Adrift

aplumpton · February 8, 2010

"Arthur, I don't agree that philosophy exists apart from human experience, but you seem to believe otherwise. Please explain." (John)

I hope I didn't ruffle your feathers with my teasing comment, John. No, I don't believe what you think I believe.

I imagined that you would understand the difference between a "determinant" form of art or photography (theatrical, image set-up, or a scene deconstructed and reconstructed according to the will of the artist) and one at perhaps the other end of this spectrum, where the photographer observes a passing scene and chooses the photographic conditions under which he will record it.

On a related point: It is probably in the nature of these Internet discussions that much gets mentioned that is not continued or developed. I often miss the more rigorous debate format or chaired discussions where a topic remains live and continuous in its development. This is hard to achieve in our forum. We often are argumentally "adrift".

Norma Desmond · February 8, 2010

Phylo, I've never been happy with the typical definition of Philosophy as "love of wisdom" but I can definitely get behind "making goddamn sense" as a working title! ______________________________________ Luis/Julie, On one simple but significant level, I'm fascinated by transitions and in-between spaces regardless of what they mean and regardless of how they relate to the porousness of the frame. Just in themselves. I find myself working with the edges of my shapes often and intimately. I'm developing a gut feeling when shooting about what is right next to each face, even when it's far in the background. What color, what shape, what light. And how that will look and feel when photographed.

Then we've talked about connectedness from photograph to person (photographer/viewer). With territory still to explore.

In either context, Julie, I don't quite understand the fiction/nonfiction distinction. I'll give it a try. Using Plato, certainly the "story" is a fiction, the cave, the guys in the cave, the guys walking behind those guys, the fire . . . all fictions, creations of Plato's mind. Fictions told to tell what he believes is a nonfiction, a truth. And he uses that fiction because he thinks many people hearing it will be brought closer to the truth. So, yes, the fiction is the characters and the setting, but the nonfiction is how they work. (Plato thought the nonfiction was the higher order of Being, the Forms. I disagree with him there.) But the method of the allegory seems a nonfiction. And many of the "truths" told in photographs are nonfiction.

The nonfictional (?) part of my post is continued by Luis. The things he and I see in common, to me, are not fictional. They connect us. Some viewer could wonder whether one woman is my sister, guessing what the situation itself is. One figure might remind a viewer of her own sister and that will all lead to emotional reactions. Those could be fictions, but that's a spin I wouldn't make. I just consider it to be what people do with their imaginations. When Luis talks about the eyes gazing outside the edge of the frame, that seems less a fiction. If he started imagining what she might be looking at, he could be going toward fiction, but his analysis itself seems factual to me. Not everyone will talk about what they see in those terms. That doesn't matter. I think viewers will still be affected by that state of affairs, whether they consciously realize it or even think about it or not. Many viewers will say, "I don't want to analyze it, I just want to look and enjoy" and that's fine. But that doesn't mean the eyes leading them out of the frame isn't having a nonfictional effect.

Luis talked about simultaneously binding and freeing us. Makes sense! There are things Luis and I can talk about that show that we are bound to an extent by what we see in common. And those same things free us to go with our imaginations wherever we will.

In the terms you're speaking of, Julie, I can't actually think of any purely nonfictional element here. I think perhaps Luis is getting to a more physical (is physical what you mean by nonfictional?) explanation in his later paragraph that starts with "For me, the image field/print surface tends to define space . . ." It's definitely a place to go and fits right into the discussion. This kind of physical description is very significant to our relationships to photographs.

Julie, when I started the thread I wasn't considering the fictional/nonfictional distinction. To me, most everything that's been discussed has both aspects, almost by necessity since we're talking about photographs. You say, "I thought we were trying to get at the nonfiction connectedness -- feeling of continuity -- that joins the space in the photograph and our (real) selves outside the frame." Honestly, the notion of a "real" self would be a Philosophy thread in itself, and you'd have to convince me there is one. It may be precisely that thinking of the self as something contained (and contained inside the body) would make it difficult to see the connection to what's in the frame. When we can diffuse that self and see it more experientially and not bound within the confines of the body, we will perhaps better understand this connection. ;))

Norma Desmond · February 8, 2010

Arthur, I'm glad you've articulated the idea of "being adrift" as a state of mind. It's a key one. I've often found my own path to be one of alternately breaking down order into chaos and then reorganizing the chaos into some semblance of order. I drift back and forth among the states in-between those. As focused a person as I've tended to be, losing focus is a liberation.

Interestingly, when planning shots is discussed, a little bell goes off. I don't plan shots like many photographers do, deciding on location in advance, or lighting, etc. I think probably more and more that may happen but likely that prepared a method will never dominate my photographing. At this point, even my most intentional of shots have often come about somewhat haphazardly. I go out walking around town with someone whose picture I want to make (sometimes a friend, sometimes an acquaintance, sometimes someone I've met through a craigslist ad for subjects I've placed) and stumble across spots that seem suitable and, together, we make something happen. Or I'm with a friend and the right situation comes along and I ask if I can take their picture, always being open to moving them into a position I find compelling and photogenic. I'm not the kind of guy who hesitates telling someone where to sit or stand, getting their face to catch the light the way I want it, even having them make fairly specific gestures if I feel like it. Sometimes that's just not appropriate, like in the case with the two women I linked to above, and the photograph is more candid than usual for me.

