are photogs nutcases or passionate fools? are they slightly more mental than your average jane/joe?

[leslie_cheung]

ok.  this is not so imporatant, but wants to see others' perspectives

here.  i recently saw AUTO FOCUS and ONE HOUR PHOTO and it seems in

the movies,

that photographers are portrayed as nutcases or/and

passionate fools.  thinking

back on differents films with photogs:

 

HIGH ART:  druggie : leica m4

GUINEREVE:  women lover? : hassy/ nikon f2

METROLAND:   youth revolutionary :  nikon f/

rolleiflex/kodak retina

SPY GAME:   cia/sniper :  leica m4-p/ nikon fm2

BLOW UP:  fashion shooter : nikon f?

ADDICTED TO LOVE:  passionate fool meg ryan with

leica m6

AIMEE AND JAGUAR:  jew revolutionary / some leica screwmount?

UNDER FIRE:  pj with leica and bunch of nikon f2?

YI-YI:  kid with a canon leica copy?

THE UNBEARABLE LIGHTNESS OF BEING:  binoche with a practika?

these are off the

top of my heads, i'm sure there's more photog

flicks.

 

so...are photogs

slightly more crazy/passionte than the average joe/jane or

is it just in the movies?

ps. i try to post this in the general photo form, but it was rejected

for reasons i don't quite understand

[donald_brewster]

Well, uh, yeah. And don't forget the greatest photo movie of all time by John Waters titled "Pecker". I can't remember the camera used by the title character.

[bobtodrick]

There are probably no more 'nutcases' photographers than any other endevour. They don't make movies about the perfectly normal, well adjusted 'person next door' (not often anyway).

[gee-bug]

The Pecker RF was a <a href="http://www.cameraquest.com/pecker.htm" target=_blank>Canonet 28</a>.

[vic_.]

From the movie HEAT:

Vincent Hanna (Al Pacino): So you never wanted a normal life?

Neil McCauley (Robert DeNiro): What the f*ck is that? Barbeques and ballgames?

 

From the movie CON AIR:

Garland Greene (Steve Buscemi): What if I told you insane was working fifty hours a week in some office for fifty years at the end of which they tell you to piss off; ending up in some retirement village hoping to die before suffering the indignity of trying to make it to the toilet on time? Wouldn't you consider that to be insane?

[robert goldstein]

I HATED "Pecker." It was so loaded with self-consciously quirky characters that I could not accept any of them.

 

Movie stereotypes aside, I think it is fairly obvious that passionate photographers tend towards obsessive-compulsive thinking and behavior. Whether or not this tendency is greater in photographers than it is in people with other passions (e.g. golf) is uncertain, at least to me. Perhaps there are some psychologists in the house who can enlighten us on this subject.

[vic_.]

I haven't seen Pecker, but reading the reviews on Cameraquest reminded me of Jean-Michel Basquiat. Here are some comments on him by Robert Hughes, the Australian art critic who lives in the US:

 

"The only thing the market liked better than a hot young artist was a dead hot young artist, and it got one in Jean-Michel Basquiat, whose working life of about nine years was truncated by a heroin overdose at the age of twenty-seven. His career, both actual and posthumous, appealed to a cluster of toxic vulgarities. First, the racist idea of the black as naif or rhythmic innocent, and of the black artist as "instinctual," someone outside "mainstream" culture and therefore not to be rated in its terms: a wild pet for the recently cultivated collector. Second, a fetish about the freshness of youth, blooming among the discos of the East Side scene. Third, guilt and political correctness, which made curators and collectors nervous about judging the work of any black artist who could be presented as a "victim." Fourth, art-investment mania. And last, the audience's goggling appetite for self-destructive talent: Pollock, Montgomery Clift. All this gunk rolled into a sticky ball around Basquiat's tiny talent and produced a reputation."

 

My comments: Is/was there such a phenomenon in the photographic world? My artist friends are still blown away by sharp rise and fall of Basquiat. I think a movie was made about him.

[Rob F.]

"are photogs nutcases or passionate fools? are they slightly more mental than your average jane/joe?"

 

This looks like an artificial, forced dichotomy.

 

---Or, as Audrey Hepburn said to Robert Wagner in "Love among Fools":

 

"Is that all you have available?"

 

---Bob Fleischman

[Rob F.]

Oops. Make that "Love among Thieves."

[jsbc]

What is AUTO-FOCUS?

 

Anyhow, I finished reading a couple of photog books a while ago. Not the Shutter-babe, but a more realistic one the Bang Bang Club which talks about PJs who risked their lives in South Africa during Apartheid and after. It seems that (1) Good photography demands the photographer to be involved - not just as a bystander. Not necessarily emotionally, but even knowing more about the subject matter makes the photo better-informed and composed (2) many photographers are dedicated, perceptive and passionate by nature, that's what's draw them into the hobby /business. Photography is an outlet for the emotions they already have.

 

I think all true artists need (1) a creative vision, way of thinking, that is out of the ordinary (2) an ability to execute this vision. These are the pre-requisites. Whether this unique vision spread to other aspects of their lives, well, it may. But it is the business of Hollywood to exaggerate things.

 

Johnson

[leslie_cheung]

rob---

 

i didn't mean to make a forced dicotomy. personally, they are very

similar. a nutcase is an extreme case of passionate foolishness in my

book, much like robin williams role in one hour photo.

 

---billy

[Alex_Es]

Friends,

 

Artists in general are "nut cases." If you think photographers are strange hang around a clatch of poets for a while.

 

A couple years ago I heard a lecture about shamans. The upshot of it was that the artist is a modern shaman--and shamans wherever you go are difficult people and outsiders.

 

So there we are. Be happy that we are fullfilling a social function.

 

Speaking of movies, remember the photo journalist in Apocalypse Now?

 

Best,

 

Alex

[ralph_barker]

I think Alex came close to nailing it with, "Artists in general are 'nut cases'." It is often the artist's inability (or, unwillingness) to simply accept things as they are that is a driving force. (Those who can, become monks.) Or, sometimes it is a matter of greater sensitivity or perceptiveness. But, in fairness, I think photographers pretty much cover the full spectrum, as well. Some are artists with great sensitivity, or social consciousness, some are photon engineers, and some are view salesmen.

 

I've not heard of a photographer who cut off his ear, however. ;-)

[terry_rory]

Pardon?