Images on fivenineclimber.com

My adolescence in the realm of climbing was the early eighties. The era in which Himalayan super alpinism became vogue at the cost of nearly all british talent. It was mere moments before Alan Watts came out of the closet and changed American cragging forever. The dawn of the first sticky rubber, seen on the feet of a certain blond Californian. Bouldering was decidly out of fashion and just the lone pursuit of a few highly educated individuals.

Ken Wilson's Mountain Magazine was at its peak and basically the only rag that mattered. It was an opinionated publication with high ethical and journalistic standards. The photography was superb. We were influenced and inspired, sometimes dangerously beyond our fledging abilities.

Ehh, wait.. What was that? Superb photography? Where? I don't recall any. Clearly, those amateurs wielding Instamatics didn't bracket their exposures or care about the rule of thirds? Does out of focus ISO 400 butt shots in black and white define superb? Remember that cover featuring a couple of down-and-out dole collectors at a belay on the Shroud, literally hanging on top of each other. At a belay? ON THE COVER?

Back then Galen Rowell and John Cleare were pretty much the only pro photographers in the climbing world, and they were good and we certainly awed over their products. Yet all those memorable pics from Squamish, Elbsandstein, Trollveggen, Yosemite captured by various dirtbags and college professors represented to us the true essence of adventure as well as any Mountain Light magic, and this without much fuss.

Why? Well, we were not yet numbed by a legion of Corey Riches producing slick pop culture images, or utterly baffled by someone bagging a FA on remote Shipton Spire, seen from a vantage point 40' above the lead climber! Now, hold on.. That Shipton Spire thing, or wherever. How can the photographer get away with this and not desecrating the experience of those poor climbers running it out on RPs a few feet below some geek on jumars. And how can I watch such flawless images with their enormous exposure and impossible perspective, without questioning their authenticity, however validated there are? And not wonder about the fate of raw, dirty, basic climbing photography? Thanks alot, Epi and Zack!

Well. So, with that off my chest, on to the next sore spot: Does people really bother reading anymore, with so many other, more effective methods of gratification available? Probably not, meaning first of all that this rant is utterly wasted and I should just quit right here, but also leads to the subject of why those 'mediocre' photos from Mountain are so permanently etched in my mind: Because they were securely linked to real stories, with believable characters writing them. The articles were carefully selected for quality of writing, or significance of subject, and the photos merely an extension of this.

Here on fivenineclimber I try to build on these observations. We're certainly not doing groundbreaking climbs, and almost all are in the 'grey' middle grades. The photography is pretty average, shot by a participating climber either in the middle of a pitch or while belaying. But it is my hope that by combining the best of the images with a paragraph or two of meaningful narrative, the viewer is left with a lasting impression.