When I learned to play piano, I was taught to "practice" not in order to become rigid, but in order to allow for the freedom I needed to express myself when I was playing an actual piece of music. Perhaps my classical music training and exposure helped further my love for those in-between spaces, especially the space in the piano keys between all the way up and fully depressed, the depth of the keys where the magic happens. Some see classical music itself as somewhat rigid because one adheres to a "script." The challenge and thrill is finding the freedom within those boundaries. It can sometimes seem more free precisely because it's also bound. Like Luis said.

luis_g · February 8, 2010

Arthur typed - " On a related point: It is probably in the nature of these Internet discussions that much gets mentioned that is not continued or developed."

That is true, but we can take actions to reverse or at least reduce the losses. Many tantalizing sideboards and points often get glossed over for several reasons, or are derailed by any of a multitude of reasons. Circling back and re-posting some of these may help. Reviving a derailed thread is next to impossible.

fate_faith_change_chains · February 8, 2010

Not to make this not about our own methods, but you might want to look into the excellent book Moving Out about the work and ways of Robert Frank, because it touches on much of the same matters discussed in this thread. From the introduction :

The restlessness that pervades both the man and his art has consistently forced him to rebel against repetition and stasis, as well as all that threatens to confine, define, or pull him backward. Struggling to stretch the boundaries of expression, he has actively courted tension, chaos, and a lack of control, pushing himself, both literally and methaphorically, to the edge, moving out and on. Particularly in recent years, his films and photographs have been characterized by a questioning and agitated spirit, and a need to challenge - even to destroy - as much as to create.

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I think that it's indeed the case that we as photographers either redefine the medium, to constantly go towards ( not necesarilly at ) the next level, before the medium defines and dictates our limits as photographers. Being constantly adrift.

aplumpton · February 8, 2010

Interesting points. The being adrift or freedom Fred mentions as one plays music, between the un-depressed and depresed key or keys or chords, or between the suggested rigidity of the music sheet and the moment and manner of interpretation is perhaps a good analogy for the adriftness of thought possible in those spontaneous moments of photography.

One of the reasons I love shooting with my viewfinder or rangefinder cameras is the opportunities sometimes present in that gap between all-exposure-decisions-having-been-made and the moment of image capture, not obscured by mirror movement or long shutter delays. So often, when following movements of subjects within a scene, we have that space between confirmation of focus and exposure (even when pre-set) and the moment of capture. We are sometimes following the concurrent movements of several subjects, but at one point everything looks right in the movements and the overall scene composition and the final depression of the shutter button is made. That in-between period sees much happening, but only one part of that (the interpretation) is chosen.

The same adriftness or change can be witnessed in more extended periods of pre-exposure, in the manner Phylo has suggested in giving the Frank reference. Thanks. Elsewhere, adriftness in discussion can also be useful in bringing up interesting points not ear-marked by the theme, and as you sugggested, Luis, circling back and re-posting is sometimes beneficial in following up such thoughts. I wonder how many great works or inventions have been created without circling back to re-evaluate priorly held hypotheses or thoughts. Probably not too many.

jtk · February 8, 2010

"I imagined that you would understand the difference between a "determinant" form of art or photography (theatrical, image set-up, or a scene deconstructed and reconstructed according to the will of the artist) and one at perhaps the other end of this spectrum, where the photographer observes a passing scene and chooses the photographic conditions under which he will record it." - Arthur

Arthur, why would you "imagine" that anyone can "understand" your ideas if you don't use reasonably standard English?

If you intended to discuss "determinant form" you would have said so. You said "determinism" ... entirely different. Your "ism" indicated directly that you "believed" something mystical was at work, rather than your own decisionmaking. Your further assertion that you could observe without influencing drove that point home. I don't accept your photographer-as-ghost, "philosophy" as unattached to life premises.

Fred, why bother to speak of "philosophy" while inventing a non-standard meaning for the word? That's a pattern. Why not us words with reasonable accuracy? By detaching "philosophy" from "wisdom" you seem to mean that "wisdom" is not attached to your work. My impression is that you hold conflicted ideas about this, do want to do significant work but don't want to be fully credited with it. Who else deserves credit, other than you?

I don't "understand" the point of reliance upon entirely quirky, personal, non-standard (= anti-communicative) word usage. The concepts in this thread are simple. The prose, however, is prolix (Catch 22).

aplumpton · February 9, 2010

John, mea culpa, my original mention of determinism was not as "Determinism" but rather as a quasi-synonym of determinant. Not the first time in my humble existence that I have enjoyed playing with words. I was taken over the coals by my doctoral examiner many moons ago for having invented three non-standard technical words and expressions to explain some rather muddy phenomena. When acquiring my second language (at 30 and primarily"in the street"), I quite often assumed some meaning for a French word that was proven a bit "distorted" when I finally got to the dictionary.

Forget the ghost-like imaging process, I was refering to the difference between a pre-conceived or "theatrical" photographic approach (a process known to most artist-painters) and that made more "on the fly" without any attempts to "set-up" the scene.

