Is There Beauty in Vulnerability?

<p>Lannie, on Kant</p>

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<p>his attempt to make beauty purely about rationality divorced from feeling leaves me cold</p>

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<p>With all respect, I believe you misread Kant, and with all modesty, me too, when you write:</p>

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<p>that the sense of vulnerability comes solely from the emotion that is evoked in the viewer.</p>

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<p>My fault, without doubt. I might not have been clear or complete enough to be understood. I'll try again.<br>

When I wrote about "vulnerability-of-the-viewer-that-makes-it-possible-to-see-beauty" I tried to get away from discussions on the "beauty-of-vulnerability" that doesn't seem to bring us much further. I admit it is your thread, so you decide, Lannie.<br>

In the moment you concentrate on the viewer and his readiness, ability, to see something we can call "beauty" I'm not, as you write, referring to emotion only, but doing exactly what you write should be done, looking at both the intellectual and emotional dimensions of the self.</p>

<p> The intellectual dimension of beauty is in my eyes both relative and objective.<br>

It is relative first of all in the sense that "beauty" evolves throughout history. The "beauty" of the naked women of <a href="http://imagecache2.allposters.com/images/pic/SSPOD/SuperStock_900-101416~Venus-Pudica-Affiches.jpg">Botticelli</a> is not the same as the beauty <a href="http://www.taramtamtam.com/wallpapers/Art/R/Rubens/images/Rubens_1.jpg">Rubens</a> or <a href="http://lewebpedagogique.com/bred2009/files/2008/12/olympia-manet.jpg">Manet</a>. Relativity of beauty can secondly be seen by comparing beauty between cultures. Beauty perceived by Americans is clearly not the same at that of Japanese or Europeans (despite globilisation). Awareness and knowledge of these relative qualities of beauty is part of our capacity of seeing beauty.</p>

<p>But "beauty" has also an objective dimension. We can all go back to Pythagorus and Leonardo da Vinci and see their "golden numbers" of <a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/22/Da_Vinci_Vitruve_Luc_Viatour.jpg">harmonious proportions</a> of the human body and see what during centuries (and still?) has been seen as "objective beauty" in reality (natural world). </p>

<p>Seeing beauty includes these intellectual dimensions (and others) - for those that have the knowledge and experience to draw on them. </p>

<p>But beauty has also of course an emotional dimension. It is here that Kant, in my eyes, draw some very important observations by underlining that beauty provokes "<strong>disinterested satisfaction</strong>".</p>

<p><strong>Beauty and Manipulation/Post Processing</strong></p>

<p>I would like to go back to the exchange above between Fred G. and John MacPherson, especially as it related to disagreement over John's statement that</p>

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<p>Manipulation can only deal with what is already there. If 'beauty' is absent no amount of fiddling can make it appear. (Aug 27, 2011; 01:59 p.m.)</p>

 

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<p>Fred responded as follows:</p>

 

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<p>John, I'm not so sure. Sometimes a photo is beautiful even when the original subject or scene was not. That is a case of beauty being absent until someone saw something a certain way and did something about it by taking a picture of it. Painters fiddle with paints in order to make beautiful things. Sculptors fiddle with marble in order to make beautiful things. A photographer can fiddle with his raw materials (the world) by taking a picture of it or he can fiddle with his capture in post processing in order to make a beautiful thing. Beauty is not always simply found. It can be <em>realized</em>. Some things are already beautiful and some things are made beautiful, in all kinds of ways. Photographic beauty is often in the photographer's vision, not in the world he photographs. The realization of that vision often includes whatever manipulation might already be built into that vision. (Aug 27, 2011; 02:13 p.m.)</p>

 

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<p>John MacPherson responded:</p>

 

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<p>If it appears Fred, then it was already there! (Aug 27, 2011; 05:36 p.m.)</p>

 

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<p>Fred then responded yet again:</p>

 

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<p>My point is that the original capture can be not beautiful and the manipulated (I prefer post processed) photo can be. No, the beauty may not have been in the original scene. And it may not have been in the original capture. It took the photographer doing a good job of post processing to turn that capture into something beautiful. Unless only cameras, and not people, get to make something beautiful. (Aug 27, 2011; 09:27 p.m.)</p>

