“Commercial success is very few and far between for any creative outlet, and it doesn’t stop the work being important for yourself. And for anyone else who happens to come across it.” An interview with Hugh Schulte, Millennium Images contributor.
Ana/Millennium
Thank you so much for joining us today here at Millennium. Could you introduce yourself?
Hugh Schulte
My name is Hugh Schulte, and I’m an artist, photographer and musician, I have quite a few different kinds of creative outlets, which is nice, keeps things fresh and interesting. My main job is being in a band called Gengahr. But I have also been taking photographs since I can remember. And I think the passion for it really was reignited, about six or seven years ago, when my band started touring. We would be travelling to all these interesting places and not have a huge amount of time to see them. But we’d always have at least an hour or two in between soundcheck and performing, which luckily, would often be the golden hour. So I would rush around whatever town or city we were in and try to collect as many images as I could to remember the place.
Ana/Millennium
Do you think being able to call yourself a photographer means that it has to be your main source of income?
Hugh Schulte
I don’t see myself as massively part of the photography world. I’m not against it at all, I’d love to be more involved. But I see myself as a bit of an outsider and more of a hobbyist. But I was very grateful for Millennium picking me up. And it feels like over the last year or two, since I’ve been working with you guys, having somewhere to place the photos makes all the difference as opposed to just posting them on social media or keeping them on a hard drive. I feel like I’ve now got more purpose, so that’s been really encouraging for me.
Ana/Millennium
Do you take any commissions? Develop your own projects?
Hugh Schulte
Most of my photography is documentary, kind of just out on the road. Without too much intellectual justification, I just shoot what I like, and often will use it as tour diaries for the band. And in terms of commissions, I’ve started doing some, as I know a lot of musicians, I’ve started doing some portraiture for my friends who are in bands, but all very casual and low key.
Ana/Millennium
Did you go to photography school?
Hugh Schulte
I did photography at Sixth Form College. They had a darkroom, which was my first exposure to photography. So since I was 15, I started with black and white film, because of the darkroom facilities. And then for about 10 years after that I would almost exclusively shoot black and white film. And then it’s only in the last few years I moved to digital and started experimenting with colour. And now I’ve been kind of doing exclusively colour for the last couple of years just because it’s quite fresh and exciting for me.
I’m also a painter, so I’m quite used to working with colour. So transferring that to Lightroom or digital photography, I found it relatively straightforward to pick up in terms of colour grading, warm and cool tones etc.
Ana/Millennium
Have you had any moments that you’ve been proud of your photographic work?
Hugh Schulte
Being accepted into Millennium, I think this was my proudest moment so far. And selling prints is always nice, too.
Ana/Millennium
This is really cool, because I feel that sometimes people snub others if you are not like a hardcore full time photographer. It’s nice to listen to your perspective about being a multi faceted artist, you’re a painter, and you’re a musician, and you also take pictures, and the joys of having different streams of income.
Hugh Schulte
You’re totally right. And I suppose I don’t hang around that much with photographers. I’d like to kind of move into the photography world a bit more thoroughly, but I haven’t experienced that snobbery. I’m sure I will, as you say, because if someone is a full time photographer, they might see other other kinds of more part time photographers, as some are somehow less important, I suppose. I don’t know.
Ana/Millennium
For me this year, I’ve been doing more like thing more design and less photography. And sometimes I feel I’m losing that part of me. But I guess you are still a photographer, no matter what.
Hugh Schulte
Commercial success is very few and far between for any creative outlet, and it doesn’t stop the work being important for yourself. And for anyone else who happens to come across it.
Ana/Millennium
What kind of paintings do you do?
Hugh Schulte
I’ve traditionally done quite figurative hyperreal paintings of still lifes and landscapes. But have moved into portraiture. I did a year of an art school painting degree, but then I dropped out when the band was signed, and we started touring. So I suppose that was when I picked up photography, because I didn’t have much time to paint being busy with the band.
Ana/Millennium
Do you see a relationship between painting and photography?
Hugh Schulte
Absolutely particularly with colour photography, I think when I was doing black and white, I felt there were quite separate outputs, but now I’m doing colour it’s so similar. Just gradually tweaking the spectrum of colour that you can tune into the various aspects of the composition to help bring out the dynamics of it.
Ana/Millennium
How’s the band doing?
Hugh Schulte
Good, we just put out a new album last year, called Red Sun Titans. That was accompanied by a tour of the UK, Europe and Australia. We are playing our first shows in America this year too.
Ana/Millennium
What kind of music do you guys play? What’s your role in the band?
Hugh Schulte
I play bass guitar. And music is alternative. Guitar. Pop.
Ana/Millennium
That’s very exciting, so you’re always taking pictures for the band and keeping up the score?
Hugh Schulte
Yeah, exactly. It’s just such an obvious choice when you’re on tour, and you’ve got just a bit of time, it’s just such a no brainer for me just to kind of go on a little explore where we are.
Ana/Millennium
Would you say photography is a strong part of your life? Or is your heart divided?
Hugh Schulte
I think my heart is divided to a certain extent. But it just depends on the context. Like, if I’m in London, I won’t take a lot of photographs. I don’t know, for some reason, because I’m from London. I don’t find it inspiring. If I’m travelling, I’m addicted to my camera. And if I’m at home, not so much.
Ana/Millennium
Would you like to be more of a full time photographer? Is this something that will interest you? Or are you happy with like, just having it as another output for your creativity, and maybe having some extra income?
Hugh Schulte
I always want to keep my options open with everything I do. But I do have a strong commitment to painting. And I can’t ever see myself not doing those in some form. But also just tactically, I think it’s useful to have multiple income streams because I can’t really rely on any of them in one.
Ana/Millennium
Do you have any photo dreams? Or not? At the moment?
Hugh Schulte
A dream in photography? Yeah. Just to like, get some more like kind of, yeah, like a book cover or someone just to use one of my images for something very important to them.
Ana/Millennium
Do you paint sometimes from your pictures?
Hugh Schulte
Yes, often. And that is quite tricky, because sometimes if there’s a photo that’s really good as a photo, you might be tempted to paint it. But if it’s if it worked as a photo, then it’s hard to find a reason to paint it.
Ana/Millennium
Thank you for your time Hugh
Hugh Schulte
Thank you very much for having me for my first interview as a photographer, so this is very exciting for me.
Ana/Millennium
Well, thank you so much for talking to us.
You follow Hugh’s band here and see more of his photography here.