Julie H · February 11, 2010

The red dress a fortiori holds with all its fibers onto the fabric of the visible, and thereby onto a fabric of invisible being. A punctuation in the field of red things, which includes the tiles of roof tops, the flags of gatekeepers and of the Revolution, certain terrains near Aix or in Madagascar, it is also a punctuation in the field of red garments, which includes, along with the dresses of women, robes of professors, bishops, and advocate generals, and also in the field of adornments and that of uniforms. And its red literally is not the same as it appears in one constellation or in the other, as the pure essence of the Revolution of 1917 precipitates in it, or that of the eternal feminine, or that of the public prosecutor, or that of the gypsies dressed like hussars, who reigned twenty-five years ago over an inn on the Champs-Elysées. A certain red is also a fossil drawn up from the depths of imaginary worlds. If we took all these participations into account, we would recognize that a naked color, and in general a visible, is not a chunk of absolutely hard, indivisible being, offered all naked to a vision which could be only total or null, but is rather a sort of straits between exterior horizons and interior horizons ever gaping open, something that comes to touch lightly and makes diverse regions of the colored or visible world resound at the distances, a certain differentiation, an ephemeral modulation of this world -- less a color or a thing, therefore, than a difference between things and colors, a momentary crystallization of colored being or of visibility. Between the alleged colors and visibles, we would find anew the tissue that lines them, sustains them, nourishes them, and which for its part is not a thing, but a possiblity, a latency, and a flesh of things.

-- Maurice Merleau-Ponty, The Visible and the Invisible

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Norma Desmond · February 11, 2010

But I think it drifts way beyond what I thought we were/are talking about in this particular thread. --Julie

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Julie, I appreciate the quote and it fits in very nicely with the thread. In your previous post, you felt we had drifted from what we were talking about and I don't see that. I felt as if we were pretty much on the same wavelength throughout, so that post of Feb.8 at 5:13 a.m. surprised me. Perhaps you think Merleau-Ponty's description is somehow more physical(?) than some others given here. I don't, though I think it's beautifully conceived. I'd have to know specifically where you think you and I parted ways in order to address that. I find Merleau-Ponty's description allegorical myself (remembering that we're just taking this paragraph out of context), almost Platonic . . . Redness . . . "the fabric of invisible being."

Julie H · February 12, 2010

I can't think how to explain better than the earlier post. If "nonfiction" doesn't get it, maybe "tangible," "physical" or "material"? I thought we were discussing how the ... "actual" (?) "stuff" of our common existence (well, I'm already in trouble ... ) runs ... "through" pictures; binds them or weaves them (pictures) into our immediate, shared world. There are no walls on the container.

I'm not so interested in the psychological/meaningful where it does not have physical continuity within the physical landscape from which pictures are taken. For example, what Merleau-Ponty describes is not a landscape that is (necessarily) continuous with its various parts. It's a sharing of psychological or meaningful "common-ness" but not of my lived in time/space continuity.

I love the Merleau-Ponty quote -- and I also very much agree with what you and Luis et al are saying. I think it's true, but I don't think it's very useful (in the same way and for the same reasons that I think Minor White's teachings are inspiring but not very useful). To me, a discussion of material continuity would be useful.

Nevertheless, if I can't have my way (boo-hoo!), I'll go along with the thread wherever it leads. Inspiration is always good ... and can be useful in and of itself.

luis_g · February 12, 2010

Julie, please continue with the physical/material continuity angle. It certainly has its place in this thread. There's a gradient of positions or angles on this topic and all of it is interesting and potentially useful. Have your way, Julie, and take this thread wherever you want to. Maybe a few URLs to pictures (not necessarily yours) that you think exemplify this, with some analysis might help to clarify.

Julie H · February 12, 2010

Okay, Luis, but this is your fault. I don't have good luck trying to explain this kind of thing in a forum.

(1) Looking at a photo, if, in your imagination (ignoring date/time limits), you could zoom back/out from the scene shown, would it ever reach you? Can you make it include you? Is its ground capable of being the same as yours? And if "yes" then (2a) if you then imagine it turning into a frame in a motion picture -- it starts moving, flowing -- where (would you imagine) did you enter the scene? What is your point of entry? How do you gain entry, access to that space? If "no" then >> (2b) what is blocking your access? What is preventing you from being there or sharing its space? I am interested in thinking about why/when/how (1) happens with a picture and if so then I am interested in knowing how to control it; to make it happen if/when/where I want it to. To be able to know when I want people to get "into" the picture, when I don't want them to, and how to make it (whichever I choose) happen.

I think there is a continuum of possible shared spaces -- from a picture space that is entirely inaccessible -- it keeps me, leaves me, places me, wants me to stay outside; to a space that is easily accessible -- available like a public park; to a space that is so available, I'm in without effort -- it envelopes me; it's inside out. None of these are "better" than the others. I like pictures in all parts of this (hypothetical) continuum; it's nothing to do with the quality of the picture, but I think it has a great deal to do with how a picture works. Knowing, consciously as opposed to intuitively, as much as possible about how pictures work is, in my opinion, a very valuable tool for a maker of pictures to possess.

