Are the greats really that great?

cliveh · Mar 3, 2014

Thomas Bertilsson said:
Clive,

Did I anywhere me nation machine gun? No.
Over the course of a career, especially 35mm photographers tend to accumulate thousands or tens of thousands of negatives.
Nobody shows them all, and I was trying to highlight that they published those that they thought were worthy of it.

Thomas, no you didn't but I thought that is what you meant. My apologies if I mis-understood.

MattKing · Mar 3, 2014

Robert Capa had a whole body of interesting work. His D-day photographs are extraordinary, but he was far from a "one hit wonder".

Context is really important, but so is access. In earlier days it was far harder to get one's photography where a lot of people could see it. Now it is easy to get one's photography where a lot of people can see it, but it is harder to differentiate one's photography from everyone else.

PKM-25 · Mar 3, 2014

Ever notice how many of us have quotes at the bottom of our ramblings?

We say or shoot a lot in our lifetimes but only a bit of it resonates and is selected to be "Quoted" visually or otherwise.
It does not make any of us less of a person or less of a photographer to have visual or literary narrative that lead up to and went passed what was considered the best.

One of us may someday do something to be considered a "Great" but none of us will ever do anything to make those before us less great.

Jaf-Photo · Mar 3, 2014

I have often reflected that many of the truly great masters of photography would never have been noticed on flickr.

I think it's because most people no longer understand what good photography is about.

They think it's about exaggerated contrast and saturation and simplified compositions, all in order to get noticed in thumbnail format.

Real photography is much more about subtlety, an image that can be explored and grow on you.

Or alternatively, about documenting real events. Today we take technical perfection for granted in photojournalism. But that's because the camera does the work. Just imagine what it was like for Capa and his colleagues to be in the thick of the action and trying to capture split-second events on old stock without autofocus or autoexposure.

There is skill behind those blurry, grained images I tell you.

blockend · Mar 3, 2014

Photography is an act of editing and curatorship as much as genius. A street or war photographer will have a huge miss to hit ratio, the question is whether the hit will be 1 in 100 or 1 in 10000, and will he know the difference when he sees it, through the viewfinder or on the contact sheet? Greatness is mostly hard work with a dash of inspiration. Don't knock either.

ntenny · Mar 3, 2014

Gerald C Koch said:
Capa was there on the beach during the invasion. It is miraculous that he survived let alone that he was able to take photographs. The greats had a vision of the world that was not found in the average person.

The first two sentences seem incontestable, but I don't think they have much to do with the third one.

And in point of fact, I think *any* competent photographer who had been in the right place at the right time, and had gotten their film out afterwards, would be remembered today for it. In that sense I think war photojournalism is a difficult place to look for artistic insight or a "vision of the world", because there's unlikely to be much basis for comparison.

-NT

Jaf-Photo · Mar 3, 2014

ntenny said:
The first two sentences seem incontestable, but I don't think they have much to do with the third one.

And in point of fact, I think *any* competent photographer who had been in the right place at the right time, and had gotten their film out afterwards, would be remembered today for it. In that sense I think war photojournalism is a difficult place to look for artistic insight or a "vision of the world", because there's unlikely to be much basis for comparison.

-NT

Well, I think that an average photographer probably could have missed all his shots in the D-day landing.

The ability to capture poignant photos is a matter of skill and vision. If either of those are missing, nothing will happen photography-wise.

We see that in everyday life to. If several people take photos on the same location, someone will produce great photos and someone will produce nothing.

It's not about being in the right place at the right time, it's about being able to capture them.

NB23 · Mar 3, 2014

They are all truly great. The Soul is in the finger.

But. There are so many great photographers that will never be recognized. There is indeed a form of injustice.

gone · Mar 3, 2014

"How do you define quality"?

I suspect that if someone doesn't know how to define quality, then they wouldn't know it if it bit them on the butt, so it doesn't matter anyway.

