Painters and paintings, inspiration for the photographer?

There rarely seems to be any mention here of painters and paintings

as inspiration for photographers. Why is this? Are painters and

paintings a source of inspiration for your own work as a photographer?

Absolutely. Painting over the past 100 years has really

deconstructed the picture plane to it's most formal elements.

The language that surrounds painting is really useful in

describing and filling the two dimensional picture plane that is

photography.

 

Abstract painting in particular forces one to analyse the picture

plane purely based on it's visual content. There are no symbolic

or narrative clues with which to read the two dimensional plane

or "picture." Understanding this sense of space helps in

organizing photographic space strictly based on what falls into

the picture plane. Then, the photographic narrative and symbolic

elements can be dealt with in the forefront.

They aren't an influence on me.

My influences are entirely photographic and cinematographic.

Oh, yes! Particularly the Old Dutch Masters (the painters, not the cigars), Edward Hopper, the Wyeths, Van Gogh and Toulouse-Lautrec.

I don't get a lot of inspiration from painters or paintings. I do appreciate them and relish the opportunity to view them in person. But I see it as apples and oranges. I suspect you would get the same type of reply from a painter.

If by "source of inspiration" you mean "a good place from which

to steal ideas," then yes, painters are definitely a source of

inspiration to me (as are writers and musicians).

Hey Keith... Everything I have done recently is inspired by Painters. Photographers are so locked into conventional thought and techical perfection that the art in it is lost. Painters (the masters and the amatures) recreate the world as they see it. Photographers (these days) create it as everyone else wants to see it. That is sad...

vermeer

<a href=http://www.cacr.caltech.edu/~roy/vermeer/pop.html>idem grant</a>

<i>"Painters (the masters and the amatures) recreate the world as they see it. Photographers (these days) create it as everyone else wants to see it."</i><p>This is a good point. Many photographers seem to get their inspiration and motivation solely from the work of their peers. Why is it that artists, amateur and professional alike, constantly strive for originality, whilst it could be argued that many photographers aspire only to the work of their peers? I realise that this is perhaps a little off topic, but find the reason for this and it might give a clue to why many photographers are seemingly blinkered.<p><i>"But I see it as apples and oranges. I suspect you would get the same type of reply from a painter."</i><p>I have to disagree with this. Many painters use photography as inspiration, reference and use the medium of photography itself.

Artists have been drawing, painting, sculpting, and otherwise representing still-life for 500 years, but there is only one Pepper #30.

Dave N.:

Editors, gallery owners, and critics have a powerful influence on what succeeds, that is, what we get to see, hear, and read. They are as much to blame as we are. Film is a medium that encourages experimentation and everyone does it, but what we eventually see is what somebody deems useful.

 

I like to photograph waves. There is a practically endless number of ways to render surf. I am always fascinated by the way painters paint the surf and look at it very carefully. I am sure I have learned from this.

The best artists are the ones who have the most influences, the ones who are the most curious. Great artists are intellectualy voracious types of people. Being a student of painting and other two dimensional and three dimensional media is just part of what it means to be an educated person. Look at an artists bookself and you will find poetry, history, fiction, the sciences and anything else you can think of.

 

I am also speaking about the performing arts and writing. I spend a good amount of time hanging around with artists and I can tell you that if you want to get into some interesting conversation, go find some really good artists because they will talk about everything but what they specifically do. You can use the same language to talk about photography as you do about Thelonius Monk or van Gogh or George Balanchine, Monet, Bach, Brancussi, Maya Angelou, Herman Melville, Picasso, Vladimir Horowitz, Romare Bearden or Sammy Davis Jr. at the Sands.

 

Besides, how can you look at Rembrandt,Vermeer, El Greco, Millet, Cezanne and many many others and not be inspired or atlease learn alot about lighting and color and composition. Why not have a full experience? Why not study at the foot of a master?

Absolutely... but in an unconscious way. I don't go out with the idea in my head to

make a photograph that looks like a Rothko painting, but I have come to realize that I

have an artistic predisposition to make images that, when I look at them later, remind

me of my favorite artists. So yes, I am inspired by impressionists such as Monet, by

post-impressionist Van Gogh and his vibrant colors, by Seurat's pointillism, and by

the abstract expressionists - mainly Mark Rothko, Helen Frankenthaler, and Georgia

O'Keefe.