If I break this continuum into three arbitrary categories ( for the purposes of discussion only), there would be [examples are a random off-the-top-of-my-head and from a quick flip through Szarkowski's Looking At Photographs; I reserve the right to change my mind]:

First, pictures that I can't get "into"; that I can't "find" the space in which they are happening. In this category, you might find a lot of (but not all) abstracts, many (but not all) faceless nudes but also (in my opinion), some of the colder (less peopled) urban scenes, and even some portraits. Photographers whose work (sometimes) falls into this (arbitrary) category either don't care/need to join the viewer's "space" or they may actively work to disconnect, unplug and detach. On purpose. Because that's precisely what they are after. Please note that I am talking only about space, not emotion or meaning. Examples of this type might be most but not all of Irving Penn's work (except the Picasso portrait), Minor White, Friedlander, Harry Callahan, Steichen, Michael Senna.

Second category is full, real, easy, immediate engagement. I can , do and will get into the space of the image with minimal effort -- it will invite me in. Why does this space feel available, open, accessible? Texture, natural colors, natural handling of (gravitational) weight/balance, natural variations in sharpness/focus, compositional handling of lines/shapes that draw one in, and so forth, physical gesture or eye contact, etc. Examples would be Irving Penn's Picasso portrait, Brassai, Helen Levitt, Lartigue, Arbus, Doisneau, Koudelka, Edward Weston (whose nudes I think are very much in my space where most are not).

Third category. I'm not sure I can explain this one except to say that the photographer has gone right through our shared space, right through the second category and come out the other side. He/she has invested such intense attention, emotion; given up so much, that the space contains the photographer. One only meets him/her in the mind. Space has started to melt ... Though it may sound similar to the first category, I think it's very different; these photographers are, in my opinion, very thoroughly invested in this world, these places, our space. Examples would be Robert Frank, Bill Brandt, Manuel Alvarez Bravo, Boubat, Ansel Adams (yes, I do think he belongs down here).

luis_g · February 13, 2010

[ I'll gleefully take the blame for encouraging this densely packed meaty morsel of a post. Some of the best things are hard to explain.]

I'd say yes to (1).

Julie - " I am interested in knowing how to control it; to make it happen if/when/where I want it to. To be able to know when I want people to get "into" the picture, when I don't want them to, and how to make it (whichever I choose) happen."

This makes XXXXL assumptions about "people". Some are going to walk freely, like ghosts, through your walls. Others will be walled off by your invites. At best, this can work on a statistical basis.

Julie - " I think there is a continuum of possible shared spaces..."

Agreed.

Julie - " Knowing, consciously as opposed to intuitively, as much as possible about how pictures work is, in my opinion, a very valuable tool for a maker of pictures to possess."

For you, Fred, and zillions of others, yes, but not for everyone. There are many ways of working and knowing besides yours -- and mine. I think the quality of many elements in a picture inevitably plays a part in this.

Julie - " First, pictures that I can't get "into".; that I can't "find" the space in which they are happening. In this category, you might find a lot of (but not all) abstracts, many (but not all) faceless nudes but also (in my opinion), some of the colder (less peopled) urban scenes, and even some portraits. Photographers whose work (sometimes) falls into this (arbitrary) category either don't care/need to join the viewer's "space" or they may actively work to disconnect, unplug and detach."

I see a theme, figurative, to be precise, in this category.

Julie - " I reserve the right to change my mind"

Hmm. Who knew? :-)

That first category is heavy with Modernist ideas. I do not see how Friedlander fits.

The second category... Lots of Levitts do not fit. Most of Arbus, and quite a few Koudelkas.

The third apparently does have to do with picture quality. Transcendence comes to mind.

One thing Julie held out on was providing specific examples, URLs to pictures exemplifying each (or at least one?) of these categories and walking us through it so we can see this conscious knowledge at work.

Thanks to Julie for another thought-provoking post.

Norma Desmond · February 13, 2010

Julie, thanks, that gives me much more to go on. As Luis put it, I think we're within a gradient of positions (aptly stated considering the diffused nature of the topic).

One of the ways I will feel physically invited into the frame is through the in-between spaces I've been talking about. Of course, as you say, nothing will apply universally, but consider less sharp edges in a portrait. As an example, and there are many others: I find these days, and particularly on PN, there's a tendency to over sharpen eyes. That's because people have heard that the eyes are the window to the soul. So it is thought that any way of drawing attention to them will make a better portrait. Which is, of course, untrue. When I'm "confronted" with too sharp eyes, I physically recoil from the frame. It's not the way I see others' eyes and it definitely keeps me out, not just emotionally, but physically as well. Yet, drawing attention to eyes more subtly, perhaps with light that seems to be emanating from outside the frame, is more likely to move me physically past the frame into the space of the subject.

You mention texture and I think that's a key, not just the individual textures of surfaces but the "texture" of the photograph itself, which I've likened to the color of an orchestra playing . . . the sense of each section of the orchestra exploiting so well its own characteristics, blares of trumpets with violin tremolos and accompanying rhythmic percussive undertones along with a steady cello and bass breathiness. The internal relationships of visual elements in a photograph will either open up the space to make the viewer a part of it or distance the viewer who becomes observer and not participant.

