What makes Diane Arbus so good?

[Fred De Van]

Paul,

You Got it.

You got it as clear and as right as you could be,

Fred

 

[Fred De Van]

Spare photographers and photography from inclusion

"A body of work doesn't have to be comfortable nor ethical nor technically good nor well printed..... " What's left to make it effective? I can't agree with your assumption, EVERY photograph I see takes "us" where we haven't been before. That's the whole idea of photography, a slice of time in a place we can never revisit as seen through the artist's lens and eye... Ms Arbus's eye and creative gift was effective in much of her work but not all... The same can be said about others, W E Smith comes to mind with his late, some would say disturbing, work. Look at what they all left for the rest of us.... bless them all, we should be so productive...

Since I was a friend to Gene Smith I cannot state too strongly that his name does not deserve being trashed by its inclusion in this thread about THAT personage. I am sure he would question what body parts you use to see and think with. The comment which began this thread did not mention any real photographers. It was specific to one person whose major function was to interrupt the tendency of gravity to cause a Rollieflex to go crashing to the ground when there is nothing of substance to support it.

With some businessmen you tend to count you fingers after shaking hands. When Diane left the room you had to make sure your sensibilities remained intact.

How can you even begin to relate a warning to the world about the horrors of industrial pollution and mass poisoning of the ocean and a people, with perverted, intellectually and morally bankrupt exploitation, turned into a personalized freak show.

In all my 30 years at Time-Life I NEVER heard mention of Diane by any of the photographers, except in derision and as a tragic, distasteful, bad joke. We did not get to see the consumer photo magazines, even though I was on the board of PopPhoto (Ziff-Davis) foundation, we were somewhat immune to the pestilence which infected Pop Kulture.

Myself, Sally S. and Sonia K. helped print and hung Gene Smith's final show in NY, with Cornell Capa which was the beginning of ICP, International Center of Photographyhttp://www.icp.org/. I assure you that Gene poured his heart and soul into his later work. It was neither exploitative, nor was it a freak show.

Leave Gene out of it.

Arbus is a solitary and deviant space, construct/thing/myth. A reality not shared with sentient, mammalian, full function, life forms.

 

[Tony Egan]

I agree with Jovo and Goldie. As others have said in other posts your response to an image is often more a reflection of your beliefs and attitudes than the intrinsic nature of the picture or the beliefs of the photographer. In the late '70s when I first got interested in photography I borrowed 4 or 5 monographs from my university library. One was the Arbus Aperture monograph. It was a massive whack in the head for me. Astounding, intriguing, unique, unforgettable. At the time it was an antidote to the pretty and superficial. A pin in the balloon of naive nationalism. From my side of the book I felt the "freaks" had great dignity. It seemed apparent that this photographer engaged with subjects in their environment. I have since read many criticisms for and against but I still hold to my first responses to a photographer I had never heard of before opening the book. I can still remember most of the photo titles to this day from that first reading. No other photographer has had that effect on me.

Why is she "good"? She took many risks, personal and artistic. She presented ground-breaking material in her time. She was highly influential. As a seasoned professional photographer at a workshop asked my only yesterday. Did you take any risks today Tony? No risks, no good photos! I will never have the courage of Arbus but I will write those words on my darkroom whiteboard to encourage me to test a few of my own boundaries from time to time.

 

[tim_walls]

Since I was a friend to Gene Smith I cannot state too strongly that his name does not deserve being trashed by its inclusion in this thread about THAT personage. I am sure he would question what body parts you use to see and think with. The comment which began this thread did not mention any real photographers. It was specific to one person whose major function was to interrupt the tendency of gravity to cause a Rollieflex to go crashing to the ground when there is nothing of substance to support it.

With some businessmen you tend to count you fingers after shaking hands. When Diane left the room you had to make sure your sensibilities remained intact.

