Photography and Art

<p>Julie said:</p>

 

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<p>Geez, Louise, Steve. You've got it exactly backward. The fairy dust analogy could just as well apply to people who collect Swingline staplers (yes, they do ...).</p>

 

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<p>I don't think backward. People who collect staplers are not the same audience who collect art (maybe a few in both camps). Its all about audience and the dialog between the art and the larger audience for art (not staplers, or old corvettes, or coins, etc., etc., etc.</p>

<p>"Dialogue." Sure, that must be what Vincent experiencing all day in the quote I gave, above.</p>

<p>If love at first sight is "dialog"; if getting hit in the head from behind by a baseball is "dialog"; if getting shot by a drive-by shooter is "dialog"; if watching the birth of your child is "dialog"; if encountering great art is "dialog"; then, sure, it's "all about audience and the dialog."</p>

<p>If love at first sight is mediated through another's expressions of love, if the baseball first ricochets off someone else's head, if the drive-by shooter actually hits your friend and it's really referred pain that hurts you, if the child that's supposedly yours turns out not to have your own DNA, what is that? We all have our crosses to bear.</p>

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<p>Tonight 60 minutes did a segment on the commerce of high end art:...Lots of expensive pixie/fairy dust attached to that art!!!!</p>

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<p>Yes you are right Steve. The art market can be compared to the financial market with its excesses, speculators, black markets, fraud and unbelievable profits. Values of art on that market increased by more than eight times between 2003 and 2008. Bubbles have bursted something like every ten years in that market during the last forty years period - but in each case, like presently prices increases to catch to previous levels within a few years in most fields.<br>

So why refer to the market at all in a discussion on art (and photography) ? My main reason for referring to the market and what happens around it, is that the alternative (the ultra narcissist view of art - "if I believe it is art, it is art and noone can tell me it is not" - is even less attractive, in my eyes.<br>

If we did not have the "market" we would have to invent somewhere else for the "others", the viewers, (general public, general specialized public, experts etc) to express their unvested appreciation of a pretended work art. If these "others" are people with experience and knowledge in the field, people with the capacity to appreciated creativity in all its known or new forms, some of whom are even maybe educated in the field, they can play a central role in guiding towards discovering the sublime not only for the individual, but sublime in "our time", in human and historical terms - with en ever repeated right to be dead wrong.<br>

These are the authoritative appreciation on what is art and what is not, at a given time in a given place and ever contradicted by other authoritative judgements. Many of these authoritative voices on art are related to the "market", to galeries, fairs, auction houses, and their voices should always be listened to with scepticism. Others are independent critics working and publishing in periodicals like the Art Form or Frieze and should be read with a critical eye. Yet others are researchers in the field providing scientific, historical, philosophical analyses of art movements and individual artist and should mostly be read in attention.<br>

However all together out of all these often divergent voices comes, some times, an often vague understanding of what is art; what is not so much art or maybe not art at all. Mostly is will be the latter. </p>

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<p>In this forum it needs to be said that Art Basel and its rivals are to the art world as the Octomom is to childbirth.</p>

<p>People here give every indication of pushing the extremes of the art world, the spectacular, grandiose and ridiculous to further their agenda, in adoration or disdain for the art world. Anyone with a smattering of knowledge is well aware of how 99.9% of the art world really works, and it is nothing like that. Not a peep about this here, save for a few comments from Arthur.</p>

<p>The 'market' does a lot more than traffic in artworks: It is where the majority of those interested in art get to see work in person. If it wasn't for museums and galleries, it would be happening as it did during the height of the Soviet era: People putting up tiny shows in cramped apartments.</p>

<p>This is not to say I have anything against Art Basel. I've attended the Miami one several times and gotten to see a lot of (mostly lesser) works, a few extraordinary ones, by very famous artists. I am also grateful to AB and other fairs for kindly demanding their exhibitors maintain a physical gallery. If it wasn't for this proviso, about 5-15% of the better galleries in major American cities would vanish in an instant. I have personally been told this by two of the largest gallery owners where I live. Both go to several art fairs, including AB Miami, and have said they would close immediately if the requirement was lifted. </p>

<p>Anders, why is the alternative to the market the view that whatever anyone believes is art is art. I agree with you that the latter is a very unattractive, although a way-too-often-expressed, view.</p>

<p>How about we have a discussion among ourselves and don't worry about other authorities for the moment. When someone calls Elvis on black velvet art, we simply respond by saying it's not. And we can talk about it. We can discuss the difference between art and kitsch. We can talk about its lack of authenticity and its base move toward cheap imitation. We can talk about the lack of quality or craft and the way it uses a popular icon in a mass-produced and almost mindless fashion. There are many other things we can talk about.</p>

