Popular=Good?

[jeremy jackson]

<p>Forgive me if I've got it wrong but to my count so far we have:</p>

<p>Good=popular: 3<br>

Good not = popular: 7<br>

Both: 1<br>

Don't know: 3<br>

Too chicken to say: me</p>

<p>Throw out the "both" and the "don't knows"; I'll take the side of the majority and so far we have 8 to 3 in favor of good is not equal to popular. </p>

<p>Cheers, JJ</p>

 

[jeremy jackson]

<p>Forgive me if I've got it wrong but to my count so far we have:</p>

<p>Good=popular: 3<br>

Good not = popular: 7<br>

Both: 1<br>

Don't know: 3<br>

Too chicken to say: me</p>

<p>Throw out the "both" and the "don't knows"; I'll take the side of the majority and so far we have 8 to 3 in favor of good is not equal to popular. </p>

<p>Cheers, JJ</p>

 

[patrick j dempsey]

<p>Frankly, when popular things are actually good, I am always surprised. In my experience, the popularity of most things is inversely proportional to it's quality. This also applies to people. Case in point: Keanu Reeves is insanely popular and he also couldn't act his way out of a paper bag with a hole on both ends.</p>

[steve m smith]

<p>This reminds me of a conversation I have had about 'good' music. I came to the conclusion that there is a lot of music which I really don't like which is good and also a lot of music I do like which is technically not good.</p>

<p>Just because you like something doesn't mean it's good and if you hate it, that doesn't mean it's bad.</p>

[william l. palminteri]

<p ><a href="../photodb/user?user_id=5796488">Jeremy Jackson</a> <a href="../member-status-icons"><img title="Subscriber" src="http://static.photo.net/v3graphics/member-status-icons/sub1.gif" alt="" /></a>, Dec 15, 2009; 12:39 p.m.</p>

 

<blockquote>

<p><em>Hey Bill,</em><br>

<em>Let's say we take Luis G's def'n of popular.</em><br>

<em>If popular=good then it follows that the def'n of good=a significant subset of an audience likes it.</em><br>

<em>But, if popular is not equal to good, the original question is answered. All that would remain then would be a specification of the criteria for good.</em></p>

</blockquote>

<p>Hi JJ,<br>

I never equated the two terms.<br>

Popular is what it is, good is what it is.<br>

I see no connection between the two.<br>

In my world, what I see in art (what makes it "good" to me) is vastly different than what the average viewer sees. Not better, not worse, just different.<br>

I often enjoy what is considered "popular" by the general public, sometimes things are so bad they're good because I can't believe the artist got away with it, but usually it's just trash, though.<br>

Anything that hurts my eyes is trash. </p>

<p>Bill P.</p>

 

[michaellinder]

<p>Bill:</p>

<p>"There's no accounting for taste."</p>

[william l. palminteri]

<blockquote>

<p ><a href="/photodb/user?user_id=4164596"><em>Michael Linder</em></a><em> </em><a href="/member-status-icons"><em><img title="Subscriber" src="http://static.photo.net/v3graphics/member-status-icons/sub2.gif" alt="" /><img title="Frequent poster" src="http://static.photo.net/v3graphics/member-status-icons/3rolls.gif" alt="" /></em></a><em>, Dec 16, 2009; 07:33 a.m.</em></p>

 

<p><em>Bill:</em></p>

 

<p><em>"There's no accounting for taste."</em></p>

</blockquote>

<p>Mike,<br>

There never was, never will be.</p>

<p>Bill P.</p>

[luis_g]

<p> In no way contradicting the above, there's more to it than taste, or like/dislike.</p>

 

[jtk]

<p>For me Luis's "memory" criterion (Vs house-afire / living-with-it) is the key:<br />"...<em>the test of <strong>memory</strong>. </em>Is the photograph easily forgotten or dismissed? Does it linger in memory? Do I want to see it again?" <strong>- Luis G</strong></p>

<p>I just finished "On Chesil Beach," a very short novel by Ian McEwan. It barely kept my attention. I put it down and said, <em>"OK, that was nicely crafted.</em> <em>But so what?"</em><br />Here's a review by someone who seemed not to read quietly: <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/01/books/01book.html">http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/01/books/01book.html</a></p>

<p><strong>A week later I remember</strong> "plot" inflection points, visual images, inner experiences of protagonists, can summarize the whole, as well as a lesson about life ( a misunderstanding can change everything forever).</p>

<p>I don't want to read it again, it's not "my kind of novel," I wouldn't save it from a fire, but it was certainly "good." It's popular, among novel readers, too, especially women. :-)</p>

<p>Some photographs live in memory: for example, Bill Brandt's portrait of Francis Bacon at the moment. I made a portrait of an elderly literary scholar, Brandt on my mind, and I need to print it with more care. To me that means Brandt's "good."<br>