How can you even begin to relate a warning to the world about the horrors of industrial pollution and mass poisoning of the ocean and a people, with perverted, intellectually and morally bankrupt exploitation, turned into a personalized freak show.

In all my 30 years at Time-Life I NEVER heard mention of Diane by any of the photographers, except in derision and as a tragic, distasteful, bad joke. We did not get to see the consumer photo magazines, even though I was on the board of PopPhoto (Ziff-Davis) foundation, we were somewhat immune to the pestilence which infected Pop Kulture.

Myself, Sally S. and Sonia K. helped print and hung Gene Smith's final show in NY, with Cornell Capa which was the beginning of ICP, International Center of Photographyhttp://www.icp.org/. I assure you that Gene poured his heart and soul into his later work. It was neither exploitative, nor was it a freak show.

Leave Gene out of it.

Arbus is a solitary and deviant space, construct/thing/myth. A reality not shared with sentient, mammalian, full function, life forms.

So you like her, then?



This thread has had at least one positive outcome; I have no familiarity with Arbus' work whatsoever, but I've just Amazoned my order for Revelations and look forward to it arriving tomorrow. If she can provoke this much debate it must be worth forming my own opinion.


I was at the National Portrait Gallery and then the Photographers' Gallery in London on Saturday afternoon. I saw a lot of technically outstanding work - Gerhard Richter's 'photographic paintings' are really remarkable. But more or less none of it said anything to me, and asolutely none of it challenged my perceptions in any way. Other people will have reacted differently - and that is after all one of the joys of art - but for me it was an utterly uninspiring afternoon.

Anyone can do pretty; pretty is not what I want from art.

 

[Shan Ren]

Hmmm, next up a discussion of Joel Peter Witkin, Sheng Qi, the Gao Brothers, Sally Man, Nan Goldin, Andres Serrano and Richard Prince.

Fred, last time I looked I am sentient, mammalian and as fully functioning as someone at my age can be. One that can view, appreciate, and understand Gene Smith and Diane Arbus. People don't need to like the person to like the art, and if the derision of others was a factor in deciding who entered the canon then most of the artists in history would not exist. I mean, Caravaggio was pretty much hated by most around him. Does that mean his art should be ignored? As I said earlier, I doubt I would have liked Diane as a person (I have spoken with people who knew her), does that mean I can't, or shouldn't like her work, and Gene's?

 

[catem]

I don't think Arbus was ever a voyeur (suggested above), I think she felt herself to be as much of a 'freak' as anyone else, certainly anyone she photographed.

Put another way, she was able to show the common humanity of all those society labelled as 'freaks', especially at that time. The women with down's syndrome were both shut away from sight and infantilised, and her work was a counter-reaction to both those things. That's how I see it, anyway.

Occasionally, if you read her notebooks and writings about the women, her terminology grates a little. There's a much-cited reference to her description of the women as 'my freaks'. But if you look at the context, it is obviously said both with irony and affection. She also wrote, "I adore them". It seems as if it was, ironically, (given she took her own life not long after) a happy and forward-looking time for her.

I think the more of her work you see, the more it's possible to understand. If you see less of her work, and not in context, it is more difficult to appreciate. The exhibition & book 'Revelations' a few years back was one of the most important ones, for me, I've ever seen. I agree that the book is very much worth getting - the notes and letters give great insight into her motivations as well as her technical and creative journey.

Oh - and what makes her so good - it is to do with how much of herself is in her photographs. That's necessary for all art worthy of the name, I think.

