The Butterfly Effect

Howard Greenberg, who was once a student studying psychology, was one of the many people who were influenced by the emergence of photography. He had a few friends who were involved in it and they convinced him to join the circle. His parents brought him his first camera from Japan and he began snapping away.

Before cameras, when one stumbled across something of genuine beauty, he or she would stop and stare, admiring it until it was time to move on. If one was a skilled artist, he or she would perhaps dedicate months, if not years, to capturing the sight. Still photography changed the way artists would capture the world and the way people began to see it. Suddenly, beautiful scenes became a part of history through film.

The way Howard Greenberg passionately talked about his career as a gallery curator revealed how much he really loved what he did. The stories he told us about the photographs and their history wasn’t foreign to me – I am very passionate about photography myself and I could relate to much of what he said. What shocked me the most was how suddenly his life turned around – from the medical world to the world of photography.

Listening to Mr. Greenberg speak about his life and how he was pulled into the world of photography made me realize how we’re all only a picture, painting, book, or movie away from changing our entire career path and understand what we really want to do in life. I, personally, relate to his story quite a bit because just yesterday I decided to change my major from finance to engineering – all because of one story I read on the internet. The butterfly effect: how a butterfly can flap its wings at one end of an open field and cause a storm on the other side due to wind exponentiation.