Politeness versus Photography

bjorke · Mar 18, 2007

Ray Heath said:
...art should not be an excuse to force an opinion

Please, come up with a definition of art that is not about "forcing an opinion." Isn't the most basic of artistic urges: "look at this!"?

Lee Shively said:
More political BS. Just what the world needs, another screaming idiot with an agenda. His photos are excellent but I could care less about his political position or "message".

So... you think he ought not to express them?

Lee Shively said:
My politics is that of the denial of politics.

If you are not able to see the absurd combination of both calling other people "idiots" and their opinions "BS" while at the same time declaring yourself above politics.... well, nothing anyone here has to say has any hope of crossing the desolate idealess desert that is your consciousness.

Historically, the track record of those who deny political content in art has not been good, whether it be Italian church fathers of the 1500's criticizing costumes in paintings for looking "too German," or committees and leaders decreeing that all art must express the 'Social Realism' that celbrates the ideals of Communism, or even simply with the stated desire for conversation and art that won't offend the investors or scare the children. Such declarations of being apolitical have inevitably been just a mask for a regressive, strongly-censorious political agenda that prefers not to be shone in direct light.

However, being true to my nature as a bleeding heart pinko elitist touchy-feeling blue state artspeaking tree hugger idiot, I'll ask you to declare your own genuine ideas as they relate to anything other than name-calling -- maybe with respect to photography, or at the very least art in general?

Maybe idealized romantic art
is more your speed?
And how does that not embed a profound
political message?

mark said:
There is so much more to the world than politics; so much more to artistic expression.

Such as?

Samuel Johnson said:
Language best shows a man. Speak, that I might see thee.

John Bartley · Mar 18, 2007

The title of this thread is

Politeness versus Photography

It would be polite not to assume that there is anything at all political about a photographers work
It would be polite to not expect a photographer to share their political opinions
Sometimes, depending on the circumstances, it is polite to not express any political opinions at all
Sometimes a photograph is just a photograph

A bit less politics/political meddling and a bit more minding our business and maybe we wouldn't need as many war photographers ...

cheers

bjorke · Mar 18, 2007

John Bartley said:
It would be polite not to assume that there is anything at all political about a photographers work

That's my point, and why politeness is a crappy metric to apply to art. Photography is an excercise in choices. Choosing what to photograph, how to photograph it, how to print it, what to print, how and to whom to present it. Since it is an interaction between persons, there is always at least some element of politics in it, if only to the degree of saying (by the photographer) "I think that you should spend some of your time looking at this" and the expression of trust and effort on the part of the viewer.

"Discussion about Art," 1946

Here we see all the values of lyrical sensuousness so valued by the detractors of this thread, and not the slightest whiff of acknowledgement of the world surrounding the artist -- indeed, check out the costumes, more at home in 1846 than 1946. I hear this Vasili Yakolev's painting was one of Stalin's favorites.

But hey, a picture is just a picture, right? So suppressing ideas about them is politically neutral.... right? It's not like you're dealing with real ideas or the right of people to express themselves. It's just whiffleball, a game as polite as The Minister's Cat, where pesky notions like values can be safely ignored and blanketed under one dully pleasing cliche after another.

vet173 · Mar 18, 2007

I have no use for this idiot. He wants to know my politics so he can argue with me. How in the word I have made it this far without his approval I can only wonder. What a pompous ass. As a combat vet I detest armchair warriors. If you want to be that charged up about an issue, put down the camera, pick up a gun and fight for the cause. He could care less about YOUR photography. He is only looking for validation of his own views. Only when he leaves the third person perspective will he QUALIFY to ask my views on war.

Lee Shively · Mar 18, 2007

It seems no matter how you try to avoid it, some dufus has to push politics on you. I'm no longer sure what "politics" means anymore. It's become a religion to those who feel they have to proseletize their beliefs at the expense of rational thought or logic--and the more in-your-face, the better. It's sad enough to have to put up with the nightly venom spewing forth from the cable news network scream-fests, now it has to invade the cultural arenas as well.

