It’s a dynamic relationship.
Ansel was wise and lucky in pushing himself as an authority through writing, influential friends and works that was finely tuned to be just the right amount of new and old.
And he didn’t try to tamp down mounting deification of him, even if it involved his more mundane endeavors.
Not sure how AA & Mortensen fit in.
Really ??Paul Strand got a few pictures published in a quarterly magazine which around that time had 37 subscribers
I doubt this rocked the world of pictorial photography.
That happening is usually attributed to AA and his group seventeen years later in the articles linked above from 1934 onwards.
Mortensen was still publishing booklets in the 1950s, there is download book about him on this site:
https://repository.arizona.edu/handle/10150/641042
^^^ What he said. Especially if you read The History of Photography by Beaumont NewhallReally ??
37 subscribers. ??
I was under the impression that it was a widely read publication... and Alfred you as well known within photographic and art circles having was an influential fellow.The linked Ring, nyc and Boston camera clubs knew of him, known for The Steerage connections with Alvin Langdon colburn steichen, Clarence white and others, gallery 291, armory show rubbing elbows with Art salon types in the states and in England / Europe in other words he had influence, I’m sure he had quit a bit of influence in the photographic world at the time... it wasn’t just 37 subscribers who might have heard his views....
I'm still amazed that you said only 37 people payed attention to camera work, and that Steiglitz had no influence on photography ( which might just be a misunderstanding on my part) ...I believe the main debate between the purists and the pictorialists, including their technical methods, started in 1934 Camera Craft linked above , AA vs Mortensen. I don't have Beaumont Newhall's book but I believe he never reported it.
Compared to this any debate arising from Paul Strand's pictures 17 years earlier never gets a mention unless maybe you can make the case.
The figure of 37 subscribers is a estimate , see "Final years 1915-17" here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camera_Work#:~:text=Camera Work was a quarterly photographic journal published,purpose to establish photography as a fine art
Although Camera Work folded , Steiglitz later encouraged AA.
Yes John, misunderstanding, I did not say that, posts 373, 378, the link says 37 subscribers not readers, I just said Steiglitz had to close down Camera Work.I'm still amazed that you said only 37 people payed attention to camera work, and that Steiglitz had no influence on photography ( which might just be a misunderstanding on my part) ...
the debate between straight photography and pictorialists had been going on since the 1800s. if you look at the commentary surrounding people like Henry Peach Robinson and and others in in England and the States, it wasn't just Adams and Mortensen but it continued until then ( and now if you read any public fora like Photrio look at commentary in this thread ). photography has had a very interesting history to say the least and adopted by some people who also wanted to use it to be more than just the alleged mirror to reality. and if you look at sales of brass lenses on eBay selling for thousands of dollars, and people's current interest in processes like gum bichromate, cyanotype, plainotype, carbon printing, bromoil, crafting emulsions, mordancage, color photography and other "alternative to silver gelatin processes" and I would even say on can even put some types of digital photography in there too ... its not hard to see that pictorialism is live and well, and straight silver gelatin photographers, whether they are using a minox, Leica or speed graphic s are still doing their best like critics in the 1880s, and 1910, and 1917 and 1937 to delegitimize people that don't see the world of photography the same way they do. as a exposure and print without a lot of fluff.
sorry about that alan, was a bit confused by your post.Yes John, misunderstanding, I did not say that, posts 373, 378, the link says 37 subscribers not readers, I just said Steiglitz had to close down Camera Work.
My bad, I should have made clear I was only interested in the AA &M technical methods for making negatives, posts 364, 371 .In that regard , AA was better but Mortensen merits a mention in history books IMO. However, history books are mainly written by arts people.
...and sure a bit of hypocrisy seeing Adams fully manipulated his images in other ways,.
Yes, for sure AA was a "pictorialist" himself, just off on a different tangent from the earlier ones. And yes, Strand was much more straight forward in his picture making. BTW, Strand's rather fuzzy early photo of chickens in a barnyard is the best picture of those birds ever made.
Liking one doesn't preclude you from liking the other. I was one of the many photographers, of a certain age, drawn to photography through the majesty Adams depicted. I'm still a fan. But, as my image making interests evolved, I have come to appreciate Mortenson more than I had before. I'd gladly hang both of them in my home.
+1, comparing the styles of the two photographers is a waste of time. It is like comparing Rembrandt and Picasso.
He really did capture the intelligence, nobility, mystery and romance of the chicken like few others have.
Oh gosh, is this old thread still alive, or just still in the casket for viewing way too long, until Mr. Mortuarysen is finally put to rest once for all? Chickens ... Don't get me started. I had a pantheistic neighbor down the street who claimed he could communicate with the spirits of his dead backyard chickens. He finally moved away. But some of Mortensen's pictures certainly seem haunted by the spirits of dead chickens, so I can understand why his imagery is far less popular hung on the walls of typical American homes than Ansel's. People like to sleep at night.
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