The four greatest photographers?

[removed account4]

atget

kertesz

karsh

garo

 

[Wigwam Jones]

Gene Meatyard
Brassai
Walker Evans
Julia Margaret Cameron

 

[Jim Jones]

Finally, someone beat me to Karsh.
Ruth Bernhard for nudes.
Ansel Adams for the grand scenery.
Edward Weston for being Edward Weston.

 

[c6h6o3]

Eugene Atget
Alfred Stieglitz
Edward Weston
Frederick Sommer

To me, the 4 greatest photographers, in that order...

 

[tim atherton]

So, to you capturing the image is all that matters?
That's all there is to being a photographer?
All of the time, effort, skill, successes and failures that go into learning how to print don't matter to you?
Are you sure? Why?

Well, you had to qualify it - "photography/printers" - which in itself says a lot

Capturing the image is the most important - without that you have nothing.

There have been many good and great photographers who have also been good printers and printed there own work.

There have also been many good and great photographers who haven't.

Does it matter that Cartier Bresson, Walker Evan's, Salgado, Capa, Misrach and many many more didn't print their own work if they didn't have to? Some of the greatest photographs of all time have been printed by other than the photographer.

A good photograph - the initial capture as you call it - may possibly be made better by good printing (whether by the photographer or a master printer) - yet it will often also stand up to being printed on cheap newsprint and still remain a good or great photo. But the best printer in the world can't make a good final print out of a bad photograph - silk purse and sows ear time.

Capa's D-Day photograph or his Dying Spanish Soldier are good examples of this. A kid in high-school could print the D-Day photo on toilet paper and it would still have a strong visceral impact.

Now, yes some good photos are improved by the printing (either in quality or method/materials) but it really doesn't matter who prints it)

Some good and great photographers aren't good printers and know that - it simply makes sense to hire a master printer. Some are good printers, but they know their time is far better spent making photographs than printing them - again, so they hire a master printer. But a printer who is a bad photographer is just that...

So no, it doesn't matter who prints it and yes, the initial photograph - the original matrix - negative or transparency - is primary. Without that you have nothing

 

[jd callow]

I was going to jump in here with enough witty palaver to surely earn the ire of Mr. Callow but, I will try to stay on topic. John, isn't it the work one ought to consider and not the biography. This is certainly true of many writers I admire. I love to read them, but I certainly wouldn't want to live with, or like them.
Celac.

I think that what we create and who we are are or can be inseparable. When we look at an artist's work in context of time/culture we come up with something entirely different then when the context is the artist and the work. Pollack and Warhol do much better in a cultural/time context then they do in context with who they were and what made them tick. Beckmen and Van Gogh do well in both but exceed when you narrow it down to just who they were and their work. You can love In Cold Blood and think little of Capote, I would try and push myself to take a different approach. I also have seen enough work to know the stuff you see in the books, museums and galleries is not always as unique as we are lead to believe.

<edit> and I'm also deliberately being a contrarian (I do love the established as well as the others.)

 

[Peter De Smidt]

Karsh
Wynn Bullock
Strand
Jock Sturges

 

[pelerin]

I think that what we create and who we are are or can be inseparable. When we look at an artist's work in context of time/culture we come up with something entirely different then when the context is the artist and the work. Pollack and Warhol do much better in a cultural/time context then they do in context with who they were and what made them tick. Beckmen and Van Gogh do well in both but exceed when you narrow it down to just who they were and their work. You can love In Cold Blood and think little of Capote, I would try and push myself to take a different approach. I also have seen enough work to know the stuff you see in the books, museums and galleries is not always as unique as we are lead to believe.

<edit> and I'm also deliberately being a contrarian (I do love the established as well as the others.)

John,
I will get back to you tomorrow. It's late enough here that, once I get past 3 sentences, grammer fails me utterly. Aside from that I like that stuff you have up on fleabay now... do those flatfiles contain any little itty bitty jewels that might fit into an apartment out here in real estate challenged CA?
Celac.

 

[John Bragg]

In no particular order,
Marc Riboud,
Frank Hurley,
James Ravilious,
Salgado.

 

[André E.C.]

Paul Strand
Edward Weston
Minor White
Paul Caponigro

Cheers

André

 

[catem]

I don't think I believe in "greatest" or "most important". Certainly not if it's only four.

