Fine Art Status

cliveh · Oct 17, 2012

We are like any stage in human evolution, producing future antiques which may or may not be prized by future generations. But only some chemical images will endure the test of time and what marks these out against the rest? I suppose only time will tell.

A lot depends on circumstance. For instance, without Berenice Abbott the work of Atget could have been lost forever.

DREW WILEY · Oct 17, 2012

"Art" or worse, "Fine Art" has long been a bullshit term that can be made to mean anything, and is
largely related to the "art of the bluff". The best thing that could ever happen to photography is if
the term "art" didn't even exist - and I'm stating that as somone whose own work is now almost
exlusively sold within that very category. For all those wannabee "artistes" out there... just put you work on the wall and shut up. I don't want to read anymore idiotic mission statements or fluff-headed New York artspeak.

PKM-25 · Oct 17, 2012

Rafal Lukawiecki said:
Imagine that it is year 2112. Photography uses artificial intelligence technology, and images, flat, or multidimensional, or fully spatial, can be perfect representations of what was seen, with an optional multitude of applied corrections etc, all done within a matter of seconds, by commonly available, inexpensive equipment.

Photography will not even exist in the year 2112 as it is already turning into more of a language right now rather than something to creatively aspire to for example someone can send me a text asking how I am doing and I can take a self portrait of a smile or a frown and text it back to them I am not even typing right now but speaking into my iPhone and it is doing the typing for me

Klainmeister · Oct 17, 2012

Drew, you need to come on by Santa Fe and read some of the artist bios and info here. Good stuff after a few beers.

cliveh · Oct 17, 2012

DREW WILEY said:
"Art" or worse, "Fine Art" has long been a bullshit term that can be made to mean anything, and is
largely related to the "art of the bluff". The best thing that could ever happen to photography is if
the term "art" didn't even exist - and I'm stating that as somone whose own work is now almost
exlusively sold within that very category. For all those wannabee "artistes" out there... just put you work on the wall and shut up. I don't want to read anymore idiotic mission statements or fluff-headed New York artspeak.

How sad and don't agree.

PKM-25 · Oct 17, 2012

Klainmeister said:
Drew, you need to come on by Santa Fe and read some of the artist bios and info here. Good stuff after a few beers.

Heck, I need to come down there and hang out in my super camper, bring my 16" telescope, some cameras and film and just get out of town for a few days...maybe I can start my new portrait project about drunken girl's night out called "Benders Full of Women"...

lxdude · Oct 17, 2012

PKM-25 said:
Photography will not even exist in the year 2112 as it is already turning into more of a language right now rather than something to creatively aspire to for example someone can send me a text asking how I am doing and I can take a self portrait of a smile or a frown and text it back to them I am not even typing right now but speaking into my iPhone and it is doing the typing for me

Well, that explains the lack of punctuation.

Klainmeister · Oct 17, 2012

PKM-25 said:
Heck, I need to come down there and hang out in my super camper, bring my 16" telescope, some cameras and film and just get out of town for a few days...maybe I can start my new portrait project about drunken girl's night out called "Benders Full of Women"...

Do it. I'll buy you a beer or two and if you'd like, we could maybe show you some of the new stuff we're working on at B+S.

blansky · Oct 17, 2012

DREW WILEY said:
"Art" or worse, "Fine Art" has long been a bullshit term that can be made to mean anything, and is
largely related to the "art of the bluff". The best thing that could ever happen to photography is if
the term "art" didn't even exist - and I'm stating that as somone whose own work is now almost
exlusively sold within that very category. For all those wannabee "artistes" out there... just put you work on the wall and shut up. I don't want to read anymore idiotic mission statements or fluff-headed New York artspeak.

We all know that this is true.

But we also have be aware that there is artistic pursuit and then there is marketing.

And to successfully achieve one, we often have to aggressively be involved in the other.

My take on the term "fine art" is that it's merely a marketing term and in that vein, I use it.

In my corner of the field there are often great marketers (bullshitters) that are mediocre photographers, and excellent photographers who are mediocre marketers.

And very often the better marketers make the most money by far and in fact many very good photographers who don't market themselves well, go out of business.