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<p>The line of argumentation was almost lost because of intervening comments, but Anders Hingel picked it back up again when he appended the following to one of his comments:</p>

 

 

 

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<p>I find however, that the question on how a subject of non-beauty, in conventional terms (a "beautiful woman" with a "harmonious" face) can change into beauty in photography (or painting), by manipulation or simply by framing and light, is interesting. I have uploaded an example, that in my eyes might be of interest. <a rel="nofollow" href="../photo/14097132">This shot</a> is a shot of a painting of Eugène Carrière ("Tête de fillette au noeud blanc", 1899) painted in a style similar to the <em>pictorialisme </em>of some photographers end of the 19th century<em>. </em>The photo I link to, is however a collage with elements from the Rodin museum in Paris including the infamous sculpture of hands and parts of one of the showrooms and window. The painting is shown on an obscure wall in the museum.</p>

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<p>Anders, I somehow missed the link in the preceding, but I finally found the photo in your portfolio:</p>

 

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<p>http://www.photo.net/photo/14097132</p>

 

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<p>I presume, Anders, that you were not referring to what you had added to the picture, but to the fact that, although the girl in question was not particularly pretty, the painting by Carriére was; i.e., that Carriére's treatment (analogous but not equivalent to post processing) was more beautiful than the reality (model) which he photographed.</p>

<p>I find all of this inherently interesting but also interesting as it relates to the original question of the thread, since it seems clear that photographers can use a variety of techniques to try to enhance a particular mood. I think that that is what Uelsmann has done in a rather extreme form, but regardless of whether or not his linked work above demonstrates a sense of vulnerability, it seems clear that post processing (among other things) could enhance the sense or appearance of vulnerability of the subject. Unfortunately, I have come up dry in attempts to find examples.</p>

<p>In any case, Fred and John were talking about how post processing can or cannot enhance beauty, but I am suggesting that post processing can also (I believe) enhance a sense of vulnerability--regardless of whether or not the final outcome is also adjudged to be more "beautiful." </p>

<p>If the thread ends with the exchange above, so be it, but the exchange seemed worth untangling from the extraneous comments (some by me) that obscured the real issues at stake. </p>

<p>I will leave it at that and see if anyone wants to pick up on that exchange between John and Fred--or perhaps might even offer an example of how post processing can also enhance a sense of vulnerability--or not.</p>

<p>Thank you, Anders, for the example from Carriére. (I never did find that painting on the web in its original form)</p>

<p>--Lannie</p>

<p> </p>

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<p>When I wrote about "vulnerability-of-the-viewer-that-makes-it-possible-to-see-beauty" I tried to get away from discussions on the "beauty-of-vulnerability" that doesn't seem to bring us much further. I admit it is your thread, so you decide, Lannie. In the moment you concentrate on the viewer and his readiness, ability, to see something we can call "beauty" I'm not, as you write, referring to emotion only, but doing exactly what you write should be done, looking at both the intellectual and emotional dimensions of the self.</p>

 

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<p>I am sorry that I misread you, Anders. In any case, the thread does not belong to me! </p>

<p>I think that you have made a good point, one that resonates with many of the participants, who see the original question as flawed. (It won't be the first or last flawed question that I have served up.) I would have to agree with you at this point, and with Fred and others as well, on many of the most salient points that we have discussed. it is interesting that one can change one's mind sometimes without even being aware that it has happened.</p>

<p>I do get your point about Kant as well--what is "satisfaction," after all? Even so, I do not think that I have ever read Kant on this topic. About the only thing that I can recall having read by Kant on aesthetics was a relatively short piece (as I recall) about "the beautiful and the sublime," a very different topic as it introduces the element of awe, about which we have said nothing on this thread. I read it in 1971. I can remember where I was when I found it in the "old" library of the University of Florida, in a beautiful wood-paneled small room off an obscure hallway in the old building, but that is about all I remember. The room I found it in has been renovated or incorporated into other "improvements" of the old building, and I could not find it when I was back in Gainesville in 1999-2001. It is curious how memory of philosophical passages can be "tagged" to other quite extraneous memories of value only to the person who remembers them; but a disquisition on memory would take us even further afield, and so I shall shut up for awhile.</p>

<p>--Lannie</p>

<p>Ah, the glories of the internet! Here is a link to the piece by Kant to which I just alluded:</p>