If that is the case, one could always wing it I guess. Find another Clement Greenberg to tell them "it's good because I say it's good". I'm always comfortable w/ that, as long as it's me saying it. Using conceptual words to describe visual phenomenon will never, ever work.

http://www.theartstory.org/critic-greenberg-clement.htm

omaha · Mar 3, 2014

cliveh said:
How do you define quality?

That one will drive you mad.

analoguey · Mar 4, 2014

tron_ said:
I was looking through some images the other day (more specifically some stuff Capa shot during the Normandy landing) and it made me wonder how his work would be treated if it were shot today. Part of me feels like it would be thrown to the wayside and picked apart for being "too blurry" or "too grain" or whatever.

It seems like with the flood of photography filling our daily lives, we have become very critical and selective on what we deem "good" photography.

That leads me to the thought; by todays standards, are the greats really all that great? Or do people worship them because it's the status quo to respect the old masters?

Compare to pictures from Syria, Iraq, Lebanon or whatever war zone you want to pick now. They are being shot today, newspapers/magazines are using them and you could probably then see whether they were good or not. They greats. (modern newspaper photos, are too formulaic imho; 1 major crowd shot, 1 shouter, 1 after-the-action shot as they couldnt get their AF in time for the action, and 1 placard or ruins shot. add in a weeping woman shot)

Jaf-Photo · Mar 4, 2014

analoguey said:
Compare to pictures from Syria, Iraq, Lebanon or whatever war zone you want to pick now. They are being shot today, newspapers/magazines are using them and you could probably then see whether they were good or not. They greats. (modern newspaper photos, are too formulaic imho; 1 major crowd shot, 1 shouter, 1 after-the-action shot as they couldnt get their AF in time for the action, and 1 placard or ruins shot. add in a weeping woman shot)

I think most agencies don't want their photographers to risk their lives for action shots that won't be published anyway. War is too gruesome in digital high-res.

If war photography seems formulaic, I think it's probably more on the editors who pick images for publication, than the photographers.

Dismayed · Mar 4, 2014

Tom Wolfe's, "The Painted Word", is one of the greatest books ever written on the art scene.

http://www.amazon.com/The-Painted-W...8&qid=1393934587&sr=8-1&keywords=painted+word

removed account4 · Mar 4, 2014

YES
the greats are great.
they did things that can not be imagined,
lived through times they documented, and
there results are things we can look at now.

IMNSHO ( that is what all these posts are on apug, opinions, right ? )
it doesn't matter about "substandard" printing, materials &c
its about having masterful control over one's emotions, and camera while making photographs.
and the masters had it, some as early as 10 years old.

Alan Klein · Mar 4, 2014

Capa was a war photographer in 5 wars and was killed in 1954, his last war, the First Indochina War in Vietnam. He had moved in front of an advancing French regiment to photograph them moving up the road. Here's a nice article about him, his fear in Normandy, and how only some of those pictures survived.

http://www.skylighters.org/photos/robertcapa.html

Jim Jones · Mar 4, 2014

Many of the great photographers from the distant past were indeed that great. Compare Timothy O'Sullivan's photograph of the White House Ruin at the Canyon de Chelly and the two that Ansel Adams took from nearly the same location almost 70 years later. I prefer the O'Sullivan photo to the one Adams captured with a slightly wider lens from the lower of the two positions he chose. O'Sullivan chose an even better location and captured richer shadow detail, quite an accomplishment in the days of glass plate photography. Eadweard Muybridge, Carleton Watkins, and others were also producing masterpieces of the Great American West at that time. Considering the difficulties of the technology of that time, they may well have given the composition and camera location more consideration than we do now. William Henry Jackson produced only three negatives in a whole day of strenuous effort in the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone.

Gerald C Koch · Mar 4, 2014

ntenny said:
The first two sentences seem incontestable, but I don't think they have much to do with the third one.

Well you can't really show your worth as a photographer if you cannot keep your composure in the midst of a battle. My point was how many people could take good photos with bullets flying about them.

analoguey · Mar 4, 2014

Jaf-Photo said:
I think most agencies don't want their photographers to risk their lives for action shots that won't be published anyway. War is too gruesome in digital high-res.