Composition seems very important here, as we've discussed in other places. An implied geometry which includes the photographer/viewer can be intentionally set up, I believe. I think a dynamic perspective will often make the viewer feel more a part of the scene. Shooting up at something has, usually, a more beckoning feeling than shooting down, though not universally so of course. I think, for instance, of a German Expressionist style male figure in raincoat and hat shot from a window above standing next to a lamppost with long shadows. Often comes across objectively, distanced, a closed set, a completed scene. Then there's the Nosferatu kind of large looming shadow on the wall, often shot from below, the shadow emanating from a light source below the main figure. Generally seems to open up the space more. There's often a dynamism to this kind of shot where a viewer might even feel as if the scene will eventually drown him.

Envelopment, therefore, can be crucial in my feeling a part of the space. One example: As photographer, when I become aware of what's behind me, perhaps the people in my scene are looking not just at me but beyond me or through me, then I become part of the composition. Obviously many other ways, but I think the emotional and psychological "placement" of myself as photographer in the scene will have a great effect since so often the viewer will adopt my physical position, the one I had as photographer. I think this is why so many not-so-great street photographs leave me cold. Because the scenes have been found, come across, looked upon rather than participated in. And that's a physical thing, not just an emotional one.

I'd draw attention to a distinction between more voyeuristic photography and more participatory photography. The reason is, that's something I've worked with from the time I first started shooting. Normally, one thinks of a voyeur being on the outside looking in, behind that little keyhole. That would suggest a salacious distance. I've tried often to work with voyeurism and intimacy together, a voyeurism that will actually bridge that distance and allow us, while looking at, also to be with, a voyeurism that perhaps recognizes and admits itself, that allows itself to be both outside and in . . . perhaps somewhere in-between.

Julie H · February 13, 2010

I don't have time to answer properly this minute, but I am ridiculously pleased that both Luis and Fred have so exactly understood what I was trying to say. It will take me a while to digest it all. Fred, your post -- it's too much! I don't know which part to pursue because it's all worth developing ... Hopefully, I'll be able to sort out a rational answer by tomorrow morning. How rare and wonderful to be given too much to think about ...

Back to Luis, yes, yes, and no, but yes, and ... where was I? ... no! Bring me a Levitt picture that's not accessible! (Side note: on looking through her monograph that I have, I'm noticing how clothing/clothes -- old, worn, cheap, torn, familiar, tactile. always used, never new ... are somehow ... disarming, endearing.)

On Friedlander, I confess to putting him in the first category by mistake. For some mysterious and unexplainable reason, I have, for as long as I can remember gotten him and Ralph Gibson mixed up. I know, I know; How? Why? Anyway, and nevertheless, I am going to try to insist that Friedlander still belongs in that category based on the one monograph of his that I own which is his nudes. They're so ... uncomfortable, so contrived. Interesting and in most cases, beautiful pictures, but not accessible. Comfortable is not quite the word I want nor is "at rest" but something like "right where it belongs" ... is how I find Weston's nudes and why they go in the second group. (I have to laugh, though. In one of the Friedlander pictures, the otherwise nude lady is wearing a soft of satiny blouse which has fallen open -- to reveal its laundry label. That one, I find accessible ...)

Thank you both, Fred and Luis (and anbyody else ... ?). To be continued ...

Julie H · February 14, 2010

How are Friedlander's nudes different from Weston's? I'm going to use question this to sort out and hopefully illustrate some of my ideas.

"Friedlander's not pretending to know these women, nor is he promising that we can, even with the right-in-your-face-perspective that he gets. That's what makes me trust his pictures. They're about his curiousity." HIS curiousity.

"Why only women? Friedlander's answer is that he's not curious about men."