<a href="http://jmcolberg.com/weblog/2007/08/personal_favourite_francis_bacon_by_bill_brandt.html">http://jmcolberg.com/weblog/2007/08/personal_favourite_francis_bacon_by_bill_brandt.html</a></p>

[william l. palminteri]

<blockquote>

<p ><a href="../photodb/user?user_id=977570"><em>Luis G</em></a><em> </em><a href="../member-status-icons"><em><img title="Frequent poster" src="http://static.photo.net/v3graphics/member-status-icons/3rolls.gif" alt="" /></em></a><em>, Dec 16, 2009; 11:52 a.m.</em><br>

<em>In no way contradicting the above, there's more to it than taste, or like/dislike.</em></p>

</blockquote>

<p>You bet Luis, WAY more !</p>

<p>Bill P.</p>

[cooltpmd]

<p>Interesting concept, because arguments exist in both directions.</p>

<p>Artists often say that popularity is "selling out". That is a great excuse to be an artist whose work noone likes. It doesn't pay well.</p>

<p>While I believe that most people can recognize quality ... the twilight example shows that there is not 100% correlation.</p>

[luis_g]

<p> When you hang with artists, it's rarely about purity and not selling their souls, or selling out. It's usually about the more pervasive problem of the <strong>lack of buyers</strong> , recognition, paying bills, health insurance, shipping rates, etc. In short, the big philosophical questions.</p>

<p> </p>

[jtk]

<p>The original topic had to do with "good image" ..seemingly not bill-paying or "art". I don't think there's any relationship between any those ideas.</p>

 

[mizore]

<p>Maybe the real issue is good or popular; I think it's influential or popular. The people who might be most influential are those who do things that don't have "democracy of access," but who stimulate other artists whose works are easier to understand. There's a tier below those sets that's people whose work is neither influential nor popular.</p>

<p>I've often wondered, since popular artists and artists with aspirations toward being influential/good go to the same or similar schools, if the popular work doesn't have characteristics that are geared deliberately at repelling certain audiences. Take Thomas Kincade -- he was at Berkeley before transferring to an art school in Pasadena; he doesn't paint badly (he does appear to be doing what he wants to do). Maybe the purpose of his work <strong>is</strong> to make Joan Didion write nasty things about him so his audience will buy more work as part of their cultural identity.</p>

[michaellinder]

<p>I'm not sure that popularity and commercialism are the same. There may be some degree of correlation between the two, but I don't see that one entails the other, or vice-versa.</p>

[jtk]

<p>Michael, I don't think doing commercial work is "commercialism." <br>

Ansel Adams did a lot of conventionally commercial work, but his "art" was more commercially successful. By contrast, Weston abandoned commercial work when he went to Mexico...did his subsequent work, done mostly in poverty, show as much "commercialism" as, say, Mapplethorpe's?</p>

[william l. palminteri]

<blockquote>

<p ><a href="../photodb/user?user_id=1154645"><em>John Kelly</em></a><em> </em><a href="../member-status-icons"><em><img title="Subscriber" src="http://static.photo.net/v3graphics/member-status-icons/sub6.gif" alt="" /><img title="Frequent poster" src="http://static.photo.net/v3graphics/member-status-icons/3rolls.gif" alt="" /></em></a><em>, Dec 16, 2009; 03:19 p.m.</em><br>

<em>The original topic had to do with "good image" ..seemingly not bill-paying or "art". I don't think there's any relationship between any those ideas.</em></p>

</blockquote>

<p>John, what I see Luis saying is that artists have a different value system when guaging a "popular" vs. "good" image. I agree with Luis that people "inside" a profession usually have a vastly different view of their work that outsiders do.<br>

For example, most railroad workers don't like trains, and they especially don't like "railfans", the group of people who DO like trains.<br>

Who woulds thunk it ?</p>

<p>Bill P.<em> </em></p>

[jtk]

<p>William, yes. Great train example!</p>

<p>However, "good" and "popular" and "bill-paying" don't often relate to "good image" (the OT). We do know for whom the notion resonates: it's standard with almost artists (eg early career or failing career)</p>

<p>Obviously, a few VanGoghs do have money or popularity deficiencies, but I don't think that relates to "goodness."<strong> </strong>(the OT).<strong> Do you?</strong></p>

[william l. palminteri]

<blockquote>

<p ><a href="/photodb/user?user_id=1154645"><em>John Kelly</em></a><em> </em><a href="/member-status-icons"><em><img title="Subscriber" src="http://static.photo.net/v3graphics/member-status-icons/sub6.gif" alt="" /><img title="Frequent poster" src="http://static.photo.net/v3graphics/member-status-icons/3rolls.gif" alt="" /></em></a><em>, Dec 17, 2009; 01:38 p.m.</em></p>