DREW WILEY · Oct 17, 2012

True, Blansky. Up in your part of the world some software exec decides to retire, so buys a botique winery or orchard and decides to be an art collector. So now he's got a lot of money to waste on things he couldn't afford way back when, so he buys a bunch of idiotic neo-Pop Art, like the stuff that was in vougue in the 60's or 70's when he took a college art class, and rounds this out the mix with a few vintage photographs from long-dead famous guys. ... which all informs me he doesn't have a clue what he's looking at, and is letting outside interests dictate his taste, rather than his own eyes. Conspicuous consumption, keeping up with the Jonses'. And now you've got a whole generation who can even attend some art school full time and seemingly have never even witnessed
what a good print looks like. All they know visually is how things look on an idiotic computer monitor.

cliveh · Oct 17, 2012

I suppose fine art photography is so inextricably linked with fashion, marketing, conceptualism and fame, that it is sometimes difficult for people to see the wood from the trees.

Steve Smith · Oct 17, 2012

blansky said:
My take on the term "fine art" is that it's merely a marketing term

I have posted before that my gallery owner friend says that putting the word fine in front of art allows her to charge an extra 40%

Steve.

PKM-25 · Oct 17, 2012

Man, if I ever feel the need to make sour wine, I will know exactly where to come for the grapes...

Some serious "Baditude" going on here....

DanG · Oct 17, 2012

I agree, however, I know of at least one "cell phone photographer" who was given a show at a major gallery. The "pigs" may be winning

DanG

DanG · Oct 17, 2012

Exactly, nor do most people care about how hard you worked to get a photograph, how far you hiked or how much equipment you carried or how frozen your butt was at the end of the day.

Just saying.

DanG

Bill Burk · Oct 17, 2012

Steve Smith said:
I have posted before that my gallery owner friend says that putting the word fine in front of art allows her to charge an extra 40%

Steve.

That's really funny. So, if I go at it without an agent, I can forgo the word fine and break even.

MaximusM3 · Oct 18, 2012

Why paint oneself in a corner with a definition and argue ad infinitum? Just make GOOD ART and market yourself properly to get your work out there. As they say in my home country..."Se son rose, fioriranno"...literally translated: "If they are roses, they will flower".

Thomas Bertilsson · Oct 18, 2012

MaximusM3 said:
Just make GOOD ART...

Indeed. I like that very much, and it's a mantra well worth repeating.

DREW WILEY · Oct 19, 2012

Last time I walked into a "Fine Art" photography gallery it was on Maui, and the nomenclature in discussion was inextricably linked to total suckers with lots of money to waste climbing off cruise ships and getting softshoed into some frightfully overpriced amateurish abomination that would look appropriate hanging next to their other half on an art collection, namely, their black velvet Elvis rug.

Mainecoonmaniac · Oct 19, 2012

Definitely

Thomas Bertilsson said:
Indeed. I like that very much, and it's a mantra well worth repeating.

But also, don't expect praise and make good art because it pleases yourself.

cliveh · Oct 19, 2012

I once overheard a woman in a private art gallery in conversation with her friend say but darling, theyre all so affordable.

Thomas Bertilsson · Oct 19, 2012

Mainecoonmaniac said:
But also, don't expect praise and make good art because it pleases yourself.

Absolutely. For me at least, and many that I know.
I think that may be different for some though, if there is some larger purpose or plan. I'm thinking of an artist painting a fresco in a cathedral, for example. Other influences are there, for sure.

DREW WILEY · Oct 19, 2012

Well Tom, my aunt did do frescos in catherals, and even designed a cathedral once. Just about everything she did is now on the Nat'l Historic Register. She also had four phD's, one of them in
art history. But you should have heard her poking fun at all the pretension and cornball artsy vocabulary that was rife even back then. We got along.

Thomas Bertilsson · Oct 19, 2012

DREW WILEY said:
Well Tom, my aunt did do frescos in catherals, and even designed a cathedral once. Just about everything she did is now on the Nat'l Historic Register. She also had four phD's, one of them in
art history. But you should have heard her poking fun at all the pretension and cornball artsy vocabulary that was rife even back then. We got along.

What does that say about pleasing oneself versus somebody else, though? Did she do the frescos based on a discussion with those who commissioned her to do them? Or were they created by her, freely creating to please herself?

DREW WILEY · Oct 19, 2012

That's a long topic, Tom. Basically, some of both. Lots of the classic murals were done under WPA auspices, so had to be something of public interest. At the same time artists' were rebelling, which
at that point in history amounted to Social Realism, which was abhorred by many as a Commie plot, but backed by FDR, and now considered part of our mainstream natl heritage, except for a few Tea
Party crackpots who actually want them demolished. Her personal work ranged much wider in subject
and media choice, and really cannot be commercially valued because it's all locked up in major museum or private collection, and never comes up for sale. But things haven't changed much. I've
had directors of major museum sitting at my dinner table cracking jokes about all the stupid artspeak
going around, and all the idiotic things they themselves do just to pique public interest and sell
museum tickets.

Fine Art Status

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