Hilla and Bernd Becher :

[Sirius Glass]

But that is one of the wonders things about art in general...the ability to elicit different emotions and interpretations from different people. I would even posit that one should start the study of art with the abstract expressionists, removing obvious subject matter from the equations and allowing composition, color, texture to dominate.

I did read this many years ago in collage. Took it very seriously and still do.

One should not over think things. Some things should be appreciated for just what they are. Others can and should be pondered. I remember the college dormitory discussions that when on endlessly about the meaning of the lyrics of a particular song and how that time could have been used better in many other ways.

 

[faberryman]

Since we're engaged in interpretation, I'll add something many find important, stimulating, and especially relevant, Susan Sontag's "against interpretation". As many know, Sontag was married to a famous professional photographer, Annie Leibovitz.

Against Interpretation

It is interesting to note that the essay dates from 1964. It must not have gone over very well with artists at the time who, as an act of revenge, invented conceptual art. Of course, these new conceptual artists thought the art critics and academics were ignoramuses, so instead of leaving it to art critics and academics to come up with interpretations, the artists wrote treatises about what their art works meant so there would be no misunderstandings. (Now they do lengthy interviews on YouTube.) Actually, the artists were afraid that the art critics and academics, who by this time were well versed in psychoanalytics, would interpret them in a light unfavorable to the artist, generally along the lines of some neuroses, and wanted to get out ahead of them with a rebuttal. I'm with Sontag on this, which is why, beside the fact I am not from Vancouver, I am not a big fan of Jeff Wall and progeny.

 

[AgX]

There is a danger in reading in too much meaning into a photograph or a collection of photographs. That danger including projecting ones own experiences and prejudices.

What is wrong with that?


As long as one does not assume, based on ones own projections, that the photographer created necessarily his work with the same idea in mind.

 

[Bill Burk]

I spent hours with about 50 of their medium-sized prints at Dia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dia_Beacon

Take your time with them. As a project (not a mere series) the whole is a monumental, quiet work of art.

Dia (the gallery itself, on the Hudson) is itself monumental.

I spent considerable time enjoying their work, don’t remember where. Wasn’t hours because I never have that much time. I felt myself imagining climbing into a station wagon for the drive to the next town after town, on the hunt for another intriguing tower

 

[jtk]

It is interesting to note that the essay dates from 1964. It must not have gone over very well with artists at the time who, as an act of revenge, invented conceptual art. Of course, these new conceptual artists thought the art critics and academics were ignoramuses, so instead of leaving it to art critics and academics to come up with interpretations, the artists wrote treatises about what their art works meant so there would be no misunderstandings. (Now they do lengthy interviews on YouTube.) Actually, the artists were afraid that the art critics and academics, who by this time were well versed in psychoanalytics, would interpret them in a light unfavorable to the artist, generally along the lines of some neuroses, and wanted to get out ahead of them with a rebuttal. I'm with Sontag on this, which is why, beside the fact I am not from Vancouver, I am not a big fan of Jeff Wall and progeny.

fwiw I wasn't aware that conceptual art had not existed until Sontag wrote that essay. I thought somebody in France might have done it at Lascaux. And I wasn't aware that "psychoanalytics" (whatever that means) were ever significant to production or appreciation of art...though maybe Freud's grandson thought differently. .

 

[Alex Benjamin]

One should not over think things.

"Overthinking" is a word that has always fascinated me. It does not exist in French, nor, as far as I can tell—please correct me if I'm wrong—, in any language other than English. I find it interesting that you could put a limit on the amount of thinking that one could do about something, as if it were measurable, and its consequences akin to those of speeding on the highway.

Moreover, if one does admit that "overthinking" is a thing, wouldn't it still be better than "underthinking"?

Some things should be appreciated for just what they are. Others can and should be pondered.

OK, but who is to decide which?

 

[Sirius Glass]

"Overthinking" is a word that has always fascinated me. It does not exist in French, nor, as far as I can tell—please correct me if I'm wrong—, in any language other than English. I find it interesting that you could put a limit on the amount of thinking that one could do about something, as if it were measurable, and its consequences akin to those of speeding on the highway.

Moreover, if one does admit that "overthinking" is a thing, wouldn't it still be better than "underthinking"?



OK, but who is to decide which?

Over thinking is working to find meanings or thoughts that are not there. An extreme example would be a two year old child dumps his or her food on the floor one time:

• The child has deep seated hate for its parents
• The child has psychological issues with the counties political policies
• The child is extremely aware of the impending meteor impact that will wipe out all life on earth except for hard shell insects

 

[AgX]

Over thinking is working to find meanings or thoughts that are not there.

But they may come up in the viewers mind. And then they might be intended by the artist, or they might not.


