Pablo Casals, 1954, by Yousuf Karsh - WEEKLY DISCUSSION #18

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<p>Yes, she was poised and had spent time in the spotlight and on movie production ... but she was just 14. There wasn't really much <em>there</em> there yet. . . . It's excruciatingly difficult to tease that out (or synthesize the appearance of it) in someone who's still essentially in grade school.</p>

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<p>I understand what you're saying and would probably generally agree, Matt, but it's not completely true.</p>

<p><a href="https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-mGzvwre1OX0/TYvAVaLh2jI/AAAAAAAAE_E/wm2ppbIcjl0/s1600/dame_elizabeth_taylor.png">Young Liz</a> . . . eyes are too sharp but there's plenty of <em>there</em> there already.</p>

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<p>The Hepburn comparison is more interesting, but in Kobal's image, she is of course Acting.</p>

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<p>Very interesting point. I suspect most actors act even when they don't seem to be acting. So, it's as likely she was acting for Karsh as for Kobal. Anyway, that's how Kobal shot her and that's the photo he came up with, as opposed to Karsh, who didn't shoot her that way and didn't come up with a comparable (IMO) photo. I suspect the subjects of many portraits are acting whether we, as viewers, are aware of it or not.</p>

<p>"""I think we should look at each person photographed by Karsh and simply ask ourselves if the portrayal adds something to what we had otherwise seen of the person from other images.""<br>

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Arthur, this was exactly what I did too and ended up with some feeling of being confronted to a very professional portraitist with fine capability of capturing light, but who adding nothing spectacular to what we have seen from others. Portraits which are all nice and professional work but nothing really spectacular. Too lean to be make them worthwhile.<br>

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The "portrait" of Pablo Casals is indeed an exception, where music is what we might hear, but is it a portrait or merely a fine photo which invites to listen to his violoncel - which you don't see either ? Casals was indeed only rarely photographed. His violoncel more often. Here is one of the <a href="http://davidhertzberg.wordpress.com/2012/12/28/pablo-casals-rare-portrait/">rare photographs of him</a>, playing his beautiful instrument.<br>

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Coming back to Coleman. Personally, I find it refreshing to read a art critic who has the nerves to write out his critics without any restraints. When applying the term "<strong >depersonalized</strong>" to describe what many would see when looking at his portrait of Churchill for example. he puts his finger on this irritating predictability of Karsch portraiture. Adding "gargoyle" to the critic is obviously made by Coleman as a desperate call of waking up his readers, and with some success. In those terms, Coleman is a better critic, than Karsh is as portraitist. What is left, when looking at portraits of Karsch, is for viewers of his portraits to enjoy personal connotations to names we have encountered in the media throughout a lifetime. An experience which leaves few people cold. It is visual name callings.</p>

<p>Fred's selection of portraits of Karsh compared others is a good exercise among which I find the Avedon portrait of Marion Anderson especially cruel to Karsh. Coleman would have loved it.<br>

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<p>Little anecdote: For a short time when young, John Blakemore, the well-known British art photographer and acknowledged technical master, worked in a local portrait studio in Leicester. In his first session, he lit his subjects the way he felt they should be lit, aiming for a chiaroscuro effect. When the client (from the Indian subcontinent) arrived to pick up the prints, she paid but then demonstratively tore them into shreds and left them on the counter. The prevailing style among Indian photographers, unknown to Blakemore, was fully lit and shadowless, and she would not stand for anything else.<br>

Point of this story? Portrait photography is unique among the photographic genres in that originality and creativity are NOT vital for success but rather may be fatal. Photographic portraits MUST please the sitter, no matter whether the portrait in question has been commissioned by the sitter or a third party (as with editorial portraits). The vital qualities of a portrait photographer are technical skill in the service of flattery and, most important of all, an ability to be perceived sympathetically by and bond with subjects. This does not completely exclude the possibility of an innovative creative idea (consider, for example, Madame Yevonde, the 1930s British society photographer) but flattery is essential.<br>

The corollary of this is that hardly any portraits, even very famous ones, are rewarding to look at if we do not know who the sitter is (offhand I can think of the portrait of Stravinsky by Arnold Newman but no other examples). It is against this background that I evaluate the words of Coleman - as so often, "criticism" is stemming from someone who is not and has never been a working photographer and understands, in Roger Hicks' memorable phrase, "3/8 of f***all" about photography. <br>

Karsh was a great technician and clearly had the human qualities required to interact with his subjects. His creative technique was self-evidently to allow his subjects to project their desired public face and to see his role as facilitating the recording and dissemination of this. In this he was dramatically successful, and I for one am happy to applaud him and not ask for more from his work.</p>

<p>And most photographers know "f***all" about art.</p>

<p>Ships passing in the night.</p>

<p>+1 Julie :))</p>

 

