Appreciation of Lee Friedlander

[MattKing]

He is not in the same league as someone like HCB.

This is quite accurate - probably unintentionally so.
HCB and Friedlander were really playing at different games.

 

[cliveh]

"Friedlander’s reputation rests in large part on his portrayal of the "social landscape”, and his depictions of public spaces are often characterized by the dense profusion of elements within them. Friedlander tended towards a compositional style typified by a pleasant jumble of visual information—he gives you a lot to look at. His favored subjects were unassuming situations like this one where, lacking any central drama, the eye is invited to wander, and stitch together its own narrative."

You could write the same staement if you gave a monkey a camera and wrote about the results. I prefer to look at an image, rather than read what is written about it.

 

[Patrick Robert James]

I can appreciate Friedlander's work ethic but his images have never done much for me. I remember when I first got the MoMA book I wondered to myself why I bought it. I recently perused it and can appreciate maybe why others may like his work but it made it into the for sale pile.

 

[Pieter12]

"Friedlander’s reputation rests in large part on his portrayal of the "social landscape”, and his depictions of public spaces are often characterized by the dense profusion of elements within them. Friedlander tended towards a compositional style typified by a pleasant jumble of visual information—he gives you a lot to look at. His favored subjects were unassuming situations like this one where, lacking any central drama, the eye is invited to wander, and stitch together its own narrative."

You could write the same staement if you gave a monkey a camera and wrote about the results. I prefer to look at an image, rather than read what is written about it.

You kind of started this discussion not liking Fiedlander's work. So why beat a dead horse. It is obvious that you really don't want to be convinced.

 

[cliveh]

You kind of started this discussion not liking Fiedlander's work. So why beat a dead horse. It is obvious that you really don't want to be convinced.

Don't get me wrong, as I started this discussion under the heading of appreciation of Lee Friedlander. My beef isn't about him, as I wish him well with his take on the photographic image. My beef is all the pretentious crap written about visual artwork.

 

[nikos79]

"Friedlander’s reputation rests in large part on his portrayal of the "social landscape”, and his depictions of public spaces are often characterized by the dense profusion of elements within them. Friedlander tended towards a compositional style typified by a pleasant jumble of visual information—he gives you a lot to look at. His favored subjects were unassuming situations like this one where, lacking any central drama, the eye is invited to wander, and stitch together its own narrative."

You could write the same staement if you gave a monkey a camera and wrote about the results. I prefer to look at an image, rather than read what is written about it.

I tend to agree with Clive. And frankly the same stuff can be written by ChatGPT - which I actually just tried to do:

"Lee Friedlander’s photography embraces visual disorder as a fundamental truth rather than a problem to be solved. His frames are crowded with reflections, signs, shadows, and obstructions that interrupt any clear hierarchy, turning ordinary streets and interiors into complex fields of perception. By flattening space and allowing elements to collide, Friedlander rejects the idea of the photograph as a transparent window, insisting instead on its density and artifice.

Just as importantly, Friedlander makes the act of looking visible. His own presence—often reduced to a shadow or reflection—reminds us that the photographer is never outside the scene. These images do not offer conclusions or decisive moments; they hold attention in suspension. Meaning arises slowly, through repetition and friction, as the viewer learns to navigate uncertainty rather than resolve it."

 

[Pieter12]

I tend to agree with Clive. And frankly the same stuff can be written by ChatGPT - which I actually just tried to do:

"Lee Friedlander’s photography embraces visual disorder as a fundamental truth rather than a problem to be solved. His frames are crowded with reflections, signs, shadows, and obstructions that interrupt any clear hierarchy, turning ordinary streets and interiors into complex fields of perception. By flattening space and allowing elements to collide, Friedlander rejects the idea of the photograph as a transparent window, insisting instead on its density and artifice.

Just as importantly, Friedlander makes the act of looking visible. His own presence—often reduced to a shadow or reflection—reminds us that the photographer is never outside the scene. These images do not offer conclusions or decisive moments; they hold attention in suspension. Meaning arises slowly, through repetition and friction, as the viewer learns to navigate uncertainty rather than resolve it."

Well, ChatGPT just scrapes stuff off the internet, and probably swiped that from the initial statement.

 

[nikos79]

Well, ChatGPT just scrapes stuff off the internet, and probably swiped that from the initial statement.

It doesn’t scrape or reuse texts. It is a generative model meaning it will create original text based on general facts about Friedlander's work. I actually find it equal or better than anything a curator would write (excluding the people at this forum)

 

[Pieter12]

It doesn’t scrape or reuse texts. It is a generative model meaning it will create original text based on general facts about Friedlander's work. I actually find it equal or better than anything a curator would write (excluding the people at this forum)

So it has opinions?