 

<p><em>William, yes. Great train example!</em></p>

 

<p><em>Obviously, a few VanGoghs do have money or popularity deficiencies, but I don't think that relates to "goodness."<strong> </strong>(the OT).<strong> Do you?</strong></em></p>

</blockquote>

<p>John, trying to define something as subjective as "goodness" and "popular" is kinda like trying to nail jello to a wall.<br>

I know what's "technically" good, I know what's "politically" correct, and "popularity" can, and usually is, created.<br>

Where would Madonna be without the right publicity machine? Probably washing dishes in a diner in Paramus, next to a 52 year old short order cook (starving photographer).<br>

But to quote the O/P, "Is popular the same thing as good?", the two may or may not have anything in common.</p>

<p>Bill P.</p>

<p> </p>

[mizore]

<p>I think there's a core of what the human brain finds visually exciting without analysis, and the arts play with that. If they get too far from the core of what humans appear to perceive as beauty (see recent research on cross culture values of beautiful landscapes), it loses power. If it's just the beautiful thing itself, it loses complexity, irony, more subtle plays, ways to evoke more complex reactions to visual pleasures.</p>

<p>It may be that learning how to analysis what we see changes brain functions in ways that acting appears to change them (again, studies on line, YouTube has a video of the MRI experiment with the actress). If that's the case, artists do see things differently than the general public in significant ways. I've also met one person who could not enjoy stage acting, who was too aware that those were people pretending, which was probably connected to how his brain functioned. Learning to play music appears to also change how the brain works.</p>

<p>If this is the case, I'd appreciate some citations to follow up on.</p>

[Art X Photography]

<p>The assumption (if that's what it is) or suggestion that popular and good require some correlation with each other is false. What is 'good' is subject to individual tastes, interpretations etc.. this applies equally to photography (art) as it does to fashion, food, music (the list is endless). Popular on the other hand is self explanatory. Popular can be based on curiosity as much as appeal, on collective meaning as much as technical nous. A popular photo may very well have good technical, artistic, creative, applications, and each of those applications may appeal to different collective groups, but it may also be popular simply because of the message being conveyed, or because it symbolises a pivotal moment in history. There are far too many defining parts of the popularity puzzle to suggest one piece fits best. Equally, there are far too many individual interpretations and perceptions to apply a generic/broad definition of 'good'.<br>

So in answering your question Jeremy popular and good are not one and the same but they can be intertwined and often are</p>

[kevin_hands]

<p>Both 'Good' and 'Popular' are views endorsing positive experience but 'good' is about personal congruence with experience; whereas, in my opinion, 'Popular' is a collective congruence towards a positive experience.<br>

If something is said to be good, it is subjective, private, essentially personal and infinately debateable but I think if something is said to be popular, it is beyond debate because it is a statement of fact based upon the collective notion towards something that is inherrently good. </p>

[michaellinder]

<p>Kevin:</p>

<p>Your concept of "popular" is an interesting one, based on a collective consciousness.</p>

[jeremy jackson]

<p>Kevin, I think your response captures the essence of the problem for me.</p>

<p>When we say "I think it is good", we may be expressing a personal, idiosyncratic experience. But should we be? Is this just a wrong use of words? Would it not be better to say: "I like it", rather than "It is good"?</p>

<p>That way we can maintain the distinction between something that is good on the grounds of objective, public, criteria and something we like which is based upon personnal, internal, private criteria. </p>

<p>The point is that we may have come to use that phrase: "That is good" far too loosely in the assessment of art. When our own assessment is personal, subjective, private, etc., perhaps we SHOULD say: "I like it" not "It is good".</p>

<p>However, if we are an artist with training, education, experience, an understanding of the history of art, etc., our judgement that a piece of art is good may well be based on a host of public, objective criteria. In such a case, it makes sense to say "It is good", because that statement can be justified on grounds that are something other than one's own personal, subjective, private opinion.</p>

<p>This is why a person like me might not want to say: "It is good". Because I don't have training in art, I don't understand the history of art, etc., perhaps all I am justified in saying is: "I like it".</p>

<p>Cheers, JJ</p>

[felixg]

<p>Jeremy Jackson: trouble is, <em>there are no</em> "objective, public, criteria" for what is «good». There is only a greater or lesser but always partial consensus of individual assessments.<br>

Those of us "with training, education, experience, an understanding of the history of art, etc" are just one subset consensus. It was people exactly like us who condemned van Gogh as "a creator of meaningless hysterical daubs", and it was people exactly like us who later elevated him to the heights.<br>

«Good» can only be an assessment, not an absolute; and assessments are made by viewers.</p>