Photography hot takes!

[Cholentpot]

Whatever that certain age may be, you will eventually reach it, and your taste and ideas will be deemed "of a certain" type, also.

Anyway, I wasn't latching onto who you were identifying other than the fact they're all women.

My tastes are outdated for my age set as is. Without sounding too pretentious I look for timeless stuff. I don't care if it's been done 1,000 times, if it's excellent work it'll speak for itself.

It is almost impressive that you typed that into a thread which contains multiple posts rushing to the defence of Ansel Adams. A thread on a forum that has a > 10 year running thread on HCB Appreciation that accepts no quarter on the matter of Bresson's apparently mystical skills!

There's a certain defense I see with the photographers I mentioned. People take it personally, more personally than going after Adams.

I agree with Sherman and Lebowitz being vastly oversold as photographers.

But to be fair, there are any number of highly regarded men that are the darlings of the arts community whose work is mostly sophomoric snapshooting.

Among them I include Meyerowitz and Freedlander whose work I rarely find all that interesting. Vivien Maier was head and shoulders better than either of them. So it ain't a gender thing.

This seems to especially be a particular NYC disease where "The City" justifies all manner of artistic dreck. It is certainly true that art needs to be understood in its context and time, but it should have some timeless quality to it. None of the above hit that criteria in my estimation.

In fairness, almost no one can deliver a consistently great body of work over a lifetime of shooting so we need to give all the above a bunch of grace. But I rile at the arterati who constantly pimp mediocre work (cf "The Fountainhead" that deals exactly with this phenomenon).

Banana Taped To A Wall exists everywhere. Context and Time don't age well. Context gets removed, time moves on. Art shouldn't need an explanation.

I'm going to open a different can of worms. I find that a lot of street photography to be uh... not great.

I would agree but also say a lot of photography in general is not great.

And yes, I'm being a critic without showing my work. It's just the way it is. I've been published blah blah blah. I'm not part of the establishment though, never went to any sort of formal training. Never studied under anyone. Which is my other hot take. The beauty of photography as an artistic medium is you don't need to be part of a movement to make a statement. The whole 'outsider art' label is in my opinion just juvenile high school labeling. However I'm always open to learn about new techniques and study the masters. I can take and leave what I want.

 

[Michael Howard]

Not sure I get the hate on Cindy. I always enjoyed her various series, I think some of them are quite wonderful.

 

[Cholentpot]

Not sure I get the hate on Cindy. I always enjoyed her various series, I think some of them are quite wonderful.

To each their own as the farmer kissed the cow.

I just see it as someone taking photos of them self. If it was a 48 year old male out of shape toll booth operator I don't think the photos would have made any traction. Or maybe they would have...

Any out of shape dudes out there who want to do a Shermanesk series?

 

[Vaughn]

...
And as for Cindy Sherman,
It helps to put her best work into its own time.
...

Always important to place such work in the framework of its time.

Presently there is no future in photographing broken down old shit...rusty old wreaks with titles like "They Don't Make Them Like They Use To" , or old buildings, "If These Walls Could Talk".

Edward Weston took a photo of a rusted wreck on a beach just north of here, along with several images along the way of other wreaks and abandoned buildings in the West in the late 30s. That should have been enough, but us old guys approaching death are attracted to things older than we are that we can point our cameras at and shout, "I'm not dead yet!"

Image -- My Boys, Jeep, about 25 years ago. iPhone shot of a glossy FB print on the kitchen wall today. Platinum/palladium some day. (8x10 neg)

 

[Rick A]

After watching an interview with AA describing his photo of "Moon Rise", it struck me he's an adherent of the philosophy of "if you can't dazzle them with diamonds, then baffle them with bull$h!t".
I'm an adherent of the Weston philosophy of take your work seriously, but not yourself. AA was full of himself.

 

[cliveh]

I see that now Photoshop has an AI assistant, so you just tell it what you want the photograph to show. Can it show you what you actually saw?