<p>http://www.wisdomportal.com/Cinema-Machine/Kant-Beautiful&Sublime.html</p>

<p>Anders, if you have a title or a link to the passages by Kant which you have cited above, I would like to have them as well, if that is not too much of an imposition.</p>

<p>--Lannie</p>

<p>Lannie, I will try to find it, but I took it from notes of mine (old habit !) and they are all in French, but I'll come back if I find the original Kant text in English. </p>

<p>Thanks, Anders.</p>

<p>This is on the front page now as the most recent upload:</p>

<p>http://www.photo.net/photo/14103557&size=md</p>

<p>I would not want to be accused of making this a "pin-up" thread, but is there anything more vulnerable than an imperfect body in a bikini (or less)? There is also beauty in imperfection, I think, and not merely vulnerability. Perhaps the beauty is seen in spite of the imperfections, perhaps sometimes because of them.</p>

<p>---Lannie</p>

<p>I've not given up responding to Fred! </p>

<p>I'm still mulling over it all. I'm trying to separate in my mind the notion of latent/inherent 'beauty' being released by fiddling (great word!) or beauty being 'added' by post processing. But as I chased it around and thought I was gaining on it, the spectre of 'imposed beauty' loomed large and the further complication of viewer preference and taste tripped me up.</p>

<p>So as you can see I've got myself rather flat on the floor! I may need some help back upright.</p>

<p>Lannie, after reducing the notion of Beauty to a personal sexual fetish, an accusation of turning this into a pin-up thread's nothing to worry about. Trust me, having been in a war situation and worked in hospitals, I can assure you there really <em>are </em>things far more vulnerable than a faded beauty in a bikini (or less).</p>

<p>I'm in agreement with Fred that just about any decision at any point in the photographic process can alter the beauty, or the quality of it, in a photograph.</p>

<p> </p>

<p>Luis, it was a joke. The photo came up on the front page after I had just gone there after working for quite a while on the very serious postings above (which represented some substantial work, by the way).</p>

 

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<p>I'm in agreement with Fred that just about any decision at any point in the photographic process can alter the beauty, or the quality of it, in a photograph.</p>

 

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<p>Did Fred offer that obvious truism, or are you just putting your words into other persons' mouths--and attributing to others your own motives? Running low on real ideas these days, Luis? Your visits are more and more llke drive-by shootings. Then again, what's new?</p>

 

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<p>Trust me, having been in a war situation and worked in hospitals, I can assure you there really <em>are </em>things far more vulnerable than a faded beauty in a bikini (or less).</p>

 

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<p>No kidding? Really? I had no idea.</p>

<p>--Lannie</p>

<p>Anders, since the conversation has turned more and more to discussions of beauty, I feel compelled to post this link:</p>

<p>http://www.photo.net/photo/12183873</p>

<p>This has nothing to do with "vulnerability" in the usual sense, but the delicate beauty here is nonetheless worth noting, I think. Congratulations on a fine shot.</p>

<p>--Lannie</p>

<p> </p>

<p>Lannie, the text of Kant on beauty comes from his "Critique of practical reasoning" (1790), Second part. The central text on beauty is somewhere around the following passage :<a href="http://sergecar.perso.neuf.fr/textes_2/kant_27.htm"> see here </a>in French (sorry can't find the English text).</p>

<p>Hmm. Dont know about anyone else but the further into this thread I get the more vulnerable I feel.</p>

<p>I love Ander's pic linked to above, but also think it would look 'better' as a b&w treatment. So I guess Fred was right! (But if nobody agrees with me does that make me wrong. And Fred too?)</p>

<p>ps war zones for me too. Africa in the late 70's and early 80's, I was young then, too young to realize I was vulnerable. As were a lot of other people, but much of what I saw wasn't beautiful.</p>

 

<p>John, because "nobody agrees with you" (if that is the case) you might surely be right ! Being right is mostly a solitary pleasure. <br>

Concerning beauty, I remember some of the first color television news that I saw and found the American napalm bombing of Cambodia just "beautiful". I got wiser later on !</p>

<p>Lannie,<br>

this has been a long thread.<br>

What would you sum up to respond to your original question? Do we have clearer ideas on vulnerability in photography? and beauty?<br>

