Timing. The type of work William Mortensen was doing had run its course in the public eye and it was time for photography to continue on. AA was at the right place at the right time, and had the talent and intelligence to be a unifying figure and take advantage of it...and take photography in a new direction. AA's vision has run its course, what is pure in today's photographic world? But no need to toss him in the rubbish heap, nor William Mortensen. Both are building blocks of today's newest work...whatever that may be.
Apparently people who buy calendars and coffee mugs prefer dramatic landscape to allegory.
People prefer what that they prefer, they generally know what they like and why they like it........whether it be coffee mugs and calendars or photographs to hang on the wall.
Will somebody shown me a genuinely good photo from Mortensen?
What I’ve seen is at best mildly charming kitsch.
The first time I saw Ansel Adams' photos, which were in a picture book on someone's coffee table, I fell in love with them. I had not heard of AA before that day, so reputation had nothing to do with my reaction.
On the other hand, I don't like Mortensen's photos.
I suspect that myriad of other people felt the same way. If so then this could be at the root of why Adams is more popular, which in turn could affect why Adams in better known.
I don't know about Mortesen but I think Adams was very good at promoting his work.
And Mortensen won the battle of wits, but lost the war.Ansel Adams engaged in a suscessful one man crusade against Mortensen and his work.
Ansel Adams engaged in a suscessful one man crusade against Mortensen and his work.
The original debates between Adams and Mortensen are available for reading over several editions of Camera Craft. Contrary to what is often written about some kind of epic battle they appear quite friendly, probably enabling both to build a following.
https://archive.org/search.php?query=camera+craft&page=1
Unfortunately for Mortensen, pictorialism went out of fashion, all over the world, not just in America.
He did not leave much of a technical legacy, only developing to gamma infinity for the purpose of expanding the range of skin tones in portraiture which has few followers. I have "Mortensen on the Negative".
Adams straight landscapes remain highly popular and his technical legacy extensive for those enthusiastic enough to follow his procedures.
Mortenson was up against Group f/64. A group made up of heavy hitters. Very much like an NHL all star team playing in the Olympics.
Being firmly in the AA camp, after reading the exchanges between AA and M, I sided with the underdog, M. Who are they to say we are photography, and you aren't?? M's and AA's work is so different, you can't compare them.
Mortensen's work brings May Ray to mind, or clowning of a life that surrounded them. Ansel's work brings to mind technical glow of his teachings, honest belief in trees, leaves, and waterfalls, supporting PR campaigns, and publications hardly any aspiring photographer ever missed.
As such, the latter wound up in everybody's face, mostly for noble reasons, but also on wall calendars. The former did too, provided you learned to appreciate his twists of nature ... and many did not.
All the same, AA's work starts off quick in popularity contest, then fades away once bullshit related to technical perfection, visualisation, all the summersaults of different developments have you end up sweating your way in the darkroom anyways, to get what you want, despite of everything else you procrastinated over. So, in a span of weeks or years, one goes from a WOW to a WHY,
Mortensen's work was often a meh at the start, but tends to grow in appreciation as time goes by, especially when one develops own understanding of composition, ways of compiling a scene into a powerful image (by whatever methods).
Both have their well deserved place in history of photography as an art, as well as a technical challenge. No shame in appreciating both at he same time, yet no way to compare them side by side without admitting they were indeed vastly too different.
Don’t compare him to Man Ray.
On a good day he was Man Ray from Wish.com.
I’m still looking for an example of an actual good Mortensen photo.
All the f/64 folks were already well-known photographers; and even trying to make a living on art photography without public grants was a dicey proposal. That's why Edward Weston had his portrait studio, and Ansel his commercial photo business etc.
Capitalizing on artistic ego is a different story.
I have an old Encyclopedia Brittanica volume from that era with a rabid f/64 manifesto by EW in it. All posturing. I wonder how much of it he believed himself. Besides, much of his own best work was more related to the anathematized "Pictorial" school
he was condemning. Doubt all that noise made him a penny richer.
Mortensen was all over the map, at times a fine Pictorialist himself; at other times trying just too hard to make artsified psychopathic content. A poor excuse for a Surrealist, if that is what he had in mind. But that kind of over the top thing has always occurred. My two cents worth. I just don't have much interest in him.
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Mortensen was all over the map, at times a fine Pictorialist himself; at other times trying just too hard to make artsified psychopathic content. A poor excuse for a Surrealist, if that is what he had in mind. But that kind of over the top thing has always occurred. My two cents worth. I just don't have much interest in him.
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