 

[chuckroast]

After watching an interview with AA describing his photo of "Moon Rise", it struck me he's an adherent of the philosophy of "if you can't dazzle them with diamonds, then baffle them with bull$h!t".
I'm an adherent of the Weston philosophy of take your work seriously, but not yourself. AA was full of himself.

I'm not sure that's quite fair. AA was trying to maintain a profitable business enterprise through his work. Weston was too busy chasing skirts to spend much time on that

 

[Cholentpot]

Always important to place such work in the framework of its time.

Presently there is no future in photographing broken down old shit...rusty old wreaks with titles like "They Don't Make Them Like They Use To" , or old buildings, "If These Walls Could Talk".

Edward Weston took a photo of a rusted wreck on a beach just north of here, along with several images along the way of other wreaks and abandoned buildings in the West in the late 30s. That should have been enough, but us old guys approaching death are attracted to things older than we are that we can point our cameras at and shout, "I'm not dead yet!"

Image -- My Boys, Jeep, about 25 years ago. iPhone shot of a glossy FB print on the kitchen wall today. Platinum/palladium some day. (8x10 neg)

Hop onto the youtubes and watch the youngn's take photos of abandoned places. It's as popular as it ever was. Filmtubers flock to ghost towns and untouched homes. Can't get enough of it.

 

[Alan Edward Klein]

Here's a hot take (though not an original thought of my own).
We'll never know how good Vivien Maier was (or wasn't), because we've never really seen a Vivien Maier photo. She never got to print, never got to exhibit (though IIRC, she did start some discussions). All we have is a *heavily* curated collection of photos, from a source of 10s of thousands of negatives, selected by people that never knew her, and never spoke to her.

I never spoke to Ansel Adams or saw all of his pictures. I also haven;t spoken to VanGogh or Michaelangelo. Shouldn't art stand on its own?

 

[Vaughn]

Hop onto the youtubes and watch the youngn's take photos of abandoned places.

I believe that is just a part of a race or contest to 'discover' the newest place, or the newest old place.

 

[BrianShaw]

Shouldn't art stand on its own?

That’s one belief. Then there’s the other where folks say you need to understand the artist’s intent to fully appreciate it.

 

[Alan Edward Klein]

I guess I see it as more of a regret, in that we don't have her "voice". We have a few hundred photos selected from 150,000 photos, by a handful men that didn't know her.

WE only admire a few of Ansel Adams' work out of thousands of pictures he took. We look at the same few HCB pictures over and over. If I see that boy with the wine bottles again, I might get drunk. Same with most photographers. They've shot hundreds of thousands and only a relatively few stand out.

Garry Winogrand didn;t even develop much of his film. When he died suddenly in 1984 at the age of 56, he left behind a staggering backlog of un-sequenced and un-beheld work. He was famously more obsessed with the physical act of shooting on the streets than with editing or archiving his results.

His massive posthumous archive included:

• 2,500 rolls of completely undeveloped 35mm film (mostly Kodak Tri-X).
• 6,500 rolls of film that had been developed but never contact-printed or proofed.
• 3,000 rolls that only existed as unedited contact sheets
  
  That's 432,000 pictures based on 36 shots per roll.

 

[chuckroast]

I believe that is just a part of a race or contest to 'discover' the newest place, or the newest old place.

As someone who loves to shoot detritus, decay, and collapse, I must protest.

All art is derivative, no matter how indirectly. That doesn't make it nor worth doing.

All art is a lie. That's doesn't mean it can't tell us something about the truth.

All art is unique to its creator, even if its been done before. That doesn't mean the viewer is owed an explanation.

I do what I do because I love doing it. I not only repeat the work of others, I often repeat my own visual vocabulary. In this regard, I am participating in a long tradition of people like, say, Bach, who made extensive reuse of their own idioms.

Something doesn't have to be new to tell us new things.

There is this art school doctrine that great artists must always be doing something entirely new or they are failing. It causes a kind of creative paralysis among the students who all too often will abandon mastery of what has been done already in favor of "finding their own voice".

