I was given this statement and asked this question recently by a highly successful, much acclaimed photographer. Someone who has been involved with the medium over several decades. They have created important work and been commissioned by commercial clients. They have achieved much that others desire. So, what went wrong, or right?

Decades of meetings, pitching, pushing, compromising, paperwork and budgeting can get to anyone, but is this enough of a reason to walk away from photography completely? Surely, if you loved photography you would just try and re-centre. Return to making personal work that was true to why you started. Maybe. Of course, another reason is because clients dissapear as the world changes. As income reduces the love of the medium can fade. This is also a possibility for boredom.

But, is boredom a negative? Maybe boredom is a positive, a required state within creativity to ensure progress. I think it can be, and I think it explains why the photographer I spoke with made their decision to leave. They are not the only photographer I know that has decided to pivot into new areas away from image making, to areas deeply connected to a sense of inquisivity and curiosity. These pivots often seem to involve an engagement with connected subjects within an academic environment, such as history, archaeology, or literature. The desire to go deeper in their learning than merely making images of what they see. This inevitably leads to the adoption of creative diversity. Which is to me the essence of creativity. The foundation of the polymath.

I think we all get bored with photography at some point in our lives, the process of pressing a shutter. Some, describe this as hitting the wall, a creative block, and that is normal, but to think that only photography is the answer is to me dangerously limiting. Sometimes, we need to give our minds space to wander and that can be away from the camera. Think of musicians such as Bob Dylan (artist, sculptor, broadcaster, actor, film director, producer, writer) or David Bowie (writer, musician, actor, painter). I’m sure you can think of many others. They do not feel confined by one medium, just as no artist should feel that they cannot experiment with multiple mediums including photography.

Was this is the reason that the photographer who asked me the question walked away from photography? Did they want more? Were they discontented with what photography was giving them. Will they return? I don’t know and I don’t think they do either. We had a photographer contribute to the A Photographic Life podcast who said that “photography was my life, now it is part of my life.” I get that. It makes sense to me.

Am I bored with photography? Sometimes. Do I understand those who are? Yes! Do I think that’s a problem? No! At the end of the day photography is a choice of medium to tell a story, but there are many others available and there is no reason why a photographer shouldn’t explore all of them. That is why I increasingly suggest that photographers are storytellers who need to accept that there are many ways to tell a story. Not just with a box that captures light that has a lens attached.

Dr.Grant Scott
After fifteen years art directing photography books and magazines such as Elle and Tatler, Scott began to work as a photographer for a number of advertising and editorial clients in 2000. Alongside his photographic career Scott has art directed numerous advertising campaigns, worked as a creative director at Sotheby’s, art directed foto8 magazine, founded his own photographic gallery, edited Professional Photographer magazine and launched his own title for photographers and filmmakers Hungry Eye. He founded the United Nations of Photography in 2012, and is now a Senior Lecturer and Subject Co-ordinator: Photography at Oxford Brookes University, Oxford, and a BBC Radio contributor. Scott is the author of Professional Photography: The New Global Landscape Explained (Routledge 2014), The Essential Student Guide to Professional Photography (Routledge 2015), New Ways of Seeing: The Democratic Language of Photography (Routledge 2019), What Does Photography Mean To You? (Bluecoat Press 2020) and Inside Vogue House: One building, seven magazines, sixty years of stories, (Orphans Publishing 2024). His photography has been published in At Home With The Makers of Style (Thames & Hudson 2006) and Crash Happy: A Night at The Bangers (Cafe Royal Books 2012). His film Do Not Bend: The Photographic Life of Bill Jay was premiered in 2018.

© Grant Scott 2026