TS: As for the comment by one of your workshop participants......."my photographs are getting WAY BETTER, the amount of keepers WENT UP BIG TIME too." (The all caps are in the original.) How about that? Could have something to do with vision as the workshop he attended did not take place in the darkroom and technical things were never discussed.
It depends on what he means by better really. It depends upon his abilities and what sort of photographer he is. If he is a contact printer in tune with your way of photography he would (perhaps try to emulate your images), but then again the same issues would apply to him. If you provided the 'expert nod of approval' as he came closer to you vision he would naturally assume an improvement.
MAS: This was posted by a workshop participant whose photographs I am unlikely ever to see again. He certainly didn't write what he did to please me. I assume he meant "better" in his terms, not mine. That should be obvious.
MAS: I do not understand how anyone can prefer--or even enjoy--looking at a work of art on the web, unless they have already seen the original and can, in their minds bring it back. If the purpose of the photograph is to illustrate a concept or to show a thing, then yes, the web is adequate. But if the intention of the photograph is that it is to be a work of art, then the web is a poor substitute for the real object.
TS: So art is not about concepts or aesthetic 'things' dealt with in a particular manner specific to the artist's vision? I beg to differ. Sounds like you are defining your works as art because it is art.....sounds like you are talking all about the execution rather than content again. If you are removing concepts and the importance of the things (this is the subject content after all) what on earth is one of your photographs? Please define what it is that cannot be seen on the web aside from the actual printing merit. Is the art always missing from anything on the web? The web is always a poor substitute, but a terrible one if the only merit an image has is its 'glow' , 'radiance', 'tonal relationships'. You say your images are about equal relationships, space and rhythm and about the eyes exploring. Why is this not possible on a monitor?
MAS: Art is certainly not about concepts or ideas. If it were, all you would have to do is get the concept or idea and you wouldn't have to look anymore. Art is, however, informed by intelligence. Art is about aesthetic things--feelings--not ideas. As the great art historian Sir herbert Read said, "If one has ideas to express the proper medium is language."
MAS: "The importance of things": Ah, "things"--or as some would call it here the "subject"--is ultimately unimportant. Weston understood this. Adams did not. Weston wrote that what he photographed was the "me of universal rhythms." He went on to say that "Clouds, torsos, shells, peppers, smokestacks are but interdependent, interrelated parts of a whole, which is life. Life rhythms felt in no matter what become symbols of the whole." You see, it didn't matter what he photographed. Yes, he further wrote, " To see the thing itself is essential . . ." But it did not matter which thing it was he was photographing. And in his last photographs he got away from photographing things altogether.
MAS: Thinking you have seen a photograph on the web is even worse than thinking you have seen a painting, when all you have seen is a reproduction in an Art History book. But I guess, in this mediated world, second-hand experience is good enough for many people.
TS: Again ridiculous and actually quite patronising (tho I am sure that was not intended) to suggest that those of my view have lower standards and a lowly preference for the simple 'howling wolf under moon' type of visual injection for satisfaction. I doubt there is a single masterpiece (photo or art)out there modern or classical where the viewer would not be able to make significant enthusiastic comments based upon a web image as to why the image 'made it'. Yes there would be an infintessimally better face to face experience, but the very basic factors which make it work are there however it is represented. The actual up close execution of the art enable considerable expansion upon this identifiable substrate.
MAS: You believe there is only an infinitesimal difference between web viewing and in the presence of the actual object. I guess you feel that art museums, which I feel must be very important indeed considering the value society seems to put on them, not to mention the amount of money that gets spent on the museums and on the art, must be an almost total waste, since the difference between looking at a great work of art in the flesh so to speak and on the web is only infinitesimal.
TS: Michael, I am not intending to make a personal attack on you or your work! I just have very different opinions to you. I also feel that it is very easy to dress up pretty well anything with words. I personally feel that great images just don't need them. Like Jorge, I think the notion that those who dont like something have not 'got it' is in itself a faddish and concept based notion! My original comments were not specific to your work, but as you have used your work as a vessel to explain your view, I did likewise. I do enjoy some contact printers work very much, but feel that the a significant number (in their quest for ultimate prints) have lost the balance somewhere along the way and images of an utterly dull nature become 'art' because of the medium used to record them and the resultant technical brilliance of the print. Many are just technically perfect recordings. The fact that so many contact printers visibly get so incredibly excited about technical things (often making it the main topic of disuccion when describing an image) suggests to me that the technical conquest of an image becomes its reason for being. I also believe in the Emperor's clothers concept. People buy into an awful lot of garbage and some peddle it. Sometimes it is because they are pretentious and art becomes art because of how much it can be talked up (and not disproved), sometimes because they stick with their own self-congratulating clique and sometimes because they are charletans. Plenty of people believe plenty about cosmetic beauty products, but the number of believers does not make their assertions any more impervious to critcism.
MAS: Well, Tom, it is a personal attack. But I hope you are not referring to me in your last paragraph. You should know that outside of a workshop--when I am teaching--all I ever say about my work is that my prints are contact prints, which is hardly a technical comment. And even in our workshops, I never talk about the technical qualities of my photographs. Never. It's all about vision, first. The technical stuff, when well done, conveys the vision in the strongest possible way. Would you enjoy a concert of your favorite music if it were poorly performed?