Here we have someone who photographs ruins and produces very nice photographs that are worth seeing just for the value of the photography alone. Then he has to toss a handful of excrement on his work by proclaiming it to be political. I don't even know what his political position is because I don't care and I didn't read the whole narrative. In my eyes, he has cheapened the value of his work by saying, in effect, that it is there to push an agenda.

Some of you might remember the 1960's when western culture was suspect and all the institutions of government, religion, art and philosophy were thought to be in the midst of a revolution. The world was changing and it was for the better. Didn't work out like that. Those revolutionaries in the 60's are now in charge of those institutions and they're screwing things up just as badly or worse. Now they're also apparently also teaching art history in schools the world over and interpreting art in political terms. That says more about the narrow-mindedness totalitarionism of the interpreter than the art.

I'm sure my words will be dissected and each statement will be contradicted with antedotal evidence of how all art is politics and all artists are political. I call horseshit on that concept. Only those who have a political agenda themselves would try to politicize every work of art and every artist who created it.

What utter drivel!

Lee Shively · Mar 18, 2007

Oh, sorry. Was I being impolite?

TheFlyingCamera · Mar 18, 2007

Lee Shively said:
It seems no matter how you try to avoid it, some dufus has to push politics on you. I'm no longer sure what "politics" means anymore. It's become a religion to those who feel they have to proseletize their beliefs at the expense of rational thought or logic--and the more in-your-face, the better. It's sad enough to have to put up with the nightly venom spewing forth from the cable news network scream-fests, now it has to invade the cultural arenas as well.

Here we have someone who photographs ruins and produces very nice photographs that are worth seeing just for the value of the photography alone. Then he has to toss a handful of excrement on his work by proclaiming it to be political. I don't even know what his political position is because I don't care and I didn't read the whole narrative. In my eyes, he has cheapened the value of his work by saying, in effect, that it is there to push an agenda.

Some of you might remember the 1960's when western culture was suspect and all the institutions of government, religion, art and philosophy were thought to be in the midst of a revolution. The world was changing and it was for the better. Didn't work out like that. Those revolutionaries in the 60's are now in charge of those institutions and they're screwing things up just as badly or worse. Now they're also apparently also teaching art history in schools the world over and interpreting art in political terms. That says more about the narrow-mindedness totalitarionism of the interpreter than the art.

I'm sure my words will be dissected and each statement will be contradicted with antedotal evidence of how all art is politics and all artists are political. I call horseshit on that concept. Only those who have a political agenda themselves would try to politicize every work of art and every artist who created it.

What utter drivel!

It only requires two people in a room for politics to come into being. So to say that art exists without politics is to say that the art has an audience of one. It only appears to be non-political when you agree with its message uncritically. There is lots of art that has a message 99%+ of humanity agrees with uncritically - that pictures of fuzzy kittens are cute (within limits). Run over that cute fuzzy kitten with a cement truck and re-photograph it, and voila, you have politics!

Ray Heath · Mar 18, 2007

TheFlyingCamera said:
It only requires two people in a room for politics to come into being. So to say that art exists without politics is to say that the art has an audience of one. It only appears to be non-political when you agree with its message uncritically. There is lots of art that has a message 99%+ of humanity agrees with uncritically - that pictures of fuzzy kittens are cute (within limits). Run over that cute fuzzy kitten with a cement truck and re-photograph it, and voila, you have politics!

g'day all
The, you would also have an example of lack of control, would such an image speak more of fuzzy kittens or more of some failing and lack decency in the photographer

Paul. · Mar 18, 2007

bjorke said:
That's my point, and why politeness is a crappy metric to apply to art. Photography is an excercise in choices. Choosing what to photograph, how to photograph it, how to print it, what to print, how and to whom to present it. Since it is an interaction between persons, there is always at least some element of politics in it, if only to the degree of saying (by the photographer) "I think that you should spend some of your time looking at this" and the expression of trust and effort on the part of the viewer.

