of a wonderful gallery of contemporary art [where I was able to discover and encourage young artists who were not yet bankable names], as well as owner/chef of a restaurant [friends talked me into the restaurant thing; I had never even worked in a restaurant, just liked to cook, but from it's beginning it was constantly listed as one of the 10 best in the area...an area that had 300 restaurants]; England for 16 years where I re-started a career as a lyricist that I had begun many years before in NYC. Now, since 2001, I live in Italy. Next stop: who knows! Probably the grave...lots of years have passed and thereare definitely more lying behind me than lie ahead. In the meantime, I write, teach and take very amateur photos. I love doing all that, and my greatest passion in life is for passion...for people who are passionate about what they do, whatever it is. I have worked in the arts, in business, in social services and education and have met so many passionate people. It's what makes people beautiful. It's a great and powerful force. Let the force be with you.Finally, though I know little about photography, I know what I like: The works of Bresson; Nan Goldin; Ansel Adams; Margaret Bourke-White; George Platt Lynes; Richard Avedon; and Walker Evans, whose work with James Agee on "Let Us Now Praise Famous Men" blows my mind (including the best portraiture I've ever seen.)