Why did Gary Winogrand photograph that? NYT article

jtk · May 13, 2018

The only problem I have with Winogrand is his "street photographer" identity.

I don't totally reject "street photography" but I don't find much of it interesting. More to the point it's a kind of kitsch. Like lava lamps.

In Photrio Media I see several current, wonderful "street photographers" ....

... but a more respectful designation might be "candid photographers" because that would underline their merit as "photographers" or photo artists rather than nostalgic entities. IMHO

chip j · May 13, 2018

Yes, I shoot in the street all the time, but I don't shoot people, just things in the street. So I guess I'm not a "street photog"?

Chuckwade87 · May 13, 2018

jtk said:
The only problem I have with Winogrand is his "street photographer" identity.

I don't totally reject "street photography" but I don't find much of it interesting. More to the point it's a kind of kitsch. Like lava lamps.

In Photrio Media I see several current, wonderful "street photographers" ....

... but a more respectful designation might be "candid photographers" because that would underline their merit as "photographers" or photo artists rather than nostalgic entities. IMHO

I was under the impression that "candid" was an integral part of "street" photography?

I don't understand why his Identifier as a street photographer really matters.

Eric Rose · May 13, 2018

pentaxuser said:
David, it may just be me looking back at early APUG, as was, with rose-coloured spectacles but I cannot recall the forum exhibiting the kind of "extremes" we are now seeing in a whole range of threads.

pentaxuser

Sorry pal APUG had just as many "extremes" as we do now. In fact I think it might have decreased a bit. The ones that liked to stir it up are still doing it and the old s@$t disturbers that left have been replaced by new ones.

Eric Rose · May 13, 2018

I agree with PRJ 100%. I don't hold Winogrand in very high esteem. Sure he had some stellar photos however they can only be called happy accidents. Given his MO and the tens of thousands of images he made his batting average was pretty bad.

jtk · May 13, 2018

Chuckwade87 said:
I was under the impression that "candid" was an integral part of "street" photography?

I don't understand why his Identifier as a street photographer really matters.

Don't worry about it. Just my opinion.

Ko.Fe. · May 13, 2018

As usual every thread about Winogrand turns into his bashing by some theoretics who never took picture on the street like he did.
And not only on the street. He didn't even called himself as street photographer. But this clueless assumsion is going for decades now.
My biggest photo book is his book. It is great documentary. My mother in law took it for study recently and liked it as well.

Chuckwade87 · May 13, 2018

Eric Rose said:
I agree with PRJ 100%. I don't hold Winogrand in very high esteem. Sure he had some stellar photos however they can only be called happy accidents. Given his MO and the tens of thousands of images he made his batting average was pretty bad.

There are plenty of Players in the Baseball Hall of Fame with terrible batting averages. (Roger Bresnahan)

Happy accidents, what ever you want to call them, there still generally regarded as "great".

Oh well, I don't think anyones opinion on here (photrio) will affect Public Opinion of or the chequered legacy of Gary Winograd.

jtk · May 13, 2018

I don't care in the least about the man, my comments only apply to photography.

CMoore · May 13, 2018

I KNOW many more names of Men Than Women, that is the only reason for the names below.

Most of it is just timing.
How big of a deal would Ansel Adams be today, or Andy Warhol, or Picasso, or Eric Clapton, or Stevie Ray Vaughn.?
Guitar Centric rock&roll does not dominate the record collections of todays youth. It is Lady Gahgah, Bouncy, and Taylor Swift.....(if i have the names right).....those plus the names of "Rap Stars" that do not even sound like "real" names.
Guitar Gods are not the music standard that they were when The Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin and Lynyrd Skynyrd ruled the venues of music of my generation.
By present standards, there were not many people doing what Winogrand did. How many "street photographers" (damn good ones) are there today.?.......Hundreds and Hundreds and Hundreds.
We are not even familiar with the names of "the best" photographers.
Talent AND Fame can be wickedly elusive. Kind of like a Tornado. It wipes out all the houses for 3 blocks, but inexplicably leaves the house of one lucky guy almost untouched; smack in the middle of a path of destruction and debris.
Just so happens that i like much of Winogrand's published stuff.

Theo Sulphate · May 13, 2018

CMoore said:
...
Most of it is just timing.