Who is to decide what the viewer makes out of it?
Maybe a artist protests, saying that it was not what he intended, being misunderstood. But this is the inherent risk of an artist bringing his work to the world.

 

[Roger Thoms]

I spent considerable time enjoying their work, don’t remember where. Wasn’t hours because I never have that much time. I felt myself imagining climbing into a station wagon for the drive to the next town after town, on the hunt for another intriguing tower

Perhaps you saw them at Pier 24 Gallery, San Francisco in 2017.

Roger

 

[jtk]

But they may come up in the viewers mind. And then they might be intended by the artist, or they might not.


Who is to decide what the viewer makes out of it?
Maybe a artist protests, saying that it was not what he intended, being misunderstood. But this is the inherent risk of an artist bringing his work to the world.

Yes !

That "inherent risk" drives artists.

Of course there's a remedy that's insistently promoted by a few: "shoulds." That's the camels toe nose, under the edge of the famous "big tent". Its actively destructive to something to which the Bechers aspired.

 

[jtk]

Over thinking is working to find meanings or thoughts that are not there. An extreme example would be a two year old child dumps his or her food on the floor one time:

• The child has deep seated hate for its parents
• The child has psychological issues with the counties political policies
• The child is extremely aware of the impending meteor impact that will wipe out all life on earth except for hard shell insects

Someone's child had a bizarre upbringing.

 

[Peter Schrager]

There is a danger in reading in too much meaning into a photograph or a collection of photographs. That danger including projecting ones own experiences and prejudices.

Hilla and Bernd Beacher produced a body of work of architectural pieces that were disappearing. They used a methodical systematic approach to photograph each one in a manner that allows one to view it as art, a design study or structural study. The work stands on its own and is not a metaphor for something it was never meant to be. They achieved what they set out to do as a lifetime work which they completed. View it for what it was meant to be, not for what one would have liked it to be or how one would like to inject into it.

So we'll said BRAVO!

 

[Pieter12]

One should not over think things. Some things should be appreciated for just what they are. Others can and should be pondered. I remember the college dormitory discussions that when on endlessly about the meaning of the lyrics of a particular song and how that time could have been used better in many other ways.

But isn't that the wonder of art (and literature)? If you chose to see some personal meaning in it, go for it. Just don't assume the artist meant it that way. Roland Barthes' punctum theory comes to mind.

 

[Vaughn]

Art can be a point of departure with the artist having no clue of the viewer's destination. It is one of the artist's jobs to kick your butt out the door, and say, "Take off. Gallery closed."

And I need to finishing packing and get my butt out the door and up Redwood Creek with the 4x5 for five days! Film loaded (12 holders, Kodak Copy Film and TMax400), food packed up, permit obtained...what am I doing online! See ya next weekend!

 

[sasah zib]

show catalog ships/arrives tomorrow, 2aug22.
https://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9781588397553/bernd-and-hilla-becher/


if you want two keystone books about them, check these:
Lange, Susanne: Bernd and Hilla Becher: Life and Work, 2007
https://www.photoeye.com/bookstore/citation.cfm?catalog=MI140&i=9780262122863&i2=

Zweite, Armin: Suggestions for a Way of Seeing: Ten Key Ideas, 2004
in this book: https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/typologies-industrial-buildings

the Becher publisher for many years, since '74:
Schirmer/Mosel
http://showroom.schirmer-mosel.com/index.php?manufacturers_id=26

----

We also weren't really creatively involved with the conceptual art movement but we somehow fit into it. We didn't contradict this association, we had nothing against that. Through that connection we were included in exhibitions which didn't deal only with photography and which showed our work in a different light. That was the nature of conceptual art, it didn't divide the media so strictly as before. It didn't matter if you painted or drew, rode a bicycle or tore up paper, everything was possible. The flood gates were opened. Since we made something that couldn't be easily categorized, we fit in perfectly. --HB

People say that a documentary approach is not artistic. But who decides? Ultimately it has to be posterity. There is no way to pinpoint the criteria. Everything connected with making pictures can be artistic. -- HB

 

[jtk]

Thanks Sasan Zib.

 

[Arthurwg]

That's the camels ****, under the edge of the famous "big tent". Its actively destructive to something to which the Bechers aspired.

camels ***?

{moderator's note: I edited the phrase quoted, because I am pretty confident that it wasn't the one jtk intended, and the one used was unintentionally (I think) ribaldly funny}

 

[jtk]

Hi Arthur. Thanks for catching that!

Evidently my software didn't know about "camels toes" ... the figure of speech. Don't think I've heard "camels nose under the tent" , but maybe I've not listened closely enough ... "nose" might make more sense.

It approximately means sneaking something into a situation...in this case twisting couple's work into something they didn't intend (and then saying negative things about the twist). Hilla said somewhere that they didn't "intend" to make conceptual art, not having heard of it at the time, but she evidently accepted the term.