 

[Vaughn]

Then it comes down to why one loves doing something. What need does that love fill?

 

[Alan Edward Klein]

That’s one belief. Then there’s the other where folks say you need to understand the artist’s intent to fully appreciate it.

You don't have to be a chef to enjoy a good meal.

 

[Don_ih]

Art doesn't need to be original or unique to be art. It just needs to be the result of whatever artistic process you engage in. Does it need to say something? No. But it can. Art is the most common thing in the world - you're currently surrounded by heaps of it. Most of it is meaningless and insignificant and commercial or purposive. But some art can be special and meaningful and unique and original. It's not limited by the narrow-mindedness of elitist twats.

 

[BrianShaw]

You don't have to be a chef to enjoy a good meal.

I agree. Im just saying what I read, too often.

 

[Cholentpot]

That’s one belief. Then there’s the other where folks say you need to understand the artist’s intent to fully appreciate it.

I had to learn to separate the art from the artist. Roger Waters is one of the greatest lyricists in rock history. However he'd not like me one bit. Then again, he didn't seem to like his bandmates much either.

Intent is a nice add on to the work. But the work doesn't need a byline. It's a visual medium.

 

[BrianShaw]

I had to learn to separate the art from the artist. Roger Waters is one of the greatest lyricists in rock history. However he'd not like me one bit. Then again, he didn't seem to like his bandmates much either.

Intent is a nice add on to the work. But the work doesn't need a byline. It's a visual medium.

Agree!

 

[MattKing]

I'm happy to have my enjoyment and appreciation and understanding of any piece of art supplemented or enhanced by learning more about the artist and the methods he/she employed.
I'm also prepared to be inspired by that sort of information to try different things.
And I can understand where such information can enhance the market value of art - particularly art with a component that is documentary in nature.
If the only thing you look for in art is something that appeals to the eye, or the ear, or the taste bud, you are limiting yourself to the superficial only. There is more to art than that. Appreciation of art is both a sensory exercise and an intellectual one. And everyone has their own take on how best to balance those two components of that appreciation.
If you have never had one reaction to a piece of art, then later had a much more complex reaction after learning more about it, you are a rare art "appreciater" indeed.

 

[gbroadbridge]

Oh, we're back to 'What is Art?'.

All roads...

 

[BrianShaw]

Oh, we're back to 'What is Art?'.

All roads...

Often, it comes back to that question. If only there was a definitive answer.

 

[mshchem]

Cindy Sherman's work is awesome.

 

[Don_ih]

There are plenty of useful answers to "What is art?" If you don't bother trying to understand any of them, it's your own problem. Matt's position there was fine.

"Art" is a very very large area of human activity.

 

[Cholentpot]

I'm happy to have my enjoyment and appreciation and understanding of any piece of art supplemented or enhanced by learning more about the artist and the methods he/she employed.
I'm also prepared to be inspired by that sort of information to try different things.
And I can understand where such information can enhance the market value of art - particularly art with a component that is documentary in nature.
If the only thing you look for in art is something that appeals to the eye, or the ear, or the taste bud, you are limiting yourself to the superficial only. There is more to art than that. Appreciation of art is both a sensory exercise and an intellectual one. And everyone has their own take on how best to balance those two components of that appreciation.
If you have never had one reaction to a piece of art, then later had a much more complex reaction after learning more about it, you are a rare art "appreciater" indeed.

This take doesn't stand the test of time.

For an art form to truly shine it need no justification to exist. It needs to appeal to everyone, from the uneducated to the connoisseur.

For me, I want to see effort in art. I want to see that thought, time and intent went into the work. It might only take 1/500th of a second but someone went through those photos and chose the one that stood out. Someone took the time to learn to time.

I don't really care for market value of art. I can't afford it, and no one wants to buy my stuff. If I was for sale though I would market the heck out of my work and make it sound as thoughtful and deep as possible. I'd just make it all up post but I don't care as long as I get paid.