"Inadvertant" Art

In a previous post, I stated something to the effect that my justification for

purchasing a DSLR system was to record my family's history, not to create art.

My needs are to become a technically competent photographer. Certainly some

moments I am overloaded with just the technical aspects of capturing the shot,

i.e. sporting events. (Yes, I do consider many SI shots art.) On the other end

of the spectrum, there are events that give me more time to plan the shot, i.e.

prom pictures, Senior Portraits, etc. (Just for the record, I will be using a

professional photographer for the Senior Portraits along with my personal

attempts.)

 

 

Excluded from this discussion are my hobbyist endeavors at art such as flower

macros, landscapes, birds shots....

 

 

My questions: How much "inadvertant" art are in photos, such as family shots,

where a person just trying to get the technical aspects exposure, framing and

lighting right? Should I try to look at recording my family history as an

artist, instead of a technician?

<i>Should I try to look at recording my family history as an artist, instead of a technician?</i>

<br><br>

Happily, these two things are not mutually exclusive!

The art part comes first. In most cases the camera is making the exposure settings during family shots or the photographer is making half the call with aperture or shutter priority. The technician hat gets put on during post production sitting at the computer and printer.

You should do the best work you can. The "art" will either happen or not happen, and either outcome is equally valid.

Brian. I suggest you start looking at all you do is art.

Can someone explain what "inadvertant" means - whether it is English or not.

"Inadvertant"... essentially, accidental. Not on purpose.

Thanks .. we all learn "inadvertantly" day by day !

You can make "technique" a sticky web and you can also make considerations of "art" a sticky web. Either way you get ensnared and forget why you are making photographs in the first place.

 

"You should do the best work you can. The "art" will either happen or not happen, and either outcome is equally valid." -- Felix Grant

 

I like that a lot.

 

Don't worry about whether or not you are creating art, just strive to make photos hat clearly express, at least to you, your emotional intent and your understanding of importance of the moments in your family's lives. That is the meaning I read into Robert Capa's photographic advice "If your pictures aren't good enough you aren't close enough.' and also the old photojournalist's secret to good pix; "f/8 and be there." the f/8 is kind of irrelevant, but you must "be there" --alive to the moment, to make good photos. Worring about technique or worrying about whether it's art while you are clickign the shutter distracts and takes you away from where ever the "there" in a moment is.

 

What I wory about when I'm making photos, even snapshots, is whether there is anything anywhere in the frame that I find distracting from what I am really looking at.

 

The rest is just intellectual baggage.

 

After you shoot, then you edit ruthlessly. First throw out the bad ones, then throw out the almosts, and then start paring down the good ones. Once you get down to 2 or 3 really ones that are hard to differentiate between, stop.

With the exception of "just intellectual baggage" I agree with Ellis.

 

I think the "art" label has to do with ego...it's applied today in order in order to inflate. A family photo has inherent merit of some sort... applying the "art" label suggests personal insecurity, doesn't just add an intellectual burden. It's similar to "artists statements" next to work the "artists" fear we won't appreciate otherwise. The most hilarious examples have statements including the term "post-modern."

I find myself chuckling in agreement with John Kelly's words here... Perhaps the difference would be that I personally find the whole "art" label rather fun to play with sometimes... :) I mean, why not?

 

I have a little confession to make... My own little portfolio on this site - small and scraggy as it is - was primarily intended as a semi-parody (of sorts) of some of the more self-consciously "arty" stuff I'd seen on here. So I gave the pics "arty" titles - which were most amusing to myself and my friends - simply to see how people would react...

 

Does that make me big and clever? Nope. Did it make me laugh? Yep...

 

Is that so wrong...? :)

When I did design work as an engineer, art was the last thing on my mind when I was working. I was designing a solution to a problem that involved functionality, manufacturability, efficiency, durability and on and on. When I would complete a design (sometimes months of work), many times I would sit back and realize "this is a work of art". Now maybe it was a work of art that only an engineer could appreciate, but it was a work of art none the less.

 

So, if I am comfortable with the technical aspects and as Ellis stated "just strive to make photos that clearly express... [my]emotional intent and [my] understanding of importance of the moments in [my] family's lives", then the art, if it is there, will naturally fall into place.

I'll go against the grain.

