What is beauty?

Ian Leake · Nov 17, 2008

Many people believe that art and beauty are inextricably linked - and that for art to be successful it must be beautiful. I find this argument compelling, even if I'm not convinced it's absolute. But everyone knows that 'beauty is in the eye of the beholder.'

So this is a two part question:

1) Do you think that it's important that your photos are beautiful?
2) Which of your photographs from this year is most beautiful to you?

I'll start. I believe that all of my successful photos are beautiful, because if I don't find them beautiful then I don't consider them to be successful. And the one from this year which is most beautiful to me is this one:

(there was a url link here which no longer exists)

Now it's your turn...

dpurdy · Nov 17, 2008

Beauty is a lame human concept. It is a dumbing down of an amazing experience of increased energy from coming into contact with something that is in some way important or vital to your existance. The interesting question is why do I have this feeling when looking at something (for instance a mirror lake on a mountain top). We just write it off as beautiful. but it doesn't answer the question of why does it have an impact on me. Of course if you believe in God and that God created beauty for the amusement and inspiration of humans then that is that.. beauty is outside of us. It is just something we see and enjoy. But I don't drink that coolade. Forget the word beautiful. If something strikes me as compelling and I am drawn to dwell on it and it gives me great pleasure to consider it, it is somehow nurishing my life.
Dennis

Andrew Moxom · Nov 17, 2008

Interesting thread Ian... While I can relate to your images having beauty, mainly because they are very sensitive and flattering images of attractive people. You reflect what is in front of you with great craftmanship and knowledge of your subject and process, and bring the best out of the models that you portray... Beautiful images do in your case result. For my own photography, subjects are not really about beauty or trying to convey anything about beauty. To me, I try to look at the world by capturing what speaks to me. What my senses see and emotions that are invoked is what makes me make photographs. For example, war photos can be horrific to view and beauty is certainly not the goal. They invoke emotions that speak to people deeply, and it's the photographers sensibility that makes the image work not necessarily beauty.

As for a photo that I made this year that is what I would consider most 'beautiful' to me was this one.... (there was a url link here which no longer exists)

Ian Leake · Nov 17, 2008

dpurdy said:
Beauty is a lame human concept. It is a dumbing down of an amazing experience of increased energy from coming into contact with something that is in some way important or vital to your existance. The interesting question is why do I have this feeling when looking at something (for instance a mirror lake on a mountain top). We just write it off as beautiful. but it doesn't answer the question of why does it have an impact on me. Of course if you believe in God and that God created beauty for the amusement and inspiration of humans then that is that.. beauty is outside of us. It is just something we see and enjoy. But I don't drink that coolade. Forget the word beautiful. If something strikes me as compelling and I am drawn to dwell on it and it gives me great pleasure to consider it, it is somehow nurishing my life.
Dennis

If I've understood you correctly, Dennis, you're saying that 'beauty' is the label which we give to something which gives us, "an amazing experience of increased energy from coming into contact with something that is in some way important or vital to your existence." Something which compels us to pay attention, gives us pleasure, and nourishes us.

I agree - except for the bit about it being a lame human concept. While the word is only a word, the thing it represents is far from lame.

By the way, that's a beautiful picture Andrew.

dpurdy · Nov 17, 2008

What makes it lame is that it has no real meaning. Beautiful is wellll... beautiful. Thanks for putting an o in your nourishing.

Ian Leake · Nov 17, 2008

dpurdy said:
What makes it lame is that it has no real meaning.

Can't the same be said for every word that we use to label an emotion? The word happiness is only a label, as is pain and anger and lust. But just because those words are just labels doesn't diminish the importance of happiness, pain, anger and lust in our lives.

removed account4 · Nov 17, 2008

ian,

i am not sure if my photographs are beautiful or something else.
they are probably the "something else" since what i may find to be
beautiful might be "interesting" to others
( "beauty" is in the eye of the beholder and all that )

good thread!

john

Ian Leake · Nov 17, 2008

John - I'd say that if beauty is important to a photographer (and judging by the survey responses that is an important qualifier), then the best they can do is make a picture which they find beautiful. Others may or may not agree that it's beautiful picture, but that doesn't stop it being beautiful to the person who made it.

As an aside I find your work very beautiful - especially once I learned to switch off the analytical side of my brain when I look at them - I don't try to understand, just to enjoy.

panastasia · Nov 17, 2008

Putting the psycho babble aside, with beautifully made photos of ugly subjects would the beautiful aspect matter much? Would it not be a successful photo if it didn't matter?

What we call 'art' is subjective. To say that "art and beauty are inextricably linked - and that for art to be successful it must be beautiful" is vague; the definition of art is obscure, we can say everyone is an artist in some way no mater what they create. This discussion can go in circles.

dpurdy · Nov 17, 2008

panastasia said:
Putting the psycho babble aside, with beautifully made photos of ugly subjects would the beautiful aspect matter much? Would it not be a successful photo if it didn't matter?