I'm not going to link to any of the Friedlander nudes, but you can find them if you do a Google Image search on his name and "nudes." I think that Friedlander was interested in the idea of the (human) female, of femaleness, of showing what is utterly, purely, female. Many of the pictures include front-and-center female genitalia and yet I don't find this to be pornographic; it's simply an essential and central part of the idea that he's portraying. And, in my opinion, doing so very well. The pictures are femaleness embodied. 
　
How is this different from Weston's nudes? Where Friedlander was curious about (interested in discovering) the female, I believe (and I don't think it's controversial to claim) that Weston loved the female person. Loved. With female and person being equally important -- and the body being the embodiment of an autonomous loved being, not a "curious" idea. 
　
So, backing up to generalities, I would say that my (arbitrary) category (1) includes pictures motivated by curiousity. By discovery, by ideas. They the display that says, "Look!" of "Think!" They don't require a shared space; they often specifically want to take you out of time/space. The light, the colors, the postioning, the mapping of the image contents belongs to, is made by, controlled by the photographer. He imposes his requirements on the scene. He uses the scene. 
　
In my (arbitrary) category (2) on the other hand, where I have put Mr. Weston, the motivation is, in my opinion, love -- or, if you are not a loving kind of person, caring about. A lot. Really, really caring. I think Levitt loved her streets. I think Weston loved his nudes and his shells and his peppers and his dead pelicans. Their light and their colors and their positioning belong to them (to the nudes and the shells and the peppers and to Levitt's people in the streets) not to the photographer. (To those of you who are new to photography who think you just push the button and the light/color/positioning will belong to them ... don't I wish that were true! It's the photographer's job to know the light/color/positioning that will/does belong to the material in his photographs.) The stuff in this kind of space is alive, autonomous, loved. See Fred's description of the "color of an orchestra playing ... the sense of each section of the orchestra exploiting so well its own characteristics..." It's OWN characteristics. In this kind of picture there is a sense of joining an ongoing story, a narrative that belongs in this space, that makes this space. As I said in my previous post, the material, beings and things, should look like they are "right where they belong." 
　
In looking at a lot of pictures that I think are of this type, I agree very much with Fred that a view from a "normal" human height or lower seems characteristic and advantageous (inclusive). Texture, over and over again, seems absolutely critical but also, as I've already mentioned, colors and light must be dead-on correct (and what makes it "correct" is what will torture you in your image-editing ...). The bottom edge of the image frame also often seems to be critical. The ground needs to be there and be (seem) solid, and materially correct. Asphalt has to look (feel) like asphalt, same for concrete or grass or dirt. As an example of a failure of this, I find that in many of Martin Parr's city pictures, the street's look like they're made of plastic. They're not ... gritty, hard, abrasive. [An odd, and sort of silly feature that I find in many especially open pictures is that I can see the feet of the people shown. Seeing their grounded feet seems to give me a sensation of "weightiness" that works to confirm or prove the space. Where they are cropped at the knee or waist, I don't get that.] 
　
The third (arbitrary) category (3), seems to me to be an extension of (2). But here, I think the photographer has become a player, been enveloped, moved by, involved in/with the scene. He's gone beyong love and into pain, joy, sorrow ... Where the first category (1) the photographer imposes, or uses the material to convey an idea, in this category, the photographer is imposed upon, is used by the material to convey an exclamation, a cry, a howl ... He may be building but it's a building out of memory, not out of curiousity. It's built from emotion and response.
The light, the colors, the positioning belong to the material but it's skewed. It's a too bright, or a too dark, colors are bending to a mono-tint. Shapes may threaten to burst the frame, things blur ... but not as if you have conformed the content; rather as if your own vision was distorted by particular emotions. Texture becomes localized, particular. I get a sense of being struck, hit, assaulted from some pictures of this type. The picture is aggressive; it advances.
Given my descriptions above, where would you put Meyerowitz's Cape Light series? Is he curious about the nature of those luminous, not-quite-real colors? Is he imposing his ideas to make us look and think ... or is the Cape imposing its light upon him and his pictures are an overwhelmed cry of joy? (1) or (3)? [i'm thinkinga about it ... ]

aplumpton · February 14, 2010

Alas, little time at present to read these very erudite and thoughtful recent posts (borrowed computer; however I will print them out for later reflection), but one thing occured to me which I sort of hesitate to mention as it may be either trite or too obvious. But, here it is anyways.

We are using purely physical means to transfer non-physical information. Whether it is the physical or mental significance of the color red or a Weston nude (which I also love for their humanity and beauty), what is being received is a non-physical response on the part of the viewer. Whether it is the Weston nude, or his very captivating portrait of Tina in anguish (in tears), that particular physical portrayal (photograph) is going to be perceived and interpreted on the mental plane. That some images speak to thousands or millions, and others only to the few, is not to denigrate the latter, but to realize that either the particular image is misconstrued (of little expressive value), or that it is perhaps really only of value to a few. The variability of human response is important. An astrophysicist speaks more clearly to another astrophysicist, a mathematician to a mathematician. Taking that to a personal level, I am not so concerned in speaking to everyone via my photographs and probably shouldn't expect to. To be truthful, I am my own 'client' in many cases, but also one looking for 'sharers'. The great photographers may well have the same starting point.

luis_g · February 14, 2010

Julie stacked the deck with " Bring me a Levitt picture that's not accessible! (Side note: on looking through her monograph that I have, I'm noticing how clothing/clothes -- old, worn, cheap, torn, familiar, tactile. always used, never new ... are somehow ... disarming, endearing.)"

Wait...I didn't say they were inaccessible, and by "do not fit", I meant the category as defined, and by that I did not mean in an absolute sense (am I backpedaling yet?). Given all that, Julie gets down to the clothing.....well.....I'm not going to even try to argue against that. Here's some that are less accessible to me (By this I mean nothing negative. I am personally taken with Levitt's work):

Yeah, I know...on the cover of her book, and one I love, but it makes me feel as an outsider looking at a little mystery play.

http://www.laurencemillergallery.com/Images/Levitt_tribute_spidergirl.jpg

Here's another, a very uncharacteristic picture by H.L. (geezus, now that I'm scrutinizing them with accessibility in mind, they all seem more porous...I'm scraping...)

http://digitalgallery.nypl.org/nypldigital/dgkeysearchdetail.cfm?trg=1&strucID=612723&imageID=1260308&word=levitt%2C%20helen&s=3&notword=&d=&c=&f=4&k=0&lWord=&lField=&sScope=&sLevel=&sLabel=&total=1&num=0&imgs=20&pNum=&pos=1

This makes me feel like the outsider-type voyeur Fred talks about...

http://collections.mocp.org/detail.php?t=objects&type=browse&f=maker&s=Levitt%2C+Helen&record=4

I'm seeing that Julie wants to adress nuts and bolts in this accessibility thing (until category III, where transcendence dissolves the usual fetters). More to think about...