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<p>flattery</p>

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<p><em>"Flattery is alright, as long as you don't inhale."</em> —A. Stevenson</p>

<p><em>And most photographers know "f***all" about art.</em><br>

Thanks for that insight! Any views on Karsh, or Casals, or ... ?</p>

<p>Karsh's photo of Hepburn shows the fragility and attractiveness of a classically beautiful woman, perhaps idealised, whereas Kobal is presenting us simply with a movie poster of an actress fully "on stilts" and revealing nothing (or perhaps nothing that is seemingly "her").</p>

<p>Critics like Coleman, at least in this limited case, do little for a reasoned, rather than a polarised, view of an artist. Karsh did not always use chiaroscuro type lighting to portray his subjects, witness his portraits of Grace Kelly or Jesse Norman, which are very evenly lit. His photo of Sibelius is worth a look for those who think he only flattered his subjects with dramatic lighting rather than showing their real person. Many of male clients are quite revealing, as already noted inthe case of Eisenhower. Taken at his home in Finland when he was 84, we see an exceptional composer (Sibelius) who ran out of creative steam relatively early in his life and struggled the rest of the time to recover that ability. If interested, Matt's link will show you this portrait.</p>

<p>The OP is a success, not just for showing us a photographer who, whatever his limits, is widely admired (like artist Norman Rockwell, whom I cannot take in anything but small doses for his pervading uniformity of simple characterisation of his subjects), but also in showing how the critical positions of members of Photo.Net vary so widely. More polarised I think than in the case of other examples we have seen.</p>

<p>I am not a fan of Karsh, but for Anders, I am always happy to put on my Devil's Advocate hat and pretend that I am. [<em>primping to the mirror; 'hello, ms Devil'</em>]</p>

<p>Karsh was born in 1908. Music, men, women, race were perceived differently from his perspective.</p>

<p>After he had finished making Casals portrait, Karsh and the elderly musician sat down to sherry and biscuits. Karsh asked Casals, 'Would any contemporary composer in years to come rank with the classical figures of music?' 'I don't know,' he said, 'but I don't believe there is such a genius alive today. For me, classical music is to be adopted, felt, recognized and loved. Modern music has turned towards non-music. Though they have a natural understanding of music, the moderns reject the classical approach as pompous and irrelevant to our time. I hope music will become music again as it has been for centuries from Palestrina to Fauré, Ravel and Debussy.' We toasted each other's health in a last glass of sherry and I departed with profound sadness and yet elation.</p>

<p>That Karsh relates this anecdote in one of his own books is suggestive that he is in full agreement with Casals. The turned back in Casals portrait may be taken as representative of Casals age as well as of the inner/private inspiration for his musical genius. And/or it may rather be representative of a turn to the past and a rejection of the present/future of art/music.</p>

<p>If one presents classical music in modern contexts outside of the concert hall, it will often get reactions similar to those that Karsh's portraits receive in modern art-photographic criticism (which are generally similar to or worse than Coleman's). Taken with its own context in mind, both classical music, and maybe (at least while I have this hat on) Karsh's portraits can be fully enjoyed.</p>

<p>Julie notes that Karsh was born in 1908. Wikipedia tells me that he grew up in a town now in Turkey during the Armenian genocide and "saw relatives massacred - [his] sister died of starvation as [his family was] driven from village to village".<br />Given this background, it is very plausible that he saw life in Canada as being comparative heaven, without any of the scepticism that some of us might have, and that for him it was a dream to come from where he had started and progress to being friends with and making images of the cultural icons of the age.<br />Very probably he was far less cynical about being a skilled technician stoking the fires of the PR industry than some PNers who have grown up in relative luxury in North America untroubled by much of the violence of the 20th century.</p>

<p>I think viewers of all geographical locations and backgrounds can be discriminating and can offer valid critiques.</p>

<p>If not, photography and art will have a very limited range.</p>

<p><em>I think viewers of all geographical locations and backgrounds can be discriminating and can offer valid critiques</em><br>

So do I, Fred - I'm merely offering what I feel is a plausible explanation for Karsh's mindset and motivation.</p>

<p>These weren't shot for today's audience, marinated in today's hipper-than-thou visual sensibilities and weary, mandatory cynicism. I'd no more look at Karsh's sesssions with the same standards I'd apply to (say) Leibovitz's than I would consider his work in the way I'd ponder a portrait made in Rembrandt's studio. These were of, by, and for a different time. Recent, but different.</p>

<p>Matt, there are plenty of contemporaneous portraits to compare Karsh's to if we are going to limit judgments to a particular awareness of a time period. Then, there's also timelessness to consider as a valid touchstone for our own reactions to photos. While I'm all for gathering information and understanding milieu as part of the experience of photos, I'm not opposed to being in touch with the immediate experience of how something hits me in the gut and considering that in my assessment as well.</p>

