Today we’d like to introduce you to Elly Bernstein.
Hi Elly, can you start by introducing yourself? We’d love to learn more about how you got to where you are today?
My love of photography started early. I was completely obsessed in high school – truly obsessed. I spent so much time in the school darkroom that my angel of a father built me my own in our basement. I shot black and white only on my 1984 Nikon FG-20. For my sweet 16, I had all my friends bring their weirdest clothes and I took shots of them dressing up for hours. I took 36 rolls of film.
In college, I kind of lost track of photography in favor of classes and theater and costume design. And then, when Instagram hit, I thought I was done with photography forever. How could I possibly consider taking up photography again if everyone is taking pictures constantly? How could my photography ever stand out among the sea of my timeline? I truly gave up.
Then in 2019, I found my Nikon at my parent’s house and realized how much I missed it. And slowly, I started shooting again. I was (and continue to be) obsessed with “overlooked beauty”. I love to shoot what I think of as still lifes – the strange structures on the backs and roofs of buildings. I’m very into pipes of all kinds. Trash is beautiful. Ruins are beautiful.
In 2020, I bought a DSLR from Walmart, the cheapest I could find (the Canon Rebel EOS T100). I’ve upgraded my lenses, but it’s the camera I continue to shoot on to this day. I like it, it’s like a scrappy little underdog. DSLR really changed my life, because it turns out what I really want is to take 1000 pictures on every excursion. DSLR led me to portraiture. My happy place is taking candid portraits at parties and bars and clubs. Drunk people make the best subjects, and sometimes I think that drinking (just a little bit) makes me a better photographer. This was when I got my confidence back. I’ve recently started to get my photos accepted into juried exhibitions, and each acceptance email still blows my mind a little bit.
Even though I’m an LA transplant currently living in the San Francisco Bay Area, I continue to shoot in both places and visit SoCal about 4 times a year. I shoot a lot of personal parties, other events and candid portraits in LA and in the Bay. My partner is a musician, so I do a lot of concert photography. And I haven’t abandoned my “overlooked beauty” subjects. I still like to go for walks in Bay Area cities doing some street and urbex photography, but still taking a lot of pictures of pipes.
We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
As you can see from my previous question, most of my struggles with photography have been based on confidence. Despite loving my own work in high school, it took almost a decade for me to get that confidence back. The positive reception to my work from friends and clients has obviously been a huge confidence boost. I’ve come to truly believe in my work.
I’m currently in the (somewhat daunting) phase of trying to transition from an event and portrait photographer shooting mostly for my personal circle, to a photographer with an honest-to-god business. I’ve had some success in finding contacts through Instagram, but there’s definitely other avenues I need to explore.
As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
I’ve described a bit of how my art photography sets me apart. My philosophy focuses on “overlooked beauty”, but also on the idea that everything is a subject. I try to view all photography – of people, places and especially things – as portraiture. I believe that each object, even a discarded or ignored one, has an intrinsic value and deserves to be observed. Because of the “contentless” nature of these objects, particularly industrial objects, my art photography is very composition focused.
My event, portrait and street photography stands out because of its focus on unseen moments. When shooting people, I usually tell the subject to do whatever they want and take as many pictures as possible. I love the awkwardness almost everyone feels while having their portrait taken, and I dream of capturing the moment when the subject stops posing and you can see a flash of their true emotion.
Is there something surprising that you feel even people who know you might not know about?
People might be surprised to learn that I really struggle to take pictures in my personal life. I can photograph my friends and family at events, but in intimate circumstances I find myself getting shy. In my inner circle, we’ve never been picture-taking-people, so my camera always feels intrusive. I also have shockingly few pictures of myself, beyond mirror portraits with my face behind my Canon. I can count the number of selfies I’ve taken on two hands.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.fourcubesphotography.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/fourcubes.photography/
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/elizabeth-bernstein-aa0711248/