Give me a (much) longer list and I might come up with something.
Cate

 

[doughowk]

Brett Weston
Ansel Adams
Ed Weston
Minor White
In that order: Brett as a pure photographer, Ansel for aspiring to his grandeur images, Ed for seeing beauty in everyday objects, and Minor for thinking about.

 

[Ole]

Knut Knudsen (for "discovering" Norway)
Josef Sudek (for his intimate studies of everyday things more than the grand vistas)
Julia Margaret Cameron (for curing my obsession with technical perfection)
Ansel Adams (for giving me the obsession it took Cameron to cure me of).

 

[Bob Carnie]

Nice Thread Tim

here are my choices

August Sander
Brassai
Brett & Edward Weston
Salgado

 

[Jim Chinn]

I think 4 is to small a number considering how many different critieria one can base a decision on. I'll just throw out the ones that strike my fancy today as important to me as well as giants of the medium.

Brett and Ed Weston
Kertesz
Eugene Smith
Harry Callahan

There are probably at least 20 more I could rotate in and out of the list.

 

[ineffablething]

Whoever you want (but not just printers) - bear in mind a photographer is a person who takes a photograph. Some print their own work, others don't. It really matters little either way.

Are you kidding?

 

[davetravis]

Capa's D-Day photograph or his Dying Spanish Soldier are good examples of this. A kid in high-school could print the D-Day photo on toilet paper and it would still have a strong visceral impact.

So no, it doesn't matter who prints it and yes, the initial photograph - the original matrix - negative or transparency - is primary. Without that you have nothing

A strong visceral impact on toilet paper? Right, just as you were flushing it.
That's my point. The quality of the final print is all that matters, not just the image itself. People never see the negative/slide, only the final print. A poor print will recieve a poor repsonse, a great print will receive a great response.
So I would argue that without a great print, the primary image is nothing.
To me, the print matters more, because it is the only thing that lasts, in the mind of the viewer.
I believe the photographer/printer is therefore in a different category than just a photographer.
So my favorites are:
Photographer/Printers: Adams, Porter.
Photographers: Muench, Fielder.

 

[michaelsalomon]

most important to me

Eliott Erwitt
Michael Kenna
Ansel Adams
Sebastiao Salgado

 

[SuzanneR]

Hard to keep a list to just four photographers, but for me...

Alfred Stieglitz
Robert Frank
Andre Kertesz
Gertrude Kaesebier/Julia Margaret Cameron (ok.. kind of a tossup for me here, and I will also mention in a similar vein the very obscure Chansonetta Stanley Emmons)

ok...ok.. four it just too small a number!! There are several others I'd consider important to me, and to photograpy in general!

 

[BradS]

Great thread. I'm having trouble even thinking about my favorites - let alone the most important. I do notice that my favorites have evolved as I have matured. At present, just off the top of my head, my list of favorites right now...


Leo Holub
C.S. Bull
the FSA photographers (yeah, there's more than four)...
Stephen Shore


I like how these photographers use the craft to say something about humanity. They each in their own way, make me think about our shared common and pathetic existance.

 

[blansky]

D.J.Wright
Joe Zeltzman
Monte Zucker
Don Blair




Michael

 

[Q17]

Trying to narrow it to four who (I think) have had the greatest impact on photography in general...

Stieglitz
Adams or E. Weston (I can't decide)
HCB
Eggleston

My four favorite photographers are mostly a different set and changes from day to day. Currently, I'm looking at

Vaclav Chochola
HCB
Robert Frank
Ralph Gibson

Great thread! I'm enjoying it!

=michelle=

 

[tim atherton]

Are you kidding?

not in the least

 

[Artur Zeidler]

So, to you capturing the image is all that matters?
That's all there is to being a photographer?
All of the time, effort, skill, successes and failures that go into learning how to print don't matter to you?
Are you sure? Why?

This question is invariably raised by those who are either much better printers than they are photographers or by those who are obsessed with the technique and craft of printing.

But it never seems to be raised by any of the good or respected photographers in question.

 

[HeliH]

Yousuf Karsh
Lee Miller
Josef Koudelka
Julia M. Cameron

and
Sally Mann