Yale 2017 MFAs - Oh, the ennui

nmp · Aug 20, 2017

GregW said:
I really find the premise of this 'critique' to be really tiresome. It literally makes me tired to read this sort of dross. How the hell would you know whether these kids were spoiled and pampered? Just b/c they're at Yale? Kids just now venturing out into the world from academia and there you are yelling at them to get off your lawn.

+1

guangong · Aug 20, 2017

Having taught at one of those prestigious towers of higher learning until recently and compared with students in earlier decades with few exceptions they are spoiled and pampered. This is the generation in which everyone gets a trophy for being the best, mommy and daddy pay all of their expenses and bills and everyone gets an "A". During my last years (at an institution where tuition approaches $60,000/yr) my colleagues and I found it necessary to ask if everyone could read script. Basically, college is the new high school.

ParkerSmithPhoto · Aug 22, 2017

tim_walls said:
I don't even need to look at the link to know this is bunkum.
You judge students just starting out on their journey against great artists, and despair that they don't come up to snuff, even though they barely had time to learn their craft. And at the same time you have some deluded belief that art is something you can be taught, and that somehow a photographer from Yale (I'm guessing it's in the US?) should naturally have more talent than someone from L'viv Technical College.
In both these assumptions, you reveal yourself to be an idiot.

Gosh, Timmy! Tell us how you really feel.

Again, THESE ARE MASTERS OF FINE ART. From YALE UNIVERSITY. MASTERS, as in THE BEST OF THE BEST.

So, I have some "deluded belief" that art can be taught? Or, I'm an idiot because I'm judging them by comparing them to great artists, when they haven't had time to learn their craft? And from whom would they learn their craft, if art is something that can't be taught???

If you're going to call someone an idiot be sure not to make yourself look like one in the process.

Plus, it's bad form to pop off without even glancing at the material to familiarize yourself with the discussion at hand.

jerrybro · Aug 25, 2017

I think I said the same thing the last time I posted a reply to one of these threads, but I just don't get it. I see some well executed shots from a technical perspective, but a 5 year old with an IPhone can do that today. I see a perfectly clear picture of a tire track in the snow, hardly noteworthy to any New Englander. I know some people do not understand what the big deal is with some tree and mountain pictures taken by dead photographers decades ago, but at least they demonstrated some mastery of the tools and techniques needed to produce the output. A couple of these look like last mnute shots taken in submission to a late homework assignment.

Of course, I could be totally wrong.

Peter Schrager · Aug 25, 2017

Greg Davis said:
I think the real problem with Yale, and academic photography programs in general, is that they are making art for an audience of other academic photographers while ignoring nearly everyone else. The work is interesting to other people within their group and mostly lost on people outside. I see a whole lot of this at the regional and national conferences of Society for Photographic Education and in magazines like PDN and Ain't Bad.

Out of touch??...photography is an art not in a day week or 2 years of graduate programs

Patrick Robert James · Aug 25, 2017

Greg Davis said:
I think the real problem with Yale, and academic photography programs in general, is that they are making art for an audience of other academic photographers while ignoring nearly everyone else. The work is interesting to other people within their group and mostly lost on people outside. I see a whole lot of this at the regional and national conferences of Society for Photographic Education and in magazines like PDN and Ain't Bad.

This is what I referred to earlier with the "club" comment, although you put it in a much more descriptive manner. My club comment is basically just my observation over the years that if you ain't in it, you ain't invited.

I had never heard about Ain't Bad. I must not get out much....

removed account4 · Aug 25, 2017

when MAS did the large scale deadpan color prison inmate portraits a few years ago did he get recognized/ admitted into the "club"

ParkerSmithPhoto · Sep 7, 2017

Greg Davis said:
I think the real problem with Yale, and academic photography programs in general, is that they are making art for an audience of other academic photographers while ignoring nearly everyone else. The work is interesting to other people within their group and mostly lost on people outside.

The audience for great photographers like Adams and Strand is already small enough. When contemporary photographers work in this esoteric "inside baseball" style, people just tune it out. It's a bit sad, because although the galleries can push this stuff, they can only push so much, and many of these students who have spent huge amounts of money to be "educated" in the academic style of photography will suddenly realize that their art has less value to the average person than a good loaf of bread.

removed account4 · Sep 7, 2017

Greg Davis said:
I'm not familiar with that acronym or the images. Do you have a link available?

hi greg

michael a smith ( the ULF / azo / lodima ) person
IDK about 10-12 years ago ( i am searching for the link but can't find it )
there was talk/posts and links to giant color ink jet portraits he made of prison inmates.
they were impressive. i'll keep looking and see if i can find them.
personally, i like the pre 1920s aesthetic of non smiling ( almost grumpy looking / bored ) portraits
( im a fan of disfarmer too )

Peter Schrager · Sep 8, 2017

Greg Davis said:
Can you elaborate? Are you asking if I am out of touch, or graduate programs are out of touch?

Greg in no way am i saying you are out of touch. I agree probably more of an insiders club....

Yale 2017 MFAs - Oh, the ennui

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