Discussions are neither the turf nor the responsibility of the persons that inititiate them.
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Your photograph looks like a photograph to me. I never said all photos have to be tack sharp. I don't think anyone believes that photography indicates that a photograph cannot show selective focus. In fact, I believe, AA commented later in life that if you intend to throw a background out of focus, then make sure it is distinctly out of focus......
Chuck
(Emphasis added...) "True to the medium", like anything else subjective, is in the eye of the beholder. The medium of photography is very wide and encompasses many things from the daguerreotype to the gum print to the cyanotype, palladium, carbon, ambrotype, dye transfer, cibachrome and even the mundane f/64-style glossy, sharp gelatin silver print. The images can come from pinholes, soft-focus lenses, razor sharp super-mult-coated lenses or no lens at all. To pick one representation of photography from the long list of possibilities and declare anything else "not true to the medium" or "imitating some other art form" is a very narrow and naive view of the world, IMO.Whereas, in their view, the "pictorialists" of the day, were not being true to to the medium when they presented photography in a way that imitated another form of art.
To pick one representation of photography from the long list of possibilities and declare anything else "not true to the medium" or "imitating some other art form" is a very narrow and naive view of the world, IMO.
True dat.a narrow view of photography as art, absolutely. That was what they did and they did it well.
But I find it hard to think that in any way Ansel Adams proved his retraction wrong when Adams was nortorious for red filtered skies and excessive darkroom manipulations.
While Emerson's naturalism views were the precursor for the views of the f64 club's straight photographic renderings he did renounce these views toward the end of his career, stating that untouched photography was not art at all.But I find it hard to think that in any way Ansel Adams proved his retraction wrong when Adams was nortorious for red filtered skies and excessive darkroom manipulations.That is hardly a pure naturalism approach.
Katharine, thanks for filling in some blanks. Very interesting post.
A small point of order regarding Kerik's example using his image of the vase. I read it as an illustration of the confusion arising from assuming pictorialist is derived from technique rather than the resulting aesthetics and particularly the assumption that when the result isn't a realist aesthetic then it is probably trying to imitate a different medium, like say painting. But of course you may well have labelled the image quite knowingly. You've clarified the fact that there was never really incongruity quite nicely.
It is unfortunate this was so badly missinterpreted in the subsequent posts to Keriks.
Robert, I think you may have missed my point, which was that what Emerson retracted was the idea that tonal values could be manipulated by manipulating exposure and development. When Hurter and Driffield's paper was published, Emerson thought it meant that such manipulation was impossible, but Adams proved him wrong with his development of the zone system.
Katharine
Katherine, I was referring to Emerson's renouncing his views advocating naturalism, where nothing is used to manipulate the image. Like you say a mechanical process where the only control the artist has is framing and focus. And you are speaking to some of the methods that would help convince him. Thanks for clarifying that for me. I'm sorry I misunderstood you.Robert, I think you may have missed my point, which was that what Emerson retracted was the idea that tonal values could be manipulated by manipulating exposure and development. When Hurter and Driffield's paper was published, Emerson thought it meant that such manipulation was impossible, but Adams proved him wrong with his development of the zone system.
Katharine
Katherine, In Emerson's first treatise "Naturalistic Photography" He writes that a photograph should not be manipulated in any way beyond the natural occurring variables such as light and atmospheric conditions. In his second treatise 'The Death of Naturalistic Photography" he states that the artist should be allowed to contrive and design with photographic images. This clearly is advocating what the pictorialist of the day were doing, using contrived poses, soft focus lenses, dramatic lighting, negative manipulation. I think your description of Kerik's image as using only the materials of photography is more along the lines as to what Emerson was referring to in his first treatise than what he was referring to in his second. But technically you are right in that it can be both. Simply for the fact that you can argue that it is a contrived image and so it can't be natural. Many styles over lapped which have resulted in many a debate. After the secessionist the pictorialist welcomed almost all styles and this made it even more difficult to attach specific labels. No longer were the pictorialist held to the stringent aesthetic guidelines that was imposed on them as secessionist. This opened up a whole new world to the photographer and helped in developing some unique individual styles. In these gray areas where styles overlap you will always have contradictory opinions and it will continue to fuel debate with the usual conclusion of... you're both rightI too read Kerik's example as an illustration of the confusion around the term "pictorialist." I see Kerik's photo as a good example of a pictorialist photograph in Emerson's definition, meaning that it uses only the materials and techniques of photography to create something of beauty, something that can certainly be called art. I'm quite comfortable calling it a pictorialist photograph in that sense, but someone who thinks of pictorialism as something pejorative, like a fuzzy photograph or a photograph that's meant to look like a painting, might rather call it a straight photograph. The point is that it could be called either, and that the dichotomy that the thread started out with is really a false dichotomy. But you got that point, so there's no need to say it again.
Katharine (P.S. Thanks for kind words, guys)
Ah, I misunderstood then. I thought you were saying that Emerson argued against manipulating exposure and development on ethical grounds...not that it couldn't be done.
I frankly don't understand how anyone could have ever thought that it was impossible.
Katherine, In Emerson's first treatise "Naturalistic Photography" He writes that a photograph should not be manipulated in any way beyond the natural occurring variables such as light and atmospheric conditions. In his second treatise 'The Death of Naturalistic Photography" he states that the artist should be allowed to contrive and design with photographic images. This clearly is advocating what the pictorialist of the day were doing, using contrived poses, soft focus lenses, dramatic lighting, negative manipulation.
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