What we call 'art' is subjective. To say that "art and beauty are inextricably linked - and that for art to be successful it must be beautiful" is vague; the definition of art is obscure, we can say everyone is an artist in some way no mater what they create. This discussion can go in circles.

I thought you were going to put the psycho babble aside.

SuzanneR · Nov 17, 2008

Yes... I consider all of my most successful pictures beautiful. To me. Others are free to agree or disagree.

Beauty in art is very subjective. Beauty in the world, I believe, is far less subjective. There are extraordinary naturally beautiful places on this earth, and most of us can agree that they are beautiful.

Mind you, that doesn't mean all photographs made in such places are necessarily beautiful.

Not sure I've added anything to the thread... eventually, it goes around in circles!

Lee L · Nov 17, 2008

What Keats said when looking at the urn.

Lee

gr82bart · Nov 17, 2008

I like to take ugly, grotesque, shocking, unpleasant, morbid pictures. I find them beautiful too.

Regards, Art.

Maris · Nov 17, 2008

I try to make my photographs of high quality materials, processed carefully, and free of careless mistakes and obvious technical flaws. So, I suppose, they could be called beautiful things in their own right irrespective of the subject matter depicted.

From time to time I use subject matter that is popularly acknowledged as beautiful, butterflies, sunbeams, that sort of thing, so that the photograph says what it has to say. Ugly subject matter can be usefully expressive too.

What is a beautiful photograph; a beautiful photograph of a thing or a photograph of a beautiful thing? Examples could be found to support either, neither, or both contentions.

Ray Rogers · Nov 17, 2008

gr82bart said:
I like to take ugly, grotesque, shocking, unpleasant, morbid pictures. I find them beautiful too.

Regards, Art.

I have come to the conclusion that some people use words differently than I do!

Ray

dpurdy · Nov 17, 2008

"Beautiful" "Pretty" "Gorgeous" very limited as well as undefined concepts. Because we are trying to rein in and lable our feelings about life. What is more important than weak lables is feeling your feelings. Whether you like dead animals or lush flowers or naked girls or mountain peaks you are responsible for the feelings you have. A thing is not beautiful or ugly unless you create that feeling for yourself.
Dennis

phenix · Nov 18, 2008

I’m not looking for beauty in what I photograph, but for meaning. And the meaning calls for an idea, and the idea calls for an ideal. For me photography (art in general) is the subjective relation, we (artist and art consumer) can establish between reality and ideals due to the artistic image. Where is the beauty here? I don’t know, and I don’t care! Art is not about beauty, but could be about the ideal of beauty. And this is not the only ideal in art, some other being the ideal of truth, of good, of love, just name it. I don’t care about beauty, it’s just marginal, unnecessary. Should I chose between all these ideals, I think that the one of truth is the closest to my heart, while the ideal of beauty is one of the furthest (not that I avoid it - just don't care about).

Thomas Bertilsson · Nov 21, 2008

Sometimes when I admire a photograph I can't think of a better or any other way to describe it other than "beautiful".

I don't necessarily go for beautiful. I go for interesting. I try to photograph what's in my soul, what's in my head, and what gets my juices flowing. Sometimes that means beautiful, other times it means something else. If I react to a photograph emotionally, I think it's a successful photograph.

I'd like to take documentary photography as an example. Much of it describes very harsh realities. Many of them are shocking and outright make me feel sick. None of those are beautiful.

A very interesting thread, Ian, because it makes us think about what we're doing. Thank you for bringing it up!

- Thomas

Chuck_P · Nov 21, 2008

Very simplistic, I admit, but I don't like to make it complicated by attaching a "meaning" to anything I photograph-----I'm not wired that way. In my photographic efforts, I relate beauty to the print. Regardless of the subject matter and how I may have "felt" about it, if I cannot translate it to the final print, what good is it. I have a few successes but that's it so far. So, to me, I just simply want to make a "fine print" of whatever it is that I photograph and a "fine print" of mine, or anyone elses, is a thing of beauty regardless of subject matter.

sun of sand · Nov 21, 2008

I believe everything is beautiful
I think it has to be

I see it as a ranking -man-made- and so beautiful is really just the beauty of beauty (most beautiful)
Not the only
Problem is that people feel they know all the rest of beauty -to the point that it becomes boring and ugly-
unappreciated
and decide to focus only on the most beautiful for it seems to be unknowable

One day they see what they believed to have previously known
-completely overlooked-
and realize they knew very little

JBrunner · Nov 21, 2008

War, death, pestilence, etc. are not beautiful, but almost everybody will look at a car wreck, while not wishing it on anyone. Beautiful? No, not for a normal person maybe, but captivating. Photographs can be so many things, all of which are subjective. I'm led to thinking of ordinary and not so ordinary things well seen by a photographer, like EW. One of my favorites is the dead man.