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<p>Karsh's photo of Hepburn is as much a collaborative fabrication of feminine beauty and fragility as most others. There's nothing at all wrong with that. Most portraits, particularly of actors, are just that except maybe for candid street portraits. You take an accomplished photographer and an accomplished actor even not creating a movie poster and you still get the picture <em>they</em> want you to see. It could turn out the movie poster may just be more honest because it doesn't convince anyone that this is the essence of Hepburn, or woman. The essence we are seeing in the Karsh photo is the essence of two willing participants in the creation of a strong and relatable artifice. The fragility we see may be very real, but that's Hepburn's creation of a character as much as anything. From what I understand, Hepburn ultimately was not that fragile a person. A portrait is what it is. Both the Kobal and Karsh portraits reveal what they reveal. The Karsh doesn't have the same trappings of staging and acting but its different approach doesn't mean it's any less a projected persona. The significance often lies in the human qualities the portrait portrays, not always in the correspondence between the subject of the portrait and the qualities the viewer perceives.</p>

<p>Though later in life, the <a href="http://the-collectiveonline.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/audreyhepburn251si2.jpg">pictures from Ethiopia</a> don't show this same "fragility" that we may have supposed was so much a part of her when younger. I'd be surprised to learn that she suddenly lost all her fragility once her movie career was over and she went on to more humanitarian endeavors. My guess is much of the woman we see in Ethiopia was there all along, just not part of her projected Hollywood image.</p>

<p>Then, of course, there's the visual aspects of the two photos, the Karsh and the Kobal. Regardless of what they seem to be portraying, the Kobal, to me, is much more visually stimulating, exciting, and full of life (even if it's a more staged life). The Karsh is more pensive and pedestrian, and much more weighty and solid. The Kobal to the Karsh, to me, is like the sun to the earth.</p>

<p>Don't get me wrong, Fred. I think that looking back from where we sit now can be very constructive for someone making (or appreciating) new portraits today. Hence my choice of photos, period, and photographer. I suppose I'm resisting the notion of present-day carrying on about what Karsh should or shouldn't have done - which would be a lot more appropriate if we were talking about something he'd shot last Tuesday. </p>

<p>Julie, thanks for deepening our knowledge on the context of the portraying of Casals.</p>

<p>As you might have seen, I did notice the particularity of the Casals portrait. It is indeed very different from the standard Karsh portraiture in the series that William provided us a <a href="http://121clicks.com/inspirations/the-greatest-portraits-ever-taken-by-yousuf-karsh" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">(link)</a> to. Maybe it was the sharing of a glass of sherry and some biscuits that did indeed inspire Karsh to part from the well trodden road he normally followed when making portraits of known people. Hats off for Karsh, and Casals, then, and hats off for Matt for choosing the Casals portrait and not others of Karsh for this weekly discussion.</p>

<p>Sure, for Casals hats off, and yet the point still may be that if it wasn't Casals in the portrait, our opinion of that photo might be lower. Still, it was Casals, and if wasn't someone famous, the statement made by the photo would be different too. In each of the photo examples Karsh made a statement and I can appreciate it for what it is and also take into consideration some of what it is not. Is it art, or is it craft. Either way, his are the sort of photos that make me want to photograph, make me want to try harder to say something with a photograph.</p>

<p>Anders, have you really looked at the images of Sibelius, Graham (Martha), Eisenhower, Auden and Einstein? I have a hard time believing that you or any of us who live in such a time of extreme advertising, ever-present hype and artificialness, and even photoshopped images of some of the famous in much of the communication and media of our societies, think of the Karsh portraits as being of a similar ilk and not honest attempts at portraiture.</p>

<p>While his work may be of a certain style more popular decades ago, I would wager that in 50 or 100 years or more from now they will represent for future generations many of the historically important persons of our times (and those back to the early 40s) in a way that passport photos or others may not. Their presence and lifelike qualities, unlike many press photos of the famous that remain but unnatural slices of a partial reality, will transfer to those in the future some of the nature of the sitter, coupled with what the history books will then tell us of their character and their achievements and failures.</p>

<p>Not a bad "dénouement" or outcome for a poor young man from Armenia.</p>

<p>Rather then speculate what Karsch felt about this photo and why he shot it the way he did, let's read what he said: <em>http://onlyoldphotography.tumblr.com/post/37159602514/yousuf-karsh-pablo-casals-1954-in-the-abbey-de</em><br>

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Yousuf Karsh: <em>Pablo Casals,</em> 1954</p>