 

What draws me to these artists and their works is their strong emphasis on color as a

subject and their study of light. Monet made numerous paintings simply to study how

light changed throughout the day and how the change in light changed his subject --

what is more important to us as photographers than the changing quality of light?

Seurat's pointillist paintings are like an early form of inkjet prints. (Ever look at your

Epson printed photograph through a loop or magnifier?) And the way Van Gogh and

the abstract expressionists chose to depict their world with such vibrant, strong

colors... well, we do the same everytime we load Velvia in our cameras.

 

I find it interesting that for so long, painters attempted to make images look as

realistic as possible (just like a photograph, before photography had been

discovered). Then photography caught on and became the primary means for making

portraits of people... so painting turned the other direction, becoming more

impressionistic and abstract. Now there seems to be a trend in photography for it to

become abstract and impressionistic so as to make fine art photography differ from

snapshot-ography. What's next?

Take a look at Paul Strand's photograph, Church, Vermont, 1944.

 

He sets the frame slightly off center. The church at first looks

annoyingly clipped on the right side. Then, if you relax and except

that Strand knows what he is doing, the picture plane comes

alive in a geometry of triangles, rectangles, squares, a circle, a

patch of dramatic sky, a bit of tree. No one dominates the picture

space. The arrangement creates a geometric composition as

complex as any abstract painting.

 

Here Strand activates the entire picture plane with energetic

composition, thinking exactly as a modern painter would. ie. how

do we fill the space and formally activate it at the same time?

The photograph is perfect. And it builds on the arrangements of

space that painting was developing in his day. He could not

compose this photograph in any way different than he has and

get the same effect. Every component is essential. That is as

much painting as photography.

Great minds think alike, I suppose, Keith. I had once submitted almost the same exact question about a year ago, but some "hero" struck it down. I can always count on you to come up with and run slightly different versions of my own thoughts past the obvious progeny of the Hays Office censors. :)

 

Yes, color is paramount in how I am influenced by the great painters.

To me......

 

Edward Hopper - Fuji Velvia

Winslow Homer - Kodak Vericolor III 160

Andrew Wyeth - Kodak Ektar 25 w/ neutral density filter

Salvador Dali - Agfa Ultra 50

John Waterhouse - Kodachrome 64 w/ 81A filter

Roy Liechtenstein - Agfa RSX II - 50

El Greco - Kodachrome 64 w/ 81C filter

Piet Mondrian - Fuji Astia 100

Thomas Kincaid - Kodak Max 400 in a one-time-use camera hand-retouched by a graduate from the correspondence school of painting on the back of a matchbook cover

Alberto Vargas - Fuji 64 Tungsten

Michelangelo - Kodak Portra NC-160

Karin Kneffel - Agfa Optima II 100

Charles Burchfield - Konica VX-100

Maxfield Parrish - Polaroid 669

 

Great question, Keith! I guess this "Philosophy of Photography" is a new category.

Here goes again, with more typographical clarity:

\

Edward Hopper - Fuji Velvia; Winslow Homer - Kodak Vericolor III 160; Andrew Wyeth - Kodak Ektar 25 w/ neutral density filter; Salvador Dali - Agfa Ultra 50; John Waterhouse - Kodachrome 64 w/ 81A filter; Roy Liechtenstein - Agfa RSX II 50; El Greco - Kodachrome 64 w/ 81C filter; Piet Mondrian - Fuji Astia 100; Thomas Kincaid - Kodak Max 400 in a one-time-use camera hand-retouched by a graduate from the correspondence school of painting on the back of a matchbook cover; Alberto Vargas - Fuji 64 Tungsten; Michelangelo - Kodak Portra NC-160; Karin Kneffel - Agfa Optima II 100; Charles Burchfield - Konica VX-100; Maxfield Parrish - Polaroid 669

I especially like the Thomas Kincaid conversion.

What have you got against Kodak Max 400?

Not only painting but music. The photograph differs from the painting in two essentials. The painting is an integration over a relatively long period of time, the photograph is an instant in time. The painter can edit the subject as the picture is painted, rearranging or omitting elements; the photograph includes all that is present at that time in the spatial relationships that existed at that instant.