"And what does anyone know of my past years work?
1300 negatives - 21,000 miles of searching. No, I have not done "faces and postures," except one dead man (wish I could have found more) and many dead animals; but I have done ruins and wreckage by the square mile and square inch, and some satires."

Edward Weston - 1938

Alex Hawley · Nov 21, 2008

Ian Leake said:
1) Do you think that it's important that your photos are beautiful?
2) Which of your photographs from this year is most beautiful to you?

I'll start. I believe that all of my successful photos are beautiful, because if I don't find them beautiful then I don't consider them to be successful. And the one from this year which is most beautiful to me is this one:

(there was a url link here which no longer exists)

Now it's your turn...

I'm pretty much with the status quo with respect to beauty and art. Its always baffled me why some revel with the most repugnant things under the guise of calling it art. That must be the "eye of the beholder" part of it.

I think if a photograph is beautiful, it will be successful. To be successful, it has to stand on its own without need to explain its subject or concept. If these things have to be explained, then its not successful.

Here's my (there was a url link here which no longer exists) so far. It looked beautiful to me but I wasn't sure if it would be successful. I was pleasantly surprised at the comments it drew.

Ian Leake · Nov 22, 2008

Occasionally we see beautiful photographs of beautiful subjects:

http://www.brooklynmuseum.org/exhibitions/annie_leibovitz/images/Leibovitz_Sig_335.jpg

More often though, beautiful subjects are transformed into boring photographs. But a photograph can be beautiful even if the subject is commonplace:

(there was a url link here which no longer exists)
(there was a url link here which no longer exists)
(there was a url link here which no longer exists)

And even photographs which show the horrific can be beautiful:

http://www-tc.pbs.org/wnet/wp-content/blogs.dir/4/files/2008/08/capa_essay_01.jpg

So for me, the question of whether a photograph is beautiful or not is a different one from whether the subject is beautiful.

Thomas Bertilsson · Nov 22, 2008

I disagree the horrific photograph is beautiful. To me there is nothing beautiful about that photograph. I feel only disgust. But my interpretation of a photograph is emotional. I seldom look at the pure aesthetics of it. We look at it differently, probably.

A photograph that moves me, because I experience it as beautiful - is beautiful to me. Another photograph that I don't experience as beautiful - it simply isn't. There's no rhyme or reason to it. It just IS one way or another - to me.

I don't think I belong in this discussion.

- Thomas

ilya1963 · Nov 22, 2008

As a photographer one learns to separate the subjgects beauty from the final result , final print is just not the same , we can not duplicate nature...we can try
_____________
Michael Smith wrote this , you may agree or not , you might like his work or not ...just read it and make your own mind :

"There is no right or wrong in this. The point is to follow your heart and to make the best pictures you can. Should they prove to be deeply moving, and should they someday join the great pantheon of art from the ages, so much the better. But that is not why one makes one’s pictures in the first place. Make your photographs when you are touched unbearably and cannot restrain yourself, when it is something you must do. Consider the finished print to be a bonus. And if you follow your heart, whether your photographs are successful or not, you will at least have had the pleasure of the experience of their making. That is no small thing."

"Art which has depth comes from the core—that part of ourselves where the deepest natural feelings of love and truth arise. Over half a century ago, Wilhelm Reich discovered that human beings have three layers to their character structure: the outer superficial layer where the veneer of politeness reigns, the secondary layer where the rage that we all possess is contained, and the core. People often talk about "taking off their masks." Usually, what they are referring to is the stripping away of the superficial layer and allowing what is underneath—the secondary layer—to reveal itself. When the rage and anger appear, they feel they have found the ultimate truth. They are unaware of the core, unaware that there is something deeper that remains after the anger and rage have been fully expressed. Much art today that is politically engaged comes from the secondary layer. This art expresses feelings that are often genuine, but art is capable of expressing even deeper feelings."

Here is a link to his "letter to a young photographer" , I know most people that commented here are familiar with his teaching and his work , but sometimes it is refreshing to reread it , ...

http://michaelandpaula.com/mp/letyoung.html

ILYA

What is beauty?

Are your photos beautiful?

All my successful photos are beautiful

Most of my successful photos are beautiful

Some of my successful photos are beautiful

None of my successful photos are beautiful

I don't care about beauty

Ian Leake

dpurdy

Andrew Moxom

Ian Leake

dpurdy

Ian Leake

removed account4

Ian Leake

panastasia

dpurdy

SuzanneR

Moderator

Lee L

gr82bart

Maris

Ray Rogers

dpurdy

phenix

Thomas Bertilsson

Chuck_P

sun of sand

JBrunner

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Alex Hawley

Ian Leake

Thomas Bertilsson

ilya1963

What is beauty?

Are your photos beautiful?

All my successful photos are beautiful

Most of my successful photos are beautiful

Some of my successful photos are beautiful

None of my successful photos are beautiful

I don't care about beauty

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