 

I think some who think about art, study it, view it, and pay attention to it do so because

they're drawn to it. I also think doing so makes some people better photographers. Most

others will stay ordinary.

 

I sense some envy in comments I've read.

 

As much, if not more, ego can be found in the need to put artists (or those wanting to do

art) down as in the desire to be one.

Fred,

 

To my mind, whether something is "art" or not is simply a question of personal opinion and individual reaction. I mean, if someone finds any of my photographs to be "art" - whether they have highly-amusing-to-me titles or not - well, that's just fine with me. Glad to be of some artistic service, and all that. If not, well, so what...?

 

Ultimately, it's up to the viewer to consider whether a photograph is "art", or "ordinary" or anything else... The "artist" can only present his work, as he chooses.

 

People may study "art", strive to make "art", and present their own work as "art" of course... This may or may not make their photography more interesting to individual viewers.

If you want Art, visit an Art store, or a museum. What do you see ? Then with your camera while you are gazing through the viewfinder try your best to recreate what you saw in the Art store or museum.

What about the official Art Hat? http://www.delmonicohatter.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=CTGY&Category_Code=B&source=adwords#4&campaign=Berets

Paul W, if it wasn't "wrong" would we want it? :-)

 

Where's the "art" in just plain fun?

"...ego can be found in the need to put artists (or those wanting to do art) down as in the desire to be one."...Fred

 

The promiscuous use of the term has destroyed its meaning (see "postmodern" and Hobby Lobby). Poor "art," it forgot to retain a trademark attorney to defend the brand.

 

I don't "put artists down"... they are becoming extinct. I've met a few grizzled survivors, admire them.

 

What happened to "photographer?" Isn't that adequate?

John--

 

You've made clear that the promiscuous use of the term "art" has destroyed its meaning

for you.

 

I'm glad it hasn't for me.

 

I use the term "photographer" in many instances and "artist" in other instances, with some

overlap.

I think there might be a perspective issue here.

 

When art is discussed from an academic point of view, the discussions quickly devolve into

conclusions about its meaninglessness. That's when it's all about "the art world" (whatever

that means), history books, schools of art, periods of art, Bauhaus this and Schmauhaus

that, this or that critic and their stodgy ideas, this curator, that gallery, this museum's

history of showing what not, and on and on.

 

"Art" is mostly meaningful to me from the inside. I find it simple. Monet's Haystacks = art.

Weston was a photographer who was an artist. Man Ray, great artist. So I like to go to

museums and look at Picassos and Monets and see how they treated composition and light

and absorb that and allow it to seep into my photography. I like to consider Man Ray's kind

of expressionism and surrealism and allow it to influence me when I am thinking about my

own photographs. That doesn't mean when I am clicking the shutter I'm thinking about

whether I'm creating art. That would be a distraction. But when I sit around talking with

friends who are photographers or laying in bed thinking about my own work, I think about

these things and it informs my overall approach to making images.

 

I think if I were to get stuck in academic readings and thinkings about art to the point

where I had to declare art extinct or meaningless or if I ignored all of it completely, I'd be

prone to remain fairly shallow in my own work.

 

I believe, in many cases, resorting to statements such as "art is meaningless," "art is dead,"

"art is anything you call art," "art has been destroyed by dadaists or post-modernists" is

simply an excuse for laziness and for not facing oneself and not pushing oneself to go

deeper. No, not all photographers need to be artists. But to allow curators and art

historians and books and articles and those who use the term "artist" promiscuously to

make extinct something so rich is unfortunate.

Chance is important in any art or science endeavour. Inadvertant discoveries of

significant images are very possible in snapshots as well as the more studied (or

informed) visual conceptions. I agree that art is sometimes inadvertant. However,

perhaps even such successes probably favour the prepared mind.

 

When someone queries the approach to a well-received image, it is often necessary

for us to say "I hadn't predicted that result". It was inadvertant.

 

"To my mind, whether something is "art" or not is simply a question of personal

opinion and individual reaction" (John Kelly)"

 

Agree, John, but there are many physical (equilibrium of masses, chromatic

balances, other compositional factors) and psychological parameters (evoked by the

image itself, as created by the photographer (artist) by his choices) within the work

itself that define it as art. Independent of personal opinion and individual reaction.