How big of a deal would Ansel Adams be today, or Andy Warhol, or Picasso, or Eric Clapton, or Stevie Ray Vaughn.?
...

But there's a fallacy in that thinking: before there was an "Ansel Adams look" or an "Eric Clapton sound", someone had to introduce it - viz. those people.

It's the same thing with "Citizen Kane": it introduced so many new concepts that we take for granted today, that when we look back at the original film, most people say "so what?".

jtk · May 14, 2018

Theo Sulphate said:
But there's a fallacy in that thinking: before there was an "Ansel Adams look" or an "Eric Clapton sound", someone had to introduce it - viz. those people.

It's the same thing with "Citizen Kane": it introduced so many new concepts that we take for granted today, that when we look back at the original film, most people say "so what?".

Agree about Citizen Kane (by which I mean Orson Welles more than that film). I don't think ANY still photographer has been as artistically significant as Welles.

And of course, I'm not thinking about pop-stars such as Clapton and Adams.

What "most people say" is of course irrelevant because "most people" are tuned out.

CMoore · May 14, 2018

Theo Sulphate said:
But there's a fallacy in that thinking: before there was an "Ansel Adams look" or an "Eric Clapton sound", someone had to introduce it - viz. those people.

It's the same thing with "Citizen Kane": it introduced so many new concepts that we take for granted today, that when we look back at the original film, most people say "so what?".

Perhaps i am missing your point, but.....I do not think i have ever heard anybody make that comment about Kane.
It is still, often, called "The Greatest Film Ever Made".
The same goes for movies like Casablanca and The Wizard Of Oz. People still buy those movies today. I do bot think anybody watches Casablanca and says So What.
Very rare would be the musician that, when played a Beatles Record, would respond with "So What." That is not the type of music that Young/Popular bands play today, but they look back on that music as the people that were their Mentors...the reason they started to play guitar, or (at this point) the reason THEIR Heroes started to play.

ReginaldSMith · May 18, 2018

I went to a Picasso museum in Paris a few years back. Along with noted paintings, there were "millions" of juvenile scribblings - like moustaches penned over magazine photos, little folded up pieces of paper with a scribble on it, sticks glued together, and other noodlings. In other words, art-detritis. But all of it displayed and curated as though each was a masterpiece. None of that, however voluminous it was, rendered him less of a master artist then we generally understand.

Just the photographes published in the NYT article, would qualify GW as an accomplished artist. So what if there are tons of rolls of junk film? Look at the way today's digital photographers spew through frames like machine guns just hoping something will show up in Lightroom as a useful photograph. Was at a meeting last night where a guy showed a picture of a couple totem poles and he said he took 150 images to end up with this boring photo.

Of course not everyone has any art interest in whatever they imagine street photography to be.

I sure like those photos!

removed account4 · May 18, 2018

ReginaldSMith said:
Look at the way today's digital photographers spew through frames like machine guns just hoping something will show up in Lightroom as a useful photograph.

people have been using auto winders for decades, ...
http://www.mir.com.my/rb/photography/hardwares/classics/nikonf2/filmbacks/index1.htm

jtk · Jun 14, 2018

ReginaldSMith said:
I went to a Picasso museum in Paris a few years back. Along with noted paintings, there were "millions" of juvenile scribblings - like moustaches penned over magazine photos, little folded up pieces of paper with a scribble on it, sticks glued together, and other noodlings. In other words, art-detritis. But all of it displayed and curated as though each was a masterpiece. None of that, however voluminous it was, rendered him less of a master artist then we generally understand.

Just the photographes published in the NYT article, would qualify GW as an accomplished artist. So what if there are tons of rolls of junk film? Look at the way today's digital photographers spew through frames like machine guns just hoping something will show up in Lightroom as a useful photograph. Was at a meeting last night where a guy showed a picture of a couple totem poles and he said he took 150 images to end up with this boring photo.

Of course not everyone has any art interest in whatever they imagine street photography to be.

I sure like those photos!

Reginald...as you may know from my comments on your Media, I admire many of those photos. You're much more of an artist than most. I wonder why you're so invested in "street" as an identity ?

ReginaldSMith · Jun 14, 2018

jtk said:
Reginald...as you may know from my comments on your Media, I admire many of those photos. You're much more of an artist than most. I wonder why you're so invested in "street" as an identity ?