Luca</p>

<p>Thanks, Anders. The title is usually rendered in English as <em>Critique of Practical Reason</em>. Of his two major epistemological works, I have read portions only of the <em>Critique of Pure Reason</em> (in the original German, but not French)--but that was a very long time ago. Most of my knowledge of Kant, however, does not come from his two major studies of epistemology, but of ethics: the<em> Grundlegung zur Metaphysik der Sitten</em>, and <em>Die Metaphysik der Sitten</em>. The Grundlegung seems innocent enough, but by the time he gets around to finishing the latter he has quite strongly (an irrationally) emoted, "Woe unto the advocate of the serpentiine turnings of the happiness doctrine [utilitarianism] who would release the criminal of his punishment or any degree thereof!" or words to that effect. At least, those are the only two works that I have cited in my own <em>Conscientious Objections</em>, my quite long anti-war tract and defense of Christian ethics (not a conventional Christian treatment, to say the very least). Kant is a real hoot in my opinion, not (as someone has said) the gray eminence of moral philosophy. (In fact, I read a publication in the eighties titled, "Is Kant the Gray Eminence of Moral Philosophy?") Doing battle with the Kantians seems at times like doing battle with the disciples of Derrida, who would have driven Kant nuts.</p>

<p>John <em>et al.</em>, I have never been in a foreign war, although I have faced down feminists and been shot at while driving a cab in Durham in 1968 right after King's murder, and I personally feel like I am entering a war zone every day when I go to work--but that is another whole different story, not about physical threat. My sense of social vulnerability comes from being a pacifist in a militaristic culture, and my sense of physical vulnerability from having fecklessly (and recklessly) driven into the outer bands of three hurricanes: Camille (1969), Agnes (1972), and Eloise (1975). I have been stopped by a river flowing northward from the Gulf of Mexico (Agnes, 1972), etc., and, more important, by the cops. I have also spent thirty-two days in Cuba, where I have had my own sense of intestinal vulnerabilities in the face of microbes. (I have gotten physically very ill both times that I have gone.)</p>

<p>My greatest recent sense of vulnerability comes from posting on this forum over the last three years. Before that, I returned to grad school in Spanish and Spansh-American literature at the University of Florida in 1999-2001, starting back at the age of fifty-four to face off against fluent native-speaking youngsters. There is war, and there is war. I have even--as I pointed out above--even faced down feminists. Yessir, I know something of war, even if the bullets usually have not been of lead.</p>

<p>Most poignantly, I was married for thirty years to a northern Virginian who was a direct descendant of Robert E. Lee (and the Lee coat of arms was displayed prominently in her parents' living room on the north side of Arlington). Yessir, I know about vulnerability, especially the social variety.</p>

<p>In any case, citing credentials of vulnerability seems pointless, as my own tongue-in-cheek "vulnerability vita" just given shows. We all know what vulnerability means, if we have ever risked ourselves, and sometimes even if we have not.</p>

<p>I do not play the macho game where such things are concerned: being alive is to be vulnerable.</p>

<p>--Lannie</p>

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<p>Lannie,<br /> this has been a long thread.<br /> What would you sum up to respond to your original question? Do we have clearer ideas on vulnerability in photography? and beauty? Luca</p>

 

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<p>Luca, I might venture a serious response to that when you can sum up what you guys learned on "When Is a Photo a Work of Art?" ( http://www.photo.net/philosophy-of-photography-forum/00Z9b3 )</p>

<p>In other words, not to be flippant in the least, I have no earthly idea. As usual, we have talked past each other for some days now. I see no real convergence of opinion. </p>

<p>--Lannie</p>

<p><strong>Lannie</strong>,<br>

I did.</p>

<p><em>On <a href="../photodb/user?user_id=2124547">Luca A. R.</a> , Aug 15, 2011; 04:08 a.m.</em></p>

<p>I have clearly indicated what struck me and what was important and interesting for me.<br>

It's not necessarily a conclusion, but eventually a recapitulation of the statements you think are most outstanding in your - or any other - thread.<br>

To say the least, there must be some sort of knowledge accumulation in this - or any other thread - not necessarily a clear-cut answer.</p>