 

[Bill Harrison]

Fred, Western thought is dualistic, in photographic history, Diane Arbus was one of the many points of reference that gives it it's dualistic "edge", Gene Smith is another. They are worlds apart, no doubt. I study Gene Smith's work, in a way, he's one of my teachers, I guess that's why he came to mind. His later work was disturbing, it had to be to be effective. Maybe Diane's work needed to be disturbing for hers to be effective, I don't know, I'm not a student of her work.... your buttons push so easily, I understand why, my friend. Beyond points of reference is emptiness.... Bill

 

[chgofrank]

I find it hard to believe that after all of this discussion no one has mentioned Susan Sontag's critique of Arbus in her book, "On Photography". Sontag's book came out in 1973 just a year after Arbus' big show at MOMA in New York. So the work was fresh. Sontag is very critical of Arbus. The gist of her critique is that Arbus' subjects as presented in her work are unconnected to any sense of compassion, social relations, or moral sense. Sontag devotes quite a few pages of her book to discussing Arbus and is a "must read" for anyone trying to figure out why they do not like Arbus' work.

The book helped me after 15 years of trying to figure out why Arbus bothered me. I think that Sontag's book is a good starting point to understanding the history and philosophy of photography.

 

[keithwms]

Sontag, here we go on Sontag... :rolleyes:

 

[msdemanche]

I have to jump in, or better still just fall into this discussion. Paul, I do not think you missed anything. The work caused you to think and react. That is just what it was for. I fully believe that what we do is capture images and at the same time we show the world some of ourselves. That can be dualistic, it can be the world that no one want's to see, or the world that we only think we see. Beauty is for the philosophers and I am no philosopher. Her work would have most certainly changed had she not taken her life, our vision changes, our sensitivities to the world change, our drinking, eating, sleeping habits all change. Our soul or spirit,or intuition or whatever you want to call it also comes and goes in and out of focus when we just take a leap of faith or rationalize. I hope you will just look at her and anyones work and just look. Other people often are the one's that decide if something is "important" or not, I try to just look at the work and are compelled or repelled, what I always hope to be is surprised. That surprise sends me back out to try and capture something and that helps pull my soul, spirit, intuition, and rational mind in and out of focus.
Stay surprised.

 

[Changeling1]

Call me a Philistine if you wish but I have never found anything in her work to make me want to give it a second look. She and a number of other photographers were the moment's darling of the "art" crowd and made me stop listening to the supposed experts in the field when they loudly proclaimed the newest wonder they had "discovered".

Flame suit on.

You shall be called not merely a Philistine, but an uncircumcised Philistine.

 

[Thomas Wilson]

You shall be called not merely a Philistine, but an uncircumcised Philistine.

And the Kool-aid drinkers shall unite...

 

[msdemanche]

Have I missed some inside joke. Are you implying that some of us are mindless followers of some sort of cult. I know I certainly am not.

 

[Mike Crawford]

London Exhibition

Don't think I will get involved in this debate, but London members may be interested to know a Diane Arbus exhibition opens this week in a Mayfair gallery.
Dead Link Removed
I think it's about 60 prints of her work.

Keep up the good work!

 

[keithwms]

Have I missed some inside joke. Are you implying that some of us are mindless followers of some sort of cult. I know I certainly am not.

Michel, recall the "ignore" technology that I described on the weekend :rolleyes:

But yeah, you are part of the cult of photographers-who-don't-instantly-dismiss-other-photographers-because-their-work-is-radically-dissimilar -from-their-own. That cult welcomes you warmly

 

[Paul.]

I thank you all for your time and insights though being called a trol when questing for knowlage is somewhat insulting.
I bring my own life experiance and baggage along with me when I view others art and inevitably it influences my oppinion. I have experiance of disability within my family all now sadly decieced and my photos of these relatives are very different to the dark brooding images I saw this past Saterday.
That Arbus was a troubled soul is evident by the manner of her death, I see those troubled thoughts in her art, I have yet to find the greatness or the enpowerment in her art.
Armed with your insights and oppinion I will revisit the show. Who knows what else will reveal itself.

Regards Paul.

 

[Toffle]

Armed with your insights and oppinion I will revisit the show. Who knows what else will reveal itself.

Regards Paul.

A wise choice, Paul. I think that many artists have deserved but have not recieved that second look you are granting Ms. Arbus. It may well be that you find that you are being too generous. Then again, it may not.