"Discussion about Art," 1946

Here we see all the values of lyrical sensuousness so valued by the detractors of this thread, and not the slightest whiff of acknowledgement of the world surrounding the artist -- indeed, check out the costumes, more at home in 1846 than 1946. I hear this Vasili Yakolev's painting was one of Stalin's favorites.

But hey, a picture is just a picture, right? So suppressing ideas about them is politically neutral.... right? It's not like you're dealing with real ideas or the right of people to express themselves. It's just whiffleball, a game as polite as The Minister's Cat, where pesky notions like values can be safely ignored and blanketed under one dully pleasing cliche after another.

Sorry bjorke, you are evidently more versed in this matter than I for look as I may I cannot desern the political statement in the picture you do.
May be it is an academic persuit this seeing of hidden meaning but from my laymans point the message is lost.
That all art is political is self evident as all art is the product of mankind and all men/ woman have a set of values that dictate there politics, but as these politics are not the same the message is often misunderstood.

For me the image that stands out as haveing a political message is the seminal image of Nick Ute of the Vietnamise girl running down the road on fire after her village was attacked with napalm. This image I belive had a greater effect on public oppinion and ending that war than any other. Prehaps I misunderstand your point but if art has a message for me it had better tell me straight as I do not do hints and hidden meaning, this may be due to a lack of a clasical education on my part but it beholds an artist to realise that because he knows what he means he cannot assume that others do, to then condem my ignorance is to negate his responsability to explain his message so that it can be widely understood.
Regards Paul.

jstraw · Mar 18, 2007

Ray Heath said:
g'day all
The, you would also have an example of lack of control, would such an image speak more of fuzzy kittens or more of some failing and lack decency in the photographer

See, politics!

bjorke · Mar 18, 2007

vet173 said:
He wants to know my politics so he can argue with me.

He wants to know what your genuine context is when looking at your photographs. Norfolk's view is not new, it has long been leveled at modern and post-modern art, as living too far removed in an "aesthetically-pure" bubble, where work can be perceived mostly as useful decoration for banks, hotels, whatever sort of grand banal thing money and its hired architects can dream up. E.g., Jackson Pollack's works are considered content-free and safe for any bank, hotel, or corporate reception area.

I'd ask: isn't it impolite to assume that photographs are without a meaning deeper than the pictorial? Sounds like an insult to the potentialities of photography and photographers, to me.

Sorry, no kitten

The Flying Camera said:
It only requires two people in a room for politics to come into being. So to say that art exists without politics is to say that the art has an audience of one.

That's one possible interpretation. The other is to simply deny the possibility that any viewer may have an opinion other than the predetermined one. This doesn't mean that politics is absent, only that demagogues say it is.

Lee, I'd still like to know what sort of "cultural arenas" you think are normally free from political and worldview issues. So far you've slung a lot of personal invective but made very few points that don't involve an allusion to manure and other bodily fluids. I'm only guessing, but I think you've been watching too many of theose "cable news network scream-fests."

Ed Sukach · Mar 18, 2007

I found Simon Norfolk's work to be intensely moving.

It will always cause me to wonder about the human condition when someone who does NOT "approve" of a work, or body of work, will expend so much time and energy screaming and ranting against it. There is a saying, often used in Gallery exhibition:
"Oh ... you don't LIKE the photograph ..? Look! Here is another - just a meter or so down the wall" (applicable to this media: - "or on another site ...").

The series of Normandy Beaches, Gold, Utah, Sword, Omaha - particularly struck me... scenes of beautiful tranquility - in sharp contrast to the indelible mental images we carry, evoked by their very names, of some of the most violent carnage ever caused by man.

Pleasant, "nice" images? Not necessarily, especially not when considered in the context of their titles/ description. They ARE useful in bringing me a tiny bit closer to reality, and as a innoculation against a delusionary concept of the world.