<p>If someone insists on calling the black velvet Elvis art, we can say that person is wrong, as wrong as the person who says 2+2=5. We don't have to question his liking of the black velvet Elvis. We accept that, with misgivings, of course. But we don't accept an assertion that it's art any more than we accept the assertion that a tulip is a homo sapien. If he claims that what he believes is art is art, we tell him he's wrong. If he's insistent, well, we do what we would do with anyone who's out of touch with language. We either try to convince him further or we drop it. But we don't give up a meaningful use of language and the significant place of art in our lives because there's a popular assertion going around, especially on the pages of PN, that art is subjective and art is whatever you think is art. </p>

<p>Taste plays its role in art. But it doesn't determine art.</p>

<p>I would love to have that discussion with you Fred and I have a feeling that we would agree on most subjects in the field although it does not often come out like that in our writings here around ! <br>

Luis, you can surely continue the list of fairs, Art Basel just being the biggest and most important when it comes to contemporary art, the role Maastricht fair play in ancient art. I was thinking of going to the Miami fair, but if "mostly lesser works" are shown, I will keep away. I just came back from this year's "Art Paris/Art Fair" and was personally very impressed by the quality of works shown.<br>

How these numerous art fairs work (each bigger city seems to have their own!) and the role the play on the market, I think has been told in so many books and articles and gallery owners love to tell the story. The fact is that they exist and grow ever bigger and more influenceable. What is shown there influences not only prices on the market, but also, to the better and the worse, they mark and influence new generations of artists, whether we like it or not. </p>

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<p>I would love to have that discussion with you Fred and I have a feeling that we would agree on most subjects in the field although it does not often come out like that in our writings here around ! </p>

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<p>I will start another thread about it later and hope that you and others will offer your thoughts on the subject. Thanks. And, if it turns out we disagree, that's OK, too. We will learn from any of it.</p>

<p>Julie said:</p>

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<p>"Dialogue." Sure, that must be what Vincent experiencing all day in the quote I gave, above.<br>

If love at first sight is "dialog"; if getting hit in the head from behind by a baseball is "dialog"; if getting shot by a drive-by shooter is "dialog"; if watching the birth of your child is "dialog"; if encountering great art is "dialog"; then, sure, it's "all about audience and the dialog."</p>

 

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<p>Dear Julie, I am considered by most of my friends and co-workers a very creative person. I have created computer programs, written original material for patients I work with, I am a musician, I use my creative abilities daily in my work with patients in group and individual work. I also consider my photography my art as well. I don't believe one has to be in a trance or reverie like Vincent to create art or be creative. For me, creativity is spontaneous, it flows without effort. When I look at art I get a certain feel about it and it moves me one way or another, sometimes emotionally. Maybe "dialog" is too small a word to use here. Lets use "flow of energy" or something like that to describe the relationship between art and viewer. BTW I have been hit by baseballs, experienced love at first sight, watched the birth of both my children (no drive by shooting thank goodness). </p>

 

<p>Hmm, most Artists are following their own vision and do not care a monkeys about what others may or not think.</p>

<p>If they thought otherwise they would join the commercial world and produce the usual banal crap.</p>

<p>In the commercial world its about who you know...it is as simple as that.</p>

<p>Lets be honest you could paint a lettuce leaf silver and with the backing of the Arty world it becomes a masterpiece.</p>

<p>They would write a thousand words about it... and more...and on and on until you belief.</p>

<p>Allen, can you give two examples where this so-called Arty world has backed the equivalent of a silver-painted lettuce leaf? Better to talk in specifics than hypotheticals, no?</p>

<p>Be sure to include which specific people in the Arty world backed the pieces you're referring to, how they influenced the rest of the Arty world (or maybe all of the Arty world backed these things at once) and which specific pieces they are.</p>

<p>Thanks.</p>

<p>How about a can of soup,Fred;)</p>

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<p>A reasonable example Allen, and an enjoyable if "mildly" satirical presentation of the specifics of its acceptance and by whom (MOMA, etc.). </p>

<p>Thanks, Allen, glad to know where you're coming from. Puts your ideas very much in context.</p>

<p>I want to thank Allen as well. The way he thinks is a lot clearer now.</p>

 

<p>I'm pleased that you folks see where i'm coming from gives clarity to our chats.</p>

<p>Make images ... from the heart ... keep it fun ... and interesting .... capture emotion ... create images people long to revisit.</p>

<p>Since I first came to the realization I could never draw or paint my way out of a wet paper bag I have always looked at my camera as my paint brush, be it the old Kodak Instamatic I kept in my fishing tackle box as a kid trying to get vast landscapes of the eastern Sierra and having no clue as to who Ansel Adams was at the time or my current cameras both digital and film.</p>

<p>I like to think each and every picture I take is a potential piece of art. Others may not see it but in my mind I do and I think that is what is important.</p>