When I first spent time with the couple's work it was at the Dia on Hudson River, a gallery that is mostly devoted to conceptual work. For example, Andy Warhol was presented at the same time with about 100 prints of one subject (maybe a Marilyn Monroe?), all identical except that the wild colors were rendered differently.

Warhol's stuff is mostly thought of as "conceptual' (eg soup cans). Dia showed several of Richard Serra's beautiful walk-in steel monsters at the same time. Dia on Hudson River is the biggest gallery I've ever seen.

 

[MattKing]

FWIW, I've always heard it as the "Camel's Nose in the tent".

 

[jtk]

Well, I'm happy to be corrected.

Never actually used that expression before, but it's certainly useful...particularly when "the big tent" is used to suggest there's no difference between truth and ignorance .

 

[sasah zib]

a deeper dive into "conceptual" -- but a big swerve from the origin point of this thread, ie, to let people know something of the Bechers.

Consider that the mechanics of art expand quickly. Photography has become so intertwined with ideas beyond being "the pencil of nature" that conversations about them seems like an emulsion technologist talking to someone struggling with getting film into a holder.

conceptual art --

In 1968, the fusion of Fluxus and Pop had led to works such as Robert Morris's Card File (1962) and Ed Ruscha's Twenty-Six Gasoline Stations (1963),

photographic and textual strategies as they were being put in place in the mid-sixties by the first "official" generation of Conceptual artists: Lawrence Weiner (born 1940), Joseph Kosuth (1945), Robert Barry (1936), and Douglas Huebler (1924-77). These artists formed the group that was shown in January 1969 in New York by the art dealer Seth Siegelaub (1941-2013).

Notes that may help:

• Henry Flynt, "Concept Art", in An Anthology of Chance Operations, eds. La Monte Young and Jackson Mac Law, New York, self-published, 1963, ; revised in 2nd ed., New York: H. Friedrich, 1970.
• Joseph Kosuth, "Art After Philosophy", Studio International 178, no. 915 (Oct 1969), pp 134-137, no. 916 (Nov 1969), pp 160-161, no. 917 (Dec 1969), pp 212-213; Part I repr. in Art and Language, eds. Paul Maenz and Gerd de Vries, Cologne, 1972, pp 74-98; repr. in Kosuth, Art After Philosophy and After, MIT Press, 1991, pp 13-32.
• Sol LeWitt, Four Basic Kinds of Straight Lines, London: Studio International, 1969, 36 pp. Artist's book.
• Sol LeWitt, Four Basic Colours: Yellow, Black, Red, Blue, and Their Combinations, 1971.
• Joseph Kosuth, Art as Idea as Idea, 1967-1968, Brussels: Paul Maenz, Mar 1973, [12] pp. Catalogue.
• Sol LeWitt, Photo Grids, Paul David Press, 1977, 50 pp. Artist's book.
• Conceptual Art, ed. Ursula Meyer, New York: E.P. Dutton, 1972, xx+227 pp.
• Idea Art: A Critical Anthology, ed. Gregory Battcock, New York: E. P. Dutton, 1973.
• Minimal & Earth & Concept Art, 2 vols., ed. Karel Srp, Prague: Jazzpetit, 1982.
• "Language and Concepts", ch 9 in Theories and Documents of Contemporary Art: A Sourcebook of Artists' Writings, eds. Kristine Stiles and Peter Selz, University of California Press, 1996; 2nd ed., 2012, pp 955-1070.
• Conceptual Art: A Critical Anthology, eds. Alexander Alberro and Blake Stimson, MIT Press, 1999, 623 pp

###
with that,

 

[jtk]

a deeper dive into "conceptual" -- but a big swerve from the origin point of this thread, ie, to let people know something of the Bechers.

Consider that the mechanics of art expand quickly. Photography has become so intertwined with ideas beyond being "the pencil of nature" that conversations about them seems like an emulsion technologist talking to someone struggling with getting film into a holder.

conceptual art --

In 1968, the fusion of Fluxus and Pop had led to works such as Robert Morris's Card File (1962) and Ed Ruscha's Twenty-Six Gasoline Stations (1963),

photographic and textual strategies as they were being put in place in the mid-sixties by the first "official" generation of Conceptual artists: Lawrence Weiner (born 1940), Joseph Kosuth (1945), Robert Barry (1936), and Douglas Huebler (1924-77). These artists formed the group that was shown in January 1969 in New York by the art dealer Seth Siegelaub (1941-2013).