<p>Why don't you try?</p>

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<p><em>I might venture a serious response to that when you can sum up what you guys learned on "When Is a Photo a Work of Art?"</em></p>

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<p>Can be hardly an argument, because despite being in the same forum, we are talking about different things related to photography.</p>

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<p><em>As usual, we have talked past each other for some days now. I see no real convergence of opinion.</em></p>

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<p>I think the method can be improved, maybe sticking to the topic of the original post and trying to keep conceptually consistent when responding.</p>

<p>Otherwise, I ask, do we do something different than treading water?</p>

<p>Luca</p>

<p>Luca, I don't think the goal of a forum like this is to arrive at concrete, definitive answers. The threading water metaphor is good in the sense that we eventually sink and drown, learn to swim or become stronger, through increased understanding. Hopefully this forum does the latter for most of us.<br>

________________________________________</p>

<p>BTW, as an aside, I read somewhere a few days ago that in academic circles, some think that Kant was color blind because he mostly avoided talking about color in art.<br>

_________________________________________</p>

<p> </p>

<p>Whether something had latent beauty all the time just waiting for the right post-processing hand or whether that beauty was added is a semantical issue that may distract us from photography. That post processing can fulfill a photographer's vision, to me, is the significant thing. That post processing can change the mood of a photographed person, thing, or scene, is something that can be learned as one develops their skills both of visualizing and of post processing. The best exercise I've found for this is doing it. I will often take a photo of mine that has potential and post process it several different ways to see how much differently one photo can articulate itself with different approaches to the post work. It's like learning a language, a visual language. The thing that's helped me most with my approach to post processing is looking at paintings. Not so I can mimic painting <em>per se </em>but so I can begin to sense how technique, subtle changes in tonality and light, shifts in foreground/background emphases, changes in where attention is focused can effect the overall feel of and some very specific emotions in a photo. Also how essentially mood can be altered, sometimes with a single shift of levels, with a warmer or cooler color temperature, by burning in a shadow on a face, or by completely altering the sense of lighting, etc.</p>

<p>Luis,</p>

<blockquote>I don't think the goal of a forum like this is to arrive at concrete, definitive answers</blockquote>

<p>Sure, we are on the same page here.</p>

<p>I was rather thinking of a summary of highlights.</p>

<p>Also impossible?</p>

<p><strong>Luca - "</strong>Also impossible?"</p>

<p>Luca, I didn't say any of your ideas/requests of Lannie were impossible. I suppose it would be quite possible to do a summary of highlights, but someone would have to devote time to going back over and re-reading this lengthy thread, and simultaneously decide what was highlight and what wasn't. Any of us could do it, though I suspect that defining "highlight" might take 100 posts to narrow down, and then we'd have to have someone sum up the highlights from <em>that</em>. </p>

<p>Luca, when I said that we were talking past each other, I was not talking about you and me, but about that tendency in our forums in general--but it seems to happen everywhere, even in face-to-face conversations. </p>

<p>As for off-topic tangents, I am not troubled by the tangents so much as are some others, since it is impossible to know in advance what some may deem relevant, and it is impossible after the fact to get agreement as to what was relevant, or even "on topic."</p>

<p>I think that these forums serve a useful purpose, but I see no way to sum them up, even if I had the time--and I do not, nor (I suspect) do very many others.</p>

<p>My own philosophy is that one takes what one can from each thread and goes from there. </p>

<p>--Lannie</p>

<p>Double and triple posting--sorry, but the server is very slow right now.</p>

<p>I think it is an impossible task to summaries what came out of a thread like this one, and so many others like it. I would certainly not ask the question on what we can agree on, because, at least for me, what is interesting are certain mostly isolated questions and orientations, whether they are marginal or mainstream in the thread. <br>

I'm aware that I have been off topic up to several times (I'm somewhat used to it !) but it could be that such "off topic" contributions are made because of a genuine conviction that the discussion already has become off-topic and deserves repeatably to be redirected.</p>

<p> </p>

<p>There's a difference between going on tangents or off topic and avoiding looking at certain issues in depth. I love a good tangent and often see good reason for going off topic, but there's also something to be said for focusing, especially when one finds oneself uncertain or in unfamiliar territory. Tossing out more and more questions or links in that case can sometimes seem to me a little counterproductive, even evasive at times.</p>