"Political / apolitical"? Ill leave that for others to decide. "Politically BIASED? - No.

jstraw · Mar 18, 2007

bjorke said:
E.g., Jackson Pollack's works are considered content-free and safe for any bank, hotel, or corporate reception area.

I don't disagree but am I alone in seeing the irony? That was hardly the case when abstract expressionism was new and radical.

David H. Bebbington · Mar 18, 2007

Ed Sukach said:
I found Simon Norfolk's work to be intensely moving.

It will always cause me to wonder about the human condition when someone who does NOT "approve" of a work, or body of work, will expend so much time and energy screaming and ranting against it. There is a saying, often used in Gallery exhibition:
"Oh ... you don't LIKE the photograph ..? Look! Here is another - just a meter or so down the wall" (applicable to this media: - "or on another site ...").

The series of Normandy Beaches, Gold, Utah, Sword, Omaha - particularly struck me... scenes of beautiful tranquility - in sharp contrast to the indelible mental images we carry, evoked by their very names, of some of the most violent carnage ever caused by man.

Pleasant, "nice" images? Not necessarily, especially not when considered in the context of their titles/ description. They ARE useful in bringing me a tiny bit closer to reality, and as a innoculation against a delusionary concept of the world.

"Political / apolitical"? Ill leave that for others to decide. "Politically BIASED? - No.

Thanks for your response, Ed. 2 questions if I may:

a) Does the Normandy beach picture series have any meaning at all unless you have the picture captions and a knowledge of the history of WWII, which may in turn require you to be of a certain age?

b) Mentally compare Simon Norfolk's pictures (and wordy explanation) with the iconic blurry Robert Capa picture of an infantryman making his way through the water towards a Normandy beach. I feel there is a difference here of several billion miles between Norfolk's and Capa's respective ability to express themselves in visual terms. I am not at all perturbed by by the idea that artists may hold political views - I do believe very strongly that visual artists can and should express themselves through visual means, which are ultimately much more powerful, and I feel that Simon Norfolk is an outstanding example of a "visual artist" whose ability to express himself in this way is exceedingly weak.

Regards,

David

David H. Bebbington · Mar 18, 2007

The Capa picture I referred to is this one:

TheFlyingCamera · Mar 18, 2007

Ray Heath said:
g'day all
The, you would also have an example of lack of control, would such an image speak more of fuzzy kittens or more of some failing and lack decency in the photographer

That would all depend on the context in which the photo of the fuzzy kitten was displayed, and ditto for the splattered one. This would be so totally dependent upon context that it is impossible to gloss the image without a predetermined context.

weststarflyers · Mar 18, 2007

I agree with David H. Bebbington. The images of Mr. Norfolk need too much explanation in order to be understood. After reading the interview I felt a great deal of "defensive attitude" shouting his little or big knowledge in our faces.
As individual images some are interesting and some quite boring for his subject matter.
I am still wondering about his Paul Strand comments and if he could play Prokovief instead of Rachmaninoff without boxing gloves.

Ed Sukach · Mar 18, 2007

David H. Bebbington said:
a) Does the Normandy beach picture series have any meaning at all unless you have the picture captions and a knowledge of the history of WWII, which may in turn require you to be of a certain age?

As much meaning as does any beautifully done Land - or Sea ... or "Beachscape." Does the title INFLUENCE the interpretation of the image?" Certainly. It is nearly impossible to view any piece of art without some influence from the title, description, accompanying text, position in the gallery, ... gallery location in the town/ City. Even the label "Untilted" has some effect.

"Without a knowledege of the history of World War II..."
Interesting question. I'll ask that of the next minimally mature individual I encounter that has NO knowledge of WW II.

b) Mentally compare Simon Norfolk's pictures (and wordy explanation) with the iconic blurry Robert Capa picture of an infantryman making his way through the water towards a Normandy beach. I feel there is a difference here of several billion miles between Norfolk's and Capa's respective ability to express themselves in visual terms. I am not at all perturbed by by the idea that artists may hold political views - I do believe very strongly that visual artists can and should express themselves through visual means, which are ultimately much more powerful, and I feel that Simon Norfolk is an outstanding example of a "visual artist" whose ability to express himself in this way is exceedingly weak.

