Craft vs. Art

Ricardo, your declaration against "tweed jacketed" types merely sets up a straw man.

"Mr. Yale's" assertion seems to fit well with my own definition of art:

Whatever you can get away with

Ironically, I borrowed this from my departed friend Nick Englund, onetime dean of the California Institute of the Arts Music School -- and for official functions, Nick did favor tweed jackets!

I am glad I'm nor a perfectionist. Otherwise I would never exhibit, or sell anything. Sorry to admit, every one of my prints have imperfections in composition, film selection and development, dust/scratches on negative, poorly spotted prints, and stupid cropping. However, I doesn't seem to matter too much to clients or judges.

Cheryl,

Thanks for the info re Benson printing for Paul Strand. I saw a Strand show several years ago in Edinburgh and some of the prints were made by a Mr Benson, they were quite beautiful. I'm almost certain that Benson also made some prints for Cartier-Bresson too. I saw a Bresson show in London about 5 years ago and some of the images that he had made in the mid 90's were printed by a man named Benson, it's got to be the same man. Again the prints were beautiful. I still don't understand why he would give the impression in his statement that we should not be too bothered about attention to the little things in our craft. I know that I am critical of the statement but who am I to question such a talented printer.

We master craft when we forget it while being totally technical: only then art exists.

Juan Valdenebro said:

We master craft when we forget it while being totally technical: only then art exists.

Click to expand...

@Juan Valdenebro you really dug deep into the archives for this one!

I went back and read the whole thread - the topic is very interesting - but what struck me most were the thoughtfulness of the responses and the lack of snark and personal jabs. I find that impressive given the somewhat contentious philosophical topic.