If war photography seems formulaic, I think it's probably more on the editors who pick images for publication, than the photographers.

I probably should have qualified my answer better; Most news reports I read seem to be via wire agencies, and their photo-reportage is formulaic (I dont know how it was earlier). There are opportunities for photographers to take non-formulaic pictures, I saw a video of a chap explaining his gear (canon 1d's i think) as surviving harsh conditions by shooting a vid of an actual fire-fight - he was in the thick of it, shooting as well. The end product didn't live upto the gear.
Garbage in, Garbage out.

War/violence is more gruesome in B&W IMO, the starkness, violence amplified.

Jaf-Photo · Mar 4, 2014

analoguey said:
I probably should have qualified my answer better; Most news reports I read seem to be via wire agencies, and their photo-reportage is formulaic (I dont know how it was earlier). There are opportunities for photographers to take non-formulaic pictures, I saw a video of a chap explaining his gear (canon 1d's i think) as surviving harsh conditions by shooting a vid of an actual fire-fight - he was in the thick of it, shooting as well. The end product didn't live upto the gear.
Garbage in, Garbage out.

War/violence is more gruesome in B&W IMO, the starkness, violence amplified.

Well, it's amost impossible to shoot movies with a DSLR as you are running, ducking and crawling. A helmet cam is much better for that.

And my personal opinion, as I trained as an army medic, is that war looks a lot worse in hi-res colour. I'll have the softer impact of B&W any day. Helps keep the lunch down.

cliveh · Mar 4, 2014

Are the greats really that great?

Yes they are.

https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=D...logspot.com%2F2011_07_01_archive.html;420;300

Rudeofus · Mar 7, 2014

Gerald C Koch said:
Well you can't really show your worth as a photographer if you cannot keep your composure in the midst of a battle. My point was how many people could take good photos with bullets flying about them.

An acquaintance of me studied at Stanford Med School in 1998, and she had half a year of training in the psychiatry ward of the hospital there in the course of her research work. That was the year when "Saving Private Ryan" hit the movie theaters, and flocks of old veterans were committed to the psychiatry ward because they had severe PTSD flash backs after watching that movie, over 40 years after the end of WWII. That's the kind of situation Robert Capa brought himself into, and we should be thoroughly amazed that he brought back anything worth looking at.

ntenny · Mar 7, 2014

Gerald C Koch said:
Well you can't really show your worth as a photographer if you cannot keep your composure in the midst of a battle. My point was how many people could take good photos with bullets flying about them.

I totally agree---but that mostly has to do with their psychology rather than their photographic skills. What I was trying to say was that anyone who had Capa's ability to keep his head in that incredibly hostile environment, and competent photographic skills, would have brought back images that were similarly incomparable---literally incomparable in that there basically wouldn't be anything to compare them to.

Now, if you look at Capa's work that wasn't shot in combat conditions, it's clear he was a pretty damn good photographer too. But IMHO the famous D-day shots don't so much say "here's the work of a superb photographer", as "here's the work of a photographer with a superb ability to work in impossible conditions". It's not the kind of work that can really be evaluated on artistic terms.

-NT

frank · Mar 7, 2014

Photos are usually significant either for being extra-ordinary photos of ordinary things, or ordinary photos of extra-ordinary things. Most war and historical photos are the latter.

Jaf-Photo · Mar 7, 2014

frank said:
Photos are usually significant either for being extra-ordinary photos of ordinary things, or ordinary photos of extra-ordinary things. Most war and historical photos are the latter.

That's very well said.

However, I did review a number of Capa's war photos just now and actually found that most of the action shots are very technically proficient. They have very strong compositional elements, a massive human element and they are sharp and well exposed.

Most people would not have done half as well.

cliveh · Mar 7, 2014

Capa was one of the founder members of Magnum and for this alone he can be considered as great.

Are the greats really that great?

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