 

" I believe, in many cases, resorting to statements such as "art is meaningless," "art is

dead," "art is anything you call art," "art has been destroyed by dadaists or post-

modernists" is simply an excuse for laziness and for not facing oneself and not

pushing oneself to go deeper." (Fred Goldsmith)

 

You might be interested in the perceptions of Phillipe Dagen, in "L'Art impossible"

(2002, Editions Grasset, Paris - not sure if it is available in English?) in which the

inutility (futility..) of artistic creation in contemporary times is addressed. Artists

have a reason to be frustrated (rather than simply lazy) when "Loft Story" gleans 7

million viewers on the same day (May 10, 2001) that an important book on art barely

manages to make 3000 sales (and ironically, to the delight of its publisher).

 

"When I would complete a design (sometimes months of work), many times I would sit

back and realize "this is a work of art". (Brian Winn)

 

Engineering design and research is responsable for a very large fraction of the

'artistic' accomplishments of man in the 19th and 20th centuries. The conceptual

process is ignored by Everyman, yet is one of the most beautiful examples of the

engagement of the human spirit and talent that we know. It is possible that one day

the underlying basis of such creations will be just as well understood and popular

with the public as much figurative visual art is today.

That Fred and others treasure the term, yet never try to explain in a way thats understandable by someone who doesn't treasure it..says that for them the term is magical : Zap, I'm an "artist!"

 

It's said (Fred?)that the ever-popular Greek ancients considered art inherently intangible...couldn't be painting or sculpture, could only be performance: song, dance, poetry, theatre.

 

Since WWII, the term has come to mean decoration rather than anything suggesting meaning or significance. That correlates nicely with the "post-modern" excuse.

 

Happily, for Arthur and some other contemporary-ancient-Greeks, "art" is present in engineering, science, mathematics...not just in it's traditional beret-wearing context. We can now honor those towering accomplishments with the "art" blessing. For thoughtful photographers like Arthur, the term is no longer restricted to the postwar domain of happy snappers, Ansel-wannabes, velvet-elvis-photoshoppers and their equivalents in other media.

John--

 

I'm afraid I've explained it over and over again although only briefly above. With you, it has

fallen on deaf ears. I have put considerable effort in several past threads to delving into

the subject with you. Consider the possibility that I've explained it numerous times and

that you are simply incapable of hearing it or understanding it or at the very least you are

unwilling.

 

When you haven't understood, you have simply changed the subject, avoided it, but not

asked followup questions or engaged me in a way that would show you wanted to

understand what I'm actually saying.

 

I've talked endlessly about significance, it's role in art and meaning, and I have told you

that, judging by your responses to those lengthy explanations, you continually avoid the

subject and miss the point. Your habit is to move on to bloviating about what you've read.

You don't allow yourself in. Your books and authors are of great value, your wealth of

knowledge and exposure enviable. They are also your defense and prison.

 

You are cynical regarding art. You have the capacity to get out there and make art. Your

history and experience, the cultivation of your craft is obvious, but you a) don't recognize

that you might be capable of being an artist and b) are way too stuck in your head and

prejudices to do it.

 

There are studios in Berkeley and Bay View Hunter's Point brimming with people making

art. They haven't become jaded by their backgrounds and knowledge or by a stilted and

out-of-touch academicism that tells them art is over.

Fred, I know what painting is, I know what photography is, I know what studios in Hunters Point are, and I know what "art" has come to mean for most people. However, I think your Greeks were right.

 

That the word has powerful and inexplicable internal importance to you is entirely fine with me. However, I think art, as distinct from the word, is what's magical... literally fey. We commonly see "art" almost never art, especially in photography...and as a result, we demean the real magical thing.

"we demean the real magical thing"

 

John, you may take comfort in using the royal plural, but this is NOT about US. This is ALL

about YOU. You demean it.

 

It is YOU who chose to put the word "art" in quotes in your first sentence just above, as

you didn't do with painting, photography, and studios.

 

You may, indeed, not know what "art" is but I'll bet the house you know what art is. You

are the one distancing yourself from it (by maintaining a disquotational stance toward it)

and dwelling on the word. If you want to understand art (not "art"), stop putting it in

quotes, literally and figuratively, and get yourself in touch with it. And try doing it through

your photography.