Book Review:

‘Learn to see’

A Photographic Essay: by L.E. SAMARARATNE
Published by: Stamford Lake (Pvt) Ltd

Reviewed by: Dr. Lester James Peries

“All I want is to make you see”
David Wark Griffith
- Legendary American Director

PORTRAIT: Many, Many years ago in my distant middle age a young photographer came to take a portrait of me for a Sunday newspaper. He seemed to know precisely what he wanted.

First he said I should wear the familiar Bush - Jacket which I always wear on location. Then in case I was mistaken for a wild -life enthusiast, should I not wear around my neck a cine - directors’ badge of his trade - the view-finder?

Finally he suggested I use the cap I wear rather rakishly, which in some bizarre way was associated with me. Now he said with professional expertise, I should stand by the cine - camera - that would complete the picture.

That portrait has been my favourite in that particular period of my life, smiling as through I had broken some box office record.

The photographer I need hardly add was LE. Samararatne.

I was glad he sent me the book for a review, glad that I could pay homage to a man whose passion for his chosen medium, the STILL CAMERA, never deserted him over the last 60 years of his working life.

Samararatne’s life story reads like a Mark Twain fable. From the deep South, a Rahula kid abandons his elementary education, arrives in the Big City, works in Donald Studios in Maradana washing prints sticking it out over the years, mastering the Secrets of the Dark Room, graduating to studio portraits, joining as senior assistant at Chitrafoto, the fabled studio, inspired by D.R. Wijewardene, with Lionel Wendt’s collaboration and then to Lake House newspapers and the rest is history, and part of the legend that is Samare.

“Learn to see”. What is the real purpose of this book? It is best explained by the author himself - let me quote.

“My primary intention is to guide the artistieally minded photographer as to what the man behind the camera can achieve with even the very basic equipment.

“Learn to See” is a simple assertion and any student with a love for taking photographs can find valuable insights within the pages and perhaps these students who have a special fondness for art will find it of greater interest and of invaluable worth”.

Fair enough and clear enough I would say. Some photographs are accompanied by copious technical details - such as exposures, lighting, composition, lenses used, developing in the dark room, chemicals and papers used etc.........etc

One one level it is a “teaching text”, an invaluable primer for both beginner and the advanced student.

But for the conscientious reviewer there is a problem. Samararatne’s book is much more than an educational treatise. It is also as the author himself says a “photographic essay”.

The essay opens out into an astonishing range of themes, subject matter, treatment, in categories marked and sign-posted by the author himself as follows- Pictorial, Women, Children, Men, News Travel, Aerial Art.

Samararatne has played many roles in his time, certainly more than the seven that Shakespeare thought was everyman’s heritage.

His news coverages of historic events in Sri - Lanka’s post independence history should be part of the National Archive. The superb aerial shots of Colombo City are images which evoke an aching nostalgia for a forgotten and distant past.

Having read the pictures carefully (I believe that is the fashionable word) I would like to make two observations.

First, even on a casual glance through this extraordinary book of photographs, the first thing that struck me was the power of black and white images. Black and White, though an abstraction of reality appeared to create an almost tactile strength. It is this element in the photographs that leaves a lasting impression.

Second, the best of Samararatne’s photographs reveal the essential difference between the still photograph and the moving image.

Whether in a documentary shot or the most artistically conceived picture, a moment in time is not merely frozen, but time is redeemed, time is as it were re-incarnated so that it not only provides instant pleasure but that significant moment is caught and held for all eternity.