Again, an admonition for me to do something. I HAVE evaluated the images in question. Are you asking for MY opinion of "Which is More EXPRESSIVE ? - Capa's or Norfolk's work?"

I have been familiar with Capa's images of "D-Day". I can't recall the exact title of this particular image. Would the title of "D-Day" influence my interpretation? Of course ... It would be an entirely different photograph entitled "Training for Amphibuous Landing - Coast of California". It does require some knowledge of WW II, as does Norfolk's images.

Who is MORE expressive? Each has its own approach ... to ME (note egocentricity) it is Norfolk's - mainly because of the unexpected emotional content.

I think Norfolk's work is VERY strong!

vet173 · Mar 18, 2007

Bjorke,
Thanks for the reply. I went back and reread the beginning. I think I will stand by my statement. The surface would be as you stated but I think the undercurrent would be as I suspect. I don't make my livin' at this. My context is usually the same" It was purdy so I took a pitchture" I Have done photographs that I wanted to draw out a certain emotional response. I have never taken a photograph with the intent of making a political statement. The last thing I would do is tell my context. If you don't get it, it's because I failed. Simons' work is very good. As DHB said words have to be added to make the connection. I find that an add on for the lack of CONTEXT information in the photograph shows the maker himself saw the disconnect. If he can't even get his own context on film how is he going to evaluate mine? (poorly, that's how) With this individual I perceive that he wants to know if my context fits his agenda. There is no way that a person with a passionate agenda will not filter thru it. I know I do it. My only agenda in photography is I haven't taken a shot for a week and I'm having withdrawals.

mark · Mar 18, 2007

Such as: beauty, the simple act of being, love, etc...

Honestly Bjork, you can't be that dense.

I do not deny the impact of politics, nor the importance of politics in art.

But, if one only focuses on politics and rants against the others, they begin to sound like broken records.

As I said his images were quite successful, if you could get past the mental masturbation he wrote.

firecracker · Mar 19, 2007

Stunning images! They don't need words. Small caption works, but it's not really necessary to me, personally.

Meanwhile, we as the audience can get more "text" from journalistic reports and history book from various sources. For reading, I would suggest British journalist Robert Fisk's latest book, "The Great War For Civilization."

firecracker · Mar 19, 2007

I must say that the issue here is about the independence and solidarity of one's motive, intellect, and other things. "Politics" seems too insufficient of a word to describe what Simon Norfolk is talking about, although that's his word.

He is no Robert Capa because he doesn't side with the powerful, and he questions about it with his passion.

Michael W · Mar 19, 2007

firecracker said:
I must say that the issue here is about the independence and solidarity of one's motive, intellect, and other things. "Politics" seems too insufficient of a word to describe what Simon Norfolk is talking about, although that's his word.

Yes, as someone wrote earlier the word 'politics' can be confusing & might make people think they are being asked to declare whether they vote conservative, liberal or whatever. My understanding of his meaning, after reading the interview, is that when he says he wants to know what your politics are he means that he wants to know what are the beliefs that drive the artists' work. The images that Bjorke posted (fluffy animal, classical art studio with nude) are representative of certain value systems. Creative production does not happen in a vacuum.

jstraw · Mar 19, 2007

Indeed, the word "politics" means far more than overt opinions about governmental and economic workings.

Roger Hicks · Mar 19, 2007

jstraw said:
Indeed, the word "politics" means far more than overt opinions about governmental and economic workings.

Thanks for putting it so neatly. A lot of the hassle here seems to be down to an extremely (and to me, extraordinarily) narrow definition of the word 'politics'.

Cheers,

R.

Politeness versus Photography

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