Julie H · February 15, 2010

Luis,

I agree that the first one (spidergirl) is uninviting. However, I think that picture is a failure. Very interesting, and I can understand her attraction to it -- it has some wonderful qualities, but ultimately my mind/eye wanders around and finds nothing to hold my attention.

The second one -- boo! hiss! Bottom of the barrel, indeed. That can't be part of her art portfolio.

The third one -- I disagree totally. Structurally and emotionally, I find this one very accessible. Beyond the woman's solidity and intent with all the checkering going on, look at that wonderful paper wrapping and string on her package. [i have to add, though, that in her 2008 monograph that I have I can find about half a dozen pictures that are not accessible. They are not among her best work.]

Fred,

I have an anecdote I think you may enjoy:

I was, this morning, reading an long online essay (about art, as usual) when, in the middle I ran into this paragraph:

"Restlessness is a crucial factor in these artistic investigations. By restlessness, I mean the way the artwork—be it a book, a database, a building, a garden—can activate your imagination by offering to your mind a system of artful imbalances and implied possibilities that are available for patterned completion within your own imagination with reference to what you already believe to be tested and true in reality. Supreme examples of this aesthetic of generative incompleteness can be found in Zen temples and gardens, where the visitor experiences environments that seem ‘charged' with a powerful integrating ‘urge', a flowing potentiality for overcoming incompletion. The urge presses in response to something that is implied rather than shown. To be precise, the urge arises in the visitor; not in the environment. The visitor often feels compelled to imagine a pattern cohering across and between the essential elements and the artful absences that have been offered or extracted for appreciation. Even though the larger pattern is not explicitly present in the deliberately ‘unresolved' space, it is available because the abstemious offering of extracts prompts the viewer's urge to complete the inherent pattern. This urge often helps the viewer feel inseparable from the environment, to feel responsible for and attuned to some flowing integrity in the domain under consideration."

And I'm getting all twitchy and impatient as I usually do as soon as I see "Zen," and thinking this sounds just like Luis and Fred; very inspirational, but not useful, darn it. Where does the rubber hit the photographic road in all this fluffery?

And right there, as if reading my mind, perfectly anticipating my nuts-and-boltsy materialism, the author goes on:

"In Zen treatises this connective drive is often called ma (see Nitschke 117). Applied to contemporary Western experience it might be dubbed the forensic impulse."

" ... forensic ... "!! Well now. There is some major road-rubber. Clues. Evidence. Solutions. It's a detective story! I'm loving it. And feeling pretty sheepish that I am so easily bought ... Never underestimate the power of word packaging ... Goes to illustrate that the word "in-between-ness" has in-between-nesses of its own.

The quoted article ends:

" ... all these artworks are poetically forensic and extractively realist; they inkle out the resonant details and the immaterial relations that really matter, that galvanise a scene and keep the artist and the audience allied to reality. In this tense but thrilling interplay between the urge to select and the urge to combine, the artist can make sure that a provocative, contentious, continuous and pinpoint-efficient realism is always playing out."

I just love "poetically forensic"!!

[The essay is <a href="http://www.australianhumanitiesreview.org/archive/Issue-November-2009/gibson.html">Extractive Realism</a> by Ross Gibson]

Getting back to business, I think that this Helen Levitt photograph:

<a href="http://unrealnature.files.wordpress.com/2010/02/levitt_color01.jpg">http://unrealnature.files.wordpress.com/2010/02/levitt_color01.jpg</a>

... is an interesting example of what we've been talking about -- both groundedness and in-between-ness. First: he central man's body language is ambiguous, but to me it strongly implies his awareness of somebody (the photographer, now the viewer) outside the frame. The way he is partially, but not fully turned to the boy, and, especially, his outstretched hand. The gesture of that hand. There is a cicularity there with him as intermediary between ourselves and the boy and between ourselves and his space.

Second, think about why Levitt left all that structural stuff on the right. You might think that the center should be somewhere between the man and boy, not right on the man's head. Notice how she's carefully included a bit of horizontal in the lower right corner that advances to you (those are garbage can tops, I think, not the ground, but it serves the purpose). Also notice what all the lines, patterns and structural supports work to do to "shove" the image back out to meet you.

Norma Desmond · February 15, 2010

Julie, I think a couple of things need to be brought up for consideration.

Especially important is that I want to distinguish between "getting into something" on the one hand, and the porosity of the frame on the other, two different matters. A good place to start is by making a clear distinction between continuity and outreach or frame transgression of subject matter and continuity and outreach or frame transgression of photograph.

I think matters of taste are also becoming obvious here. For example, I often find Zen gardens and temples very uninviting precisely because of many of the things you've described. Depending on my mood, I am often wanting to be led on a messy voyage through a garden or temple/church, with lots of little nooks and hidden crannies to explore. I am more likely to find the kind of porosity and continuity I'm talking about in spaces of fullness rather than spaces of incompleteness or sparseness. For me, this is less about what's left up to me as the viewer and more about where I'm led and how I'm taken there.

For me, this is about continuity to the image and to a space beyond the image, not just my space. I think, if we want to stay "nonfictional", we might have to talk some about differences between content and form with regards to frame porosity.