(And, no... I do not believe you to be a troll.)

Regards,

 

[dpurdy]

Arbus' influence is a fact. Not everyone has a positive response to it. The thing that troubles me in all walks of life is when people encounter an opinion that they don't understand or that is the opposite of their own opinion and they respond by insulting the other person.... they must be stupid to think, you'd have to be an idiot to want, you must be crazy if you think, those who think this are mindless lemmings... on and on. I wish people would just accept that they don't respond to something that someone else does and try using their imagination to understand why. Or move on to something they are more responsive to.

 

[Ian David]

I wish people would just accept that they don't respond to something that someone else does and try using their imagination to understand why. Or move on to something they are more responsive to.

Or, like the OP, ask other people who feel differently why they feel differently, which after further consideration may (or may not) result in a change of response.

 

[SuzanneR]

Or, like the OP, ask other people who feel differently why they feel differently, which after further consideration may (or may not) result in a change of response.

It can be instructive to reflect on a negative response to work. I've often found that when I allow myself some time to think, and to take a second look at photographs that, at first, I hate... then perhaps there's something I need to consider.

Arbus has been like that for me. At times, I dislike the notion that it seems to be all about her, but then her images will, at times creep into my head, and I'll think on them. And think on the nature of photography... and the ideas she explored. And what I don't like about her work, and what I do.

Her work should be given some time. And you don't always have to "like" something to find it intriguing or thought provoking. Sometimes, it will be more provocative if you initial reaction is... "hate it!"

 

[Colin Corneau]

It's interesting to hear many say her images are about her - undoubtedly true, but it seems substantive art also says a lot about who is viewing it.

What we feel in the presence of such images says a lot about what is going on inside us and that's worth considering.

Also glad to hear someone else make a comparison to Nan Goldin, for some reason I think of her images as somewhat similar.

 

[Shan Ren]

Suzanne's comment on not having to like something to find it thought provoking is a good one. I don't like a range of things, art, food, music, people. Doesn't mean I don't appreciate them, or like that they make me think/question things. Dislike, hate even, is an acceptable reaction to many things, even, maybe especially, Arbus. I think she wanted that reaction as a way of attracting attention. To herself or her subjects is open to conjecture.

There is a quote from the bible that I will now probably mangle. It goes something like "Be ye hot or be ye cold, for if you are lukewarm I will spit you from my mouth". It seems the best art does this, and should do this.

And a story related to me by someone the other day that may be relevant, an art dealer/curator had a contract to help maintain a large corporate collection. This involved regular rotations of work in office spaces etc. One day he hung a work in an office and one of the staff got upset and said get rid of that, it's awful. Long story short, work stayed. Eighteen or so months later it came time to rotate, same person said no, please don't take it, I really love it. Things change, taste changes, exposure changes us.

Paul, I hope you get to like Arbus, I find her work strangely rewarding. If not, hey, that's fine, then you will no doubt add others to what you like. Allow yourself the openness to be challenged by work. It's a good thing.

 

[msdemanche]

I am glad to see that everyone's comments sound more open to new opinions. I have a second year art student that will be presenting his emulation project in about 8 minutes, and it is on Diane Arbus. He is an individual that has dealt with disablity and he found Revelations the book and became curious with her work. I have encouraged him to seek out and capture in his photos his feelings of being an outsider. I guess that is why I spoke so much about one's soul. I am glad to see that we can all allow openness. When I view his works (my student) I will most certainly look for a qauality of fine craftsmanship that Ms. Arbus did not always maintain, and hopefully some sign of personal insight into the people he has photographed. It should be enlightening.

Michel

 

[Phillip P. Dimor]

Sort of like looking at Capa's 'last roll', over and over.. that's what popped into my head. You want to look but you don't.

 

[Phillip P. Dimor]

demanding that art should make you feel good doesn't make sense.

I like art that makes me feel something, whether it be good or bad. I agree.