<p>I have taught photography and art for close to 12 years now.<br>

In that time I have come to realize there is nothing wrong with photographing for the simple joy of the activity. Often I find the resulting images from such an approach as informative and pleasing to ME the MAKER. Often though this type of work is just that. It has an appeal to me because I am the one who has had an insight into the scene/object and much like a vacation photograph the image is a "trigger" to that emotion or insight that I had. In essence the photograph is a document that triggers a response in me because I was the one who had the experience of making the image. But just like a vacation photograph when shown to other people they have a lack luster interest in the image because nothing in the image "triggers" any of the same emotions or insights that I felt or had when taking the image. Conversely if I am an artist who uses photography as a means of "communication" I am most certainly NOT photographing for the pure pleasure of the activity. I am consciously trying to craft a statement with a visual image. Is there anything wrong with either NO. Both are useful and beneficial, one to the individual and one to the culture. To expand also on another topic within the OP I think the general public's definition of art does not sync up with the art world's definition of art. The general public often deems art that is beautiful and technically proficient as "Good" art. Statements like "I wish I could draw that well" and "oh those colors are pretty" etc... quantify this. While the art world is primarily concerned with the artist's intent and voice. This is why we have Andy Warhol and Campbell soup cans as art. Its not because the "image" is necessarily beautiful its the CONCEPT behind the work that is seen as beautiful. The art world moved well beyond the common notions of technically perfect and aesthetically beautiful IMAGES a long time ago. And it will continue to evolve from there. Why? Because culture continues to evolve. The definition of art changes from era to era, and a study of art history (hint hint) would allow anyone to see that. Campbell's soup cans can be drawn by a ten year old, what makes them art is the voice behind why there are so many of them represented. What I mean by this is Warhol was making a STATEMENT about popular culture and our MASS PRODUCED society. The beauty is in the concept and not in the particular beauty or construction of a soup can. How does this pertain to photography today, most anyone with a decent camera today can take technically "good" images. So just crafting a technically "good" image is seen by many in the art world as insufficient. If you want to add to the cultural dialog with your images "have something to say". This type of work is work that is collected by Museums and Galleries. Now does everyone need or want to make that type of work? No. If you are content to make images that the general public is pleased with and are satisfied with that then by all means let people appreciate them. There will always be differences in opinion about what is good and what is bad, why? because everyone is different and we pull from our own set of experiences and worldviews in forming those ideas. </p>

<p>Like the first responder, John A, Blake has given a good analysis of the role of photography, whether inside or outside the sector of art. Very often attempts at either art or non-art photography are criticised (perhaps "questioned" is a better term) because they represent previously seen themes or approaches that are somewhat cliché. The entry of concept into art (which really isn't new to art, but is of more importance today) also has its limitations, primarily because there are only so many concepts ("mass production", "alienation", etc.) that seem to preoccupy the photographer/artist and viewer. Of course, aesthetics and composition also have some limits. In any case, art is by its nature not something that can, or should, be constrained to a singular approach, concept or expression.</p>

<p>Communication is the bridge that unites for me non-art photography and art photography. As someone who has spent many hours designing things that are or might be useful for some part of society, the communication with others (the eventual user) has often been subdued compared to the personal preoccupation with the design or the prototype itself. Rarely does the activity communicate directly with the user. Therefore, I find photography to be an excellent form for both personal creativity (or not, depending upon the objective) and at the same time, communication. This can be very direct communication, as with family and friends, or more downstream, timewise, as the product of our lens and mind is then diffused to others.</p>

<p>It is interesting in this sense that one often sees comments on photographs that appear many years after the photo.netter has posted the image in his or her PN portfolio. The interaction then involves communication, and I give credit to the PN adminstration in adding the small images of posters at the bottom of each forum page. If they catch our attention, that sometimes is a first step in communication of something more.</p>

<p>So, photography and art, yes both are important in their different personal expressions, and personal communication to another, attached to the pleasure of some form of creation, is what links them together.</p>

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<p>I think in many cases, art is in the eyes of the beholder. We all have different opinions on what does and does not constitute art. Something I may see as art another may see quite differently.</p>

<p>Impact is <em>thee</em> arbiter of triumph. Technical fundamentals and equipment play a part, certainly, and manipulating them to achieve a desired result is creative. But they are, after all, a means to an end. And occasionally fortuitous accidents produce unexpected pleasant surprises. In any event, the viewer responds to what they see, not how it got there. Photographer Yun-Fei Tou who produced MEMENTO MORI said, "I believe something should not be told but should be felt." Emotion! <br>

Elements found to be in normal relationships typically evoke straightforward reactions while those presented in a surreal, abstract, unnatural manner can be intriguing. Either way it’s my gut, not my head that delivers honest decisions. Occasionally I’m not sure how to react to an image. I suspect I should be impressed but instead I’m bemused. Rather than dismiss it out of hand, bewilderment follows as I find myself just not getting it. The more I have to think about whether I’m impressed, the less likely that I am. I freely admit I’m not sophisticated enough to appreciate everything I see, that a piece of art may be trying to communicate something I do not understand. My loss.</p>