All in all, I get more satisfaction from my street photos than the rest. I'm a humanist and find that the brief encounters DO have depth and value to me. To make eye contact, to exchange some words, and then to capture a photograph of other humans sticks with me. I remember every single person I have photographed for at least some small reason or characteristic. They are woven into the fabric of my life. Sure, I remember some "mountains" too, but not at all in the same way.

As you may have determined, I do NOT do "classic street" as practiced in the Henri-Cartier-Bresson method favored by most street photographers. I have actually almost no interest in the arms length, candid, hit-and-run shot. I almost never find those photos useful or prized to me. So, for the purest, they would not regard me as a street photographer. I am more like - "a guy who likes to meet strangers on the street, engage them, and photograph them." It's one way for me to stay connected to humanity.

Thanks!

jtk · Jun 14, 2018

ReginaldSMith said:
All in all, I get more satisfaction from my street photos than the rest. I'm a humanist and find that the brief encounters DO have depth and value to me. To make eye contact, to exchange some words, and then to capture a photograph of other humans sticks with me. I remember every single person I have photographed for at least some small reason or characteristic. They are woven into the fabric of my life. Sure, I remember some "mountains" too, but not at all in the same way.

As you may have determined, I do NOT do "classic street" as practiced in the Henri-Cartier-Bresson method favored by most street photographers. I have actually almost no interest in the arms length, candid, hit-and-run shot. I almost never find those photos useful or prized to me. So, for the purest, they would not regard me as a street photographer. I am more like - "a guy who likes to meet strangers on the street, engage them, and photograph them." It's one way for me to stay connected to humanity.

Thanks!

Yes. That's what I'd guessed. Thanks.

blockend · Jun 15, 2018

http://blakeandrews.blogspot.com/search/label/Winogrand

A whole bunch of intelligent articles on Winogrand.

cliveh · Jun 15, 2018

Wonderful.

eddie · Jun 15, 2018

ReginaldSMith said:
I am more like - "a guy who likes to meet strangers on the street, engage them, and photograph them." It's one way for me to stay connected to humanity.

I don’t do “Street” but I really appreciate you sharing your reason for doing so. There’s something very human in your explanation.

blockend · Jun 15, 2018

Winogrand made some incredible work, as good as it gets in street photography. However his cultural legacy is the volume of photographs he took, and the gnomic utterances with which he parenthesised it like a keep-out notice to stop people getting too close.

In the end, and arguably for a long time previously, the fine photograph was no longer the point. The thing was to keep shooting. Like Dennis Hopper's character in Apocalypse Now who shot film or no film because that was what he did, Garry Winogrand had run out of reasons even for himself. In the process he became a kind of ideal.

jtk · Jun 15, 2018

Flaneur: https://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2013/10/17/in-praise-of-the-flaneur/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flâneur#Photography

Ko.Fe. · Jun 15, 2018

ReginaldSMith said:
All in all, I get more satisfaction from my street photos than the rest. I'm a humanist and find that the brief encounters DO have depth and value to me. To make eye contact, to exchange some words, and then to capture a photograph of other humans sticks with me. I remember every single person I have photographed for at least some small reason or characteristic. They are woven into the fabric of my life. Sure, I remember some "mountains" too, but not at all in the same way.

As you may have determined, I do NOT do "classic street" as practiced in the Henri-Cartier-Bresson method favored by most street photographers. I have actually almost no interest in the arms length, candid, hit-and-run shot. I almost never find those photos useful or prized to me. So, for the purest, they would not regard me as a street photographer. I am more like - "a guy who likes to meet strangers on the street, engage them, and photograph them." It's one way for me to stay connected to humanity.

Thanks!

D for you on HCB. Looks like you watched some of his pictures and made some false assumptions about his photography. Now read his and about him books and watch interviews and documentaries about and with him. He was and he is humanist. He did talk, he knew about people and he even knew sometimes what happened to them after he took the picture. You are on the stage: bla-bla-bla, my I take your picture, feels good. Some of us are bla-bla-bla and picture is in the head, no need to share it and no way to share. We can't share something deep. Or we share so-so street portrait. Boring and irrelevant to person story. But HCB knew how to.

ReginaldSMith · Jun 16, 2018

Well, at least it's not an F.

Why did Gary Winogrand photograph that? NYT article

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