Though I think we're touching on something significant, there seems to be more of a slant toward being drawn in, toward us being connected to what's inside, which I think is only half the story, the half you told in your description of the Levitt photograph with man and boy and outstretched hand. When I see it as you're describing it, it doesn't just connect the man (and perhaps the boy) to me as viewer or suggest a connection between the man (and boy) and photographer, it pulls me (as viewer) out of the frame and away from the man as well, and not just inwardly, toward myself and my own space. The kind of connection I'm talking about is expansive, which is why I lean toward the word "envelopment" rather than connection. It's not just that it somehow binds my space and his. It creates or at least deals with space that is well beyond the viewer and the subject.

We'll have to have another thread to discuss just how "useful" or not inspiration is! ;))) . . . To be honest, I still don't see much difference in the way you're approaching this as opposed to the way Luis and I have been from the outset.

Your description of the ground and the texture of asphalt is interesting but, I find, a bit specific and narratively focused. It's too reliant on a supposed realism for me to relate to in this context. When I talked about each section of the orchestra exploiting its characteristics, I was talking more forensically than narratively. In talking about photographic texture, I was thinking of the use of photographic elements, not narrative elements like "asphalt." I meant the interrelationships between focus/blur, color/tone, perspective, composition, contrast, light, shadow, gradients, angles, content too. For me, whether or not a realistic depiction of asphalt would work toward the connectedness we're talking about would depend on many things, and I can as easily imagine a non-realistic depiction of asphalt connecting me physically and, even more, providing that feeling of envelopment that I like to come back to. The color of an orchestra is the sound of an orchestra, not the melodies it's playing. The texture of a photograph is about the relationship of photographic elements to each other, not just to the content.

I don't make the connection between Weston's work and love or humanness more than with Friedlander's work. A case could be made that Weston is beautifying. On the other hand, Friedlander is relying on our existing love for what we see presented as is in order to connect us.

Norma Desmond · February 15, 2010

Arthur, I have trouble relating to your idea of a nonphysical response. I think the mental plane is a physical plane. I think that suggests and probably even allows for the continuities we're discussing. To some extent I wonder if I'm not searching, both in this forum and in photographs, for a language that helps undermine a strongly inherited tradition of separating the supposedly "inner" subject from the supposedly "outer" object.

I agree with you that many great photographs will only appeal or work for a few. I think there's also a great likelihood that some photographs will speak only to a few because they're bad photographs. And, of course, many what I would consider bad photographs appeal to a lot of folks. See PN top-rated-photos for countless examples.

I think it's good that you've brought up the variability of human response. Some of that will be genetic, some cultural, some experiential. Some of that is taste. And it will effect this greatly.

I think the great photographers have as many different starting points and motivations as we all do.

aplumpton · February 15, 2010

Fred, I understand what you are referring too. In fact, everything in the world is indeed physical, down to the neurons or whatever that carry our brain signals or "mental operators" and influence or control our thoughts.

However, my distinction was that a two dimensional physical object known as the photograph (or electronic image) is interacting with our emotions, values, established principles and tastes, or intellectual concepts. The bridge between the two (what, how, why of that "bridge") and the resulting form and content of the communication between the two (the apparent deconstruction of the physical image and the reconstruction of the feeling or mental reaction in a viewer) is of interest to me. If it fits into the subject you are addressing (and I still need to immerse myself in the responses to date) that is good. If not, and/or if it is more global in its scope, then it might be the subject sometime of another post.

Norma Desmond · February 15, 2010

Arthur, I understand the clarification, thanks. I hope you will have a chance to review the thread and join in.

Julie H · February 16, 2010

Fred,

I need to pick your brain on three bits from your response to me. First a disclaimer/apology -- when I am trying to sort stuff out -- sniffing the air and searching for the scent -- I can sound (and probably am ...) abrupt, rude, not-very-nice. I promise you that nothing could be farther from the truth. I get this way when I am intensely interested in what we're after (very much the case here). So, if any of the following is irritating, I apologize in advance. It's not meant to be.

First bit: you (Fred) said, "... this is less about what's left up to me as the viewer and more about where I am led and how I'm taken there." Can you tell me whether it's "led" or "taken"? Those two words are different to me. The first is an exterior, the second is an enveloping, overwhelming.

Second bit: you said, "... it pulls me (as viewer) out of the frame and away from the man [in Levitt's picture] as well, and not just inwardly, toward myself and my own space." What is "it"? I just want you to try to fill that in/out, if you can. The verb "pulls" seems to require an agent; to not be about space or a state of being. Help me understand.

Third bit: you said, "It creates or at least deals with space that is well beyond the viewer and subject." What's the role of (your) memory in the conception of that space? Does this space require that you make an effort toward something unremembered, something developing, coming into consciousness or is it somehow there and simply recognized? Or is it a rearrangement of your own space out of memory -- to accommodate, make room for, join to -- the picture's space?

Is this something the picture does to you? Are you passive and it overtakes you or is this a meeting-in-the-middle? Either way (which is it?), does the picture, via this interaction (whichever or whatever direction it develops from) rearrange, reconfigure the space that you are in NOW? Is this a case where "because" that space has happened, you've recognized it, known it, and experienced it (!), therefore this/you, your now-space is different? Is this a "because >> therefore" reconfiguring of your idea of where (and therefore, somewhat, who/what/why) you (really) are?

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