Guy Tal Photography Newsletter
November, 2008
All text and images Copyright © Guy Tal.
 It's been another wonderful autumn season here in the scenic Southwest. After last month's colorful displays of aspen had faded, it was now the maples' turn to shine and boy were they blazing yellow and red through the canyons in and around Zion National Park. Fast forward just a few days and winter is here! The Wasatch mountains of northern Utah are now brimming with fresh snow, and morning frost now coats the fallen leaves after each freezing night. Flocks of migrating birds can be seen in the sky. Pretty soon the bald eagles will arrive for the winter. How fortunate we are to have this beauty around us.
$25 Holiday Mini-Print Sale
Starting immediately and until December 1st, all images in my Open-Edition collection are available as 5x7 mini-prints for the affordable price of $25. These are archival pigment prints made on high-grade fiber paper, same as my larger prints. As an added bonus, each print will be hand-mounted and matted to 8x10 ready to frame white mat board with black core. These tasteful prints make great holiday gifts, are easy to ship to distant loved ones, and will not burden your budget in these tough economic times. As always, your purchases and support are greatly appreciated.
To order, simply browse the online catalog of over 750 images. When you find the one (or more) you like, simply click the "Purchase Print" button and select the holiday special from the list of available sizes.
More Articles in Print
This month my work is featured in both Outdoor Photographer Magazine and Popular Photography Magazine. I'm sure many of the new subscribers this month found their way to my site by way of these great publications and I'd like to thank and welcome you.
New Images Posted
The most recent update to my site now includes several new images from late autumn. You can always browse the most recent addition here, or follow the "Most Recent Additions" link from the site's gallery page.The Myths of "Personal Style"
The issue of personal style is one that torments so many in pursuit of creative expression. For some, the desire to be unique is so overpowering that the quest to produce a consistent and distinct stream of images becomes more important than the images themselves. Let me dispel some of the common myths of personal style. Everyone has one. Some have several. The incessant prodding of art critics for artists to paint themselves into narrow, easily-recognizable niches carries some merit but when taken to the extreme can easily make the artist lose touch with their own voice and creative urge in favor placating the few.
Humans are complex beings. We may become obsessively interested in any one thing, or we may enjoy a broad range of interests. A personal style is no more than a style reflecting one's personality. If you are an avid fan of a specific kind of aesthetic - let that be your style. If your creative urges pull you in different directions each and every day and you are fortunate to possess the skill to pursue them all - that is an equally valid style. The only difference: it makes life harder for the critics.
Art and beauty take on many forms. The notion that one artist can only excel at one is ridiculous. Certainly some great artists can be neatly placed into categories such as "Impressionist" and "Postmodern," but can you name the personal style of Da Vinci or Picasso? To do that you'd have to consider specific periods in their lives and perhaps specific avenues they may have pursued in parallel. Both the Mona Lisa and the Vitruvian Man come from the same mind and represent the personal style(s) of one artist. A modern-day critic with no knowledge of the man and his genius would likely have dismissed him as lacking one.
My advice to you is to worry less about style and more about personal expression. If you have a personality - you have a personal style, and the better defined your personality, the more distinct your style... or styles... will be.
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