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<p><em>In the Abbey de Cuxa in Prades, I spent several glorious hours with the master of the cello. Our rapport was instantaneous - he trusted me to carry his cherished instrument. I was so moved on listening to him play Bach that I could not, for some moments, attend to photography. I have never photographed anyone, before or since, with his back turned to the camera, but it seemed to me just right. For me, the bare room conveys the loneliness of the artist, at the pinnacle of his art, and also the loneliness of exile.</em></p>

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<p><em> </em><br>

<em> </em>And further, the comments from the writer of this article:</p>

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<p><br /><em>Years later, when this portrait was on exhibit at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, I was told that an elderly gentleman would come and stand in front of it for many minutes each day. When the curator, by this time full of curiosity, ventured to inquire gingerly, “Sir, why do you stand day after day in front of this portrait?” he was met with a withering glance and the admonition, “Hush, young man, hush - can’t you see, I am listening to the music!”</em><br>

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<p>Alan, just take Julie's word for what they are worth: they indeed share a glass of sherry, or was it tea ? - and biscuits, ginger biscuits for sure. Doesn't really matter Karsh did divert from his proven portrait techniques when it came to Casals, and concentrated on the music.<br>

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Arthur, I did in fact look carefully on all the portraits in the series, including those of Sibelius, Graham, Eisenhower, Auden and Einstein - before putting my neck out. <br>

I fully agree that Karsh's portraits of famous people of the 20th century are way better than any passport shot for future generations, just because of the obvious high professional quality of the shots, and surely of the original prints also. They show the figures with technical brilliance, but do not show in all cases a great sensitivity to the individuals in question despite the fact that they are all historical characters with well known persona. Something in his portraits, that goes beyond the persona or something underlining the persona would be expected from his portraits, but we are mostly left with standard Karsh portraits in so many cases, that I think it is justified to call alert. <br>

And yet, he was able, to show hints of going beyond the predictable, which can be seen in a few of the mentioned series. I would mention the following: Hellen Keller/Polly Thompson; Martha Graham; Sibelius; Jessy Norman; Georgia O’Keefe, Mauriac, out of the some 40 "greatest portraits ever taken by Yousuf Karsh". </p>

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<p>is it a portrait or merely a fine photo which invites to listen to his violoncel - which you don't see either ?</p>

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<p>I think Anders asks a significant question which I've been considering since he asked it. My own answer is that most good portraits are both, portraits and fine photos which often go beyond serving as a portrait. In that vain, then, I often find myself looking at portraits, at least in part, abstractly, and divorced from whoever the sitter might be, much as I look at most other kinds of photos. That's, in part, why whether or not I know the person depicted in a portrait, I can still get so much out of it.</p>

<p>Photos are an odd combination of at least seeming to represent what their subject was and transforming that subject with abstractions of framing, light, shadow, texture, mood, perspective, and certain intangible qualities. The photo of something is not the same as the thing photographed. I wonder if it's harder to accept that sense of abstraction when there's a person involved as subject. And, we don't have to take the person out of it too much in order, also, to see it as a photo with qualities of light, narrative, texture, etc. The photographic qualities which can take it beyond simply being representative of the particular person can also enhance those qualities or may simply just accompany the more humanistic and personal qualities we find.</p>

<p>Every photo, and every portrait, seems to me to some extent documentary and to some extent not. Portraits may, for some reason, convince us they must be documentary because there's a real person who sat in front of the lens. And in some sense they are. But in some crucial senses, they also are not.</p>

<p>As to this particular portrait/photo, the face is not the only essential part of the man. Therefore, it is, to me, a portrait . . . and also much more than a portrait.</p>

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<p>And one you just happen to disagree with<em> in his reading of Karsh [emphasis added JDM]</em>. I tend to agree with Coleman who stops just short of calling Karsh's work "kitsch" for its sometimes over-the-top sentimentality.</p>

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<p>Actually this is not exactly true. Given his overall career, his 'revenge' on Adams, and his general attitude toward the arts, I pretty much disagree with EVERYTHING Coleman says.</p>

<p>Compare his outrage with Adams for his criticism of Mortensen, with the language Coleman uses to criticize Karsh. And if you reread his comment on Karsh, he does not fall <em>short</em> of calling his work kitsch. And if you find Karsh's work "sentimental" or "over the top" what would you call <a href="https://www.google.com/search?q=a.d.+coleman&num=100&newwindow=1&client=firefox-a&hs=wkY&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&channel=sb&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=RqMwU9r8K6WC2wXw2IDQDA&ved=0CAkQ_AUoAQ&biw=1807&bih=1311">Coleman's</a>?</p>

<p><em>""I pretty much disagree with EVERYTHING Coleman says""</em><br>

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Good grief, JDM, you must be a busy man :) </p>

<p>Maybe I'm missing something, but his photos are not only technically excellent, but portray something about his subjects. Here's some of his with his own comments of what transpired while they were taken.<br>

http://www.karsh.org/#/the_work/portraits</p>

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