 

[nikos79]

Although on a second read I liked the curator's last phrase:
"lacking any central drama, the eye is invited to wander, and stitch together its own narrative."
... very poetic

 

[nikos79]

So it has opinions?

Not really but it simulates them.
If you ask it to be a fierce critique of his work, it will do it, by gathering the most eloquent and coherent critiques available and constructing an original text.
If you ask it to praise Friedlander it will also do it.
If you ask it to just be stupid, it will do it too. it actually happened on a programmer who furious about the results he was getting he kept yelling at the prompt that it was stupid. The program took it literally in the end and erased his whole code base. Moral of the story: Be careful what role you are asking it to take

 

[Arthurwg]

I tend to agree with Clive. And frankly the same stuff can be written by ChatGPT - which I actually just tried to do:

"Lee Friedlander’s photography embraces visual disorder as a fundamental truth rather than a problem to be solved. His frames are crowded with reflections, signs, shadows, and obstructions that interrupt any clear hierarchy, turning ordinary streets and interiors into complex fields of perception. By flattening space and allowing elements to collide, Friedlander rejects the idea of the photograph as a transparent window, insisting instead on its density and artifice.

AI did a good job, better than the previously mentioned. As I said, a new visual syntax.

 

[Arthurwg]

Be careful what role you are asking it to take

AI porno is next.

 

[Pieter12]

I just came across this in a book I am reading. It seems appropriate:

 

[koraks]

AI porno is next.

That's been around for a long time.

I think the last sentence from the AI output is quite interesting as it purports to say something about Friedlander's intent. I don't know his work well enough to be able to judge whether the statement is accurate. It does in any case go beyond the preceding description of the work as it is.

@cliveh with all due respect, but if I read the blurb for your latest book, I don't find it any less presumptuous than what we've seen so far in this thread. What I'm saying is that if you try to sell something (as is true for your blurb as well as the one quoted from the gallery earlier), it'll always try to convince. In the case of something as dependent on personal taste and appreciation as photography, the net result is that any blurb can seem pretentious if you happen to be critical about the work.

 

[DREW WILEY]

Ai skims, so it all depends on what is floating on top. The given example pertaining to Friedlander sounds an awful lot like something John Szarkowski would have written, or perhaps an analogous curator. It's refined art speak, well stated; and I'd agree with the assessment of the compositional strategy in play were it not for my own pair of eyes concluding something a little different.

Maybe Friedlander just doesn't have the advantage of being Carlton Watkins a hundred years earlier, who was a significantly better master at overlying dissimilar planes on a two-dimensional composition when he chose to. Friedlander does it as a kind of teasing joke; Watkins could do it eloquently. But I doubt most people have seen enough of his mammoth plate work in person the recognize that; not much is actually left.

 

[warden]

Maybe Friedlander just doesn't have the advantage of being Carlton Watkins a hundred years earlier, who was a significantly better .....

Maybe Carlton Watkins just didn't have the advantage of being Titian.

 

[Pieter12]

Not really but it simulates them.
If you ask it to be a fierce critique of his work, it will do it, by gathering the most eloquent and coherent critiques available and constructing an original text.
If you ask it to praise Friedlander it will also do it.
If you ask it to just be stupid, it will do it too. it actually happened on a programmer who furious about the results he was getting he kept yelling at the prompt that it was stupid. The program took it literally in the end and erased his whole code base. Moral of the story: Be careful what role you are asking it to take

So, your opinions.

 

[Pieter12]

the blurb for your latest book,

Should've used AI, would have been better.

 

[nikos79]

So, your opinions.

No I didn’t direct it to either way. I guess it used a fusion of the most prevalent essays on his work plus some image analysis of his photographs

 

[Pieter12]

No I didn’t direct it to either way. I guess it used a fusion of the most prevalent essays on his work plus some image analysis of his photographs

Did you tell it he was a photographer or to write about his photographs?

 

[nikos79]

Did you tell it he was a photographer or to write about his photographs?

Just a photographer with its full name.

I can repeat it clean and you will see the response will be different this time.

Give me a couple of minutes

 

[nikos79]

Just a photographer with its full name.

I can repeat it clean and you will see the response will be different this time.

Give me a couple of minutes

Damn it wrote a 10 pages essay this time. I isolated only something that might be interesting

 

[nikos79]

And here is the full prompt I used:

“Can you write some thoughts to try and artistically approach the work of the photographer Lee Friedlander? Feel free to analyze his images too and don’t be afraid to take any stance (appraise or critique) just your honest assessment of his work and style and art”

I had to clarify to take any approach it wants because usually has a tendency to be too “flattering”

 

[Alan Edward Klein]

Pretty soon we'll all be automatically posting our thoughts using AI with automatic answers to other people's automatic AI posts. Then we all can go out and shoot pictures and let the forum go on on its own.