Notes that may help:

• Henry Flynt, "Concept Art", in An Anthology of Chance Operations, eds. La Monte Young and Jackson Mac Law, New York, self-published, 1963, ; revised in 2nd ed., New York: H. Friedrich, 1970.
• Joseph Kosuth, "Art After Philosophy", Studio International 178, no. 915 (Oct 1969), pp 134-137, no. 916 (Nov 1969), pp 160-161, no. 917 (Dec 1969), pp 212-213; Part I repr. in Art and Language, eds. Paul Maenz and Gerd de Vries, Cologne, 1972, pp 74-98; repr. in Kosuth, Art After Philosophy and After, MIT Press, 1991, pp 13-32.
• Sol LeWitt, Four Basic Kinds of Straight Lines, London: Studio International, 1969, 36 pp. Artist's book.
• Sol LeWitt, Four Basic Colours: Yellow, Black, Red, Blue, and Their Combinations, 1971.
• Joseph Kosuth, Art as Idea as Idea, 1967-1968, Brussels: Paul Maenz, Mar 1973, [12] pp. Catalogue.
• Sol LeWitt, Photo Grids, Paul David Press, 1977, 50 pp. Artist's book.
• Conceptual Art, ed. Ursula Meyer, New York: E.P. Dutton, 1972, xx+227 pp.
• Idea Art: A Critical Anthology, ed. Gregory Battcock, New York: E. P. Dutton, 1973.
• Minimal & Earth & Concept Art, 2 vols., ed. Karel Srp, Prague: Jazzpetit, 1982.
• "Language and Concepts", ch 9 in Theories and Documents of Contemporary Art: A Sourcebook of Artists' Writings, eds. Kristine Stiles and Peter Selz, University of California Press, 1996; 2nd ed., 2012, pp 955-1070.
• Conceptual Art: A Critical Anthology, eds. Alexander Alberro and Blake Stimson, MIT Press, 1999, 623 pp

###
with that,

Good stuff... hard to find in library, but local librarians (even in New Mexico) will probably be happy to dig for it via inter-library loans and or involvement with local universities (I benefitted for that when I wanted an obscure and now mostly forgotten video about Lascaux.

Speaking of Lascaux (and similar cave paintings around the world) ... the hand prints may be first evidence of "conceptual art."

 

[MattKing]

Well, I'm happy to be corrected.

Never actually used that expression before, but it's certainly useful...particularly when "the big tent" is used to suggest there's no difference between truth and ignorance .

This "big tent" includes many things. Some require a deep understanding of the complex and difficult, while others are accessible and easy to grasp. Appreciating the former can be really rewarding, but there really isn't anything embarrassing about preferring the latter.

 

[Arthurwg]

Speaking of Lascaux (and similar cave paintings around the world) ... the hand prints may be first evidence of "conceptual art."

You may have something there.

 

[bluechromis]

We've touched on two authors of fictional literature here (Umberto Eco, who I've not read, and James Joyce, who I've read quite a lot).

Since we're engaged in interpretation, I'll add something many find important, stimulating, and especially relevant, Susan Sontag's "against interpretation". As many know, Sontag was married to a famous professional photographer, Annie Leibovitz.

Against Interpretation

I have enjoyed the intellectual level of this discussion. Though the participants disagree at time the conversation has not descended into acrimonious insults as frequently happens on others on other sites.

Sontag argues against interpretation. She says that, " The task of interpretation is virtually one of translation. The interpreter says, Look, don’t you see that X is really - or, really means - A? That Y is really B? That Z is really C?" But we have learned more about the human perceptual system since Sontag's time. We now know that a human can never directly experience the outer environment or close to it. The senses provide the brain chaotic and fragmentary data about the outer world that the brain uses to make a best-guess model of what it out there. For example, my eyes may send to my brain some information some lines and shapes "X" that my brain interprets as really "A" that the car ahead of me is the same model I have. The brain is hugely biased toward creating some story, some interpretation of the information is getting to the point it would much rather make a wrong guess than have not guess at all. That is how optical illusions work. The brain is a pattern seeking machine. Much of this is unconscious. But in trying to create a workable simulation of the outer environment, our brain changes and simplifies things, makes assumptions which do not exactly match the outer scene. So everything we experience in our minds perceptually represents interpretation.

One could ague that this is a narrow technical statement that doesn't pertain to understanding art. But it does. This huge bias the brain has to labeling things, to attributing stories to things, does not end with basic perception, but imbues all our thinking whether we choose to or not. Unlike Sontag, I don't think it is possible to experience art in a neutral way without interpretation. But where I agree with Sontag is that it is limiting to have one reductionist interpretation of art. It is often said that a great power of art is that is resonates on multiple levels, has layers of meaning. Those that try to say that art has a single meaning be it Freudian, Marxist or other strip away the richness of the other layers. There is also the danger of substituting the interpretation of others for our own as often happens with ideological doctrines. But there is a difference between more individualist societies and more collectivist societies about this.