A spin-off thread: when is a photo a work of art?

[sjmurray]

<p>It seems this discussion can bog down because people are attempting to define not what is art, but what is “important” art, or something to that effect. I said it before though, most broadly, the human species is endowed with enormous creativity and intelligence. Much of this goes into practical matters such as just solving problems in living, business, science, politics, and so on. But humans also simply enjoy expressing themselves creatively through a wide range of activities (including photography!). Most of the people I know have some kind of hobby that involves creative expression. It makes us feel good just to be able to express ourselves. What I am getting at is the result of this creative expression is “art.” As a culture we do notice when some people have created works of art that impress us for various reasons, such as uniqueness or innovativeness, speaking to our times, and so on. The defining of what puts art into this “exceptional” category is where it gets complicated. We know that people vary in abilities, and I would not doubt that people who become well known artists are often exceptionally creative, and necessarily very focused on promoting themselves as well. Luck and chance and being discovered are part of it too. But in general, I just think that broadly as a species we simply enjoy being able to express ourselves creatively regardless if it for the purpose of achieving fame, or money or notoriety, etc. It just feels good! As a therapist I would also add that creative expression does seem to have a therapeutic effect on people. It allows people to “connect” with the various levels of themselves, in my estimation. As many others have said in this thread: just enjoy yourself, get in touch with your “inner self” and don’t worry about being the best in the world.</p>

[Julie H]

<p>"If you do not change your mind about something when you confront a picture you have not seen before, you are either a stubborn fool or the painting is not very good." <em>-- Robert Rauschenberg</em></p>

[je ne regrette rien]

<p><strong>Steve</strong>,</p>

<blockquote>

<p>Just did not want to leave you with the impression that this is a pointless and barren thread. It has borne some interesting fruit already (tangents) though it may not be what you were striving toward.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>As said, it's not about the thread.<br>

It's more generally related to how we proceed and to maintaining a direction along "the journey".</p>

<p><strong>Steve j Murray</strong>,</p>

<blockquote>

<p>As many others have said in this thread: just enjoy yourself, get in touch with your “inner self” and don’t worry about being the best in the world.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>I do [<em>But then, what are we talking about here? If it is intrinsically impossible to find answers here, we'd better go and practice our craft, as several suggest from time to time.</em>]. Shall we also stop philosophical speculations? Can we exclude any spill-over from speculation to craft practice?</p>

[je ne regrette rien]

<p><strong>Julie</strong>,</p>

<p>I will test it.</p>

[Julie H]

<p>Luca, do you believe that everything can or could be made into art? If I pick any word or object, do you believe that it could be made into (all or part of) art? Or do you think that there are things that are incapable of being made into art? For me, it's unquestionably the former; if I pick any word, say for example, "sneeze," immediately my mind goes to work envisioning sneezing expressions and sounds, testing, turning, querying the subject. I probably won't actually make any art from this effort, but the belief, drive, the <em>appetite</em> is there -- absolutely there -- for me. Any word. Any thing, any noun, verb or adjective or any phenomenon simply indicated by a pointing finger. Set upon it, my mind goes to work like a pack of termites. All of this without looking back to see what "art" is -- what appetite motivates this pack of termites.</p>

<p>Doesn't it motivate you that between the belief that everything could be something that is called art, and the fact that statistically, the amount of stuff that is or might be something that is called art is comparatively so small as to round to zero? Between all and nothing, all that mystery? [if you don't like calling it art, call it Bob.]</p>

<p>Maybe I just need to call Terminex.</p>

[je ne regrette rien]

<p>Julie,<br>

Maybe I am not able to understand the full meaning of your post, but I can try to answer your question:</p>

<blockquote>

<p>do you believe that everything can or could be made into art? If I pick any word or object, do you believe that it could be made into (all or part of) art? Or do you think that there are things that are incapable of being made into art?</p>

</blockquote>

<p>First of all, are we talking just about photographic art here? and thus are we considering whether the image of "everything" can be made into art?<br>

My answer is yes: probably more due to my experience (think of the works of Joseph Beuys, of Marcel Duchamp) than real ex-ante understanding of what art is.<br>

The more I think about it, the more I am sure that a work of art is the product of an artistic process of research and creativity and experimentation.<br>

The "path element" which relates the creative effort and the artistic result.<br>

In photography I don't really know. There are so many photos around and so many authors calling themselves "artists" that I don't really know what is art in photography.<br>

__________________________________<br>

My own photos are not art. I would like to think of my photography as craft with lots of trials and errors and a very small amount of viewable results. I don't pursue producing art, it's not my purpose. I rather prefer call my photos attempts to document.</p>

[Landrum Kelly]

<blockquote>

<p>Luca, do you believe that everything can or could be made into art? If I pick any word or object, do you believe that it could be made into (all or part of) art? Or do you think that there are things that are incapable of being made into art? For me, it's unquestionably the former. . . .</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Why not the former, indeed, Julie? I think that you are dead on correct here. Persons' subjective responses to photographic artifacts will continue to vary, but there can be no <em>a priori</em> claim that something must be out of bounds as art.</p>

<p>No matter how disgusting (to some but obviously not to others), no matter how banal, there is nothing that can be ruled "ineligible" to be called art<em> a priori,</em> prior to experience. Whether persons will continue to call it "art" after seeing it is quite another thing, but so far we have seen no universal criterion or criteria trotted out to adjudge the issue <em>a posteriori</em>, either.</p>

<p>Here is my own feeble attempt to create something artistic out of the totally banal:</p>

<p>http://www.photo.net/photo/13765192</p>

<p>('Twas just an out-of-focus fireplug in the rain, along with its reflection. Dogs like fireplugs, after all. Do their votes count? Is a plebiscite of either dogs or persons relevant <em>a priori </em>or <em>a posteriori</em>? I personally think not. In the example given, I could even ask whether it is more or less artistic from the larger version that it was cropped from, which is not to say that others are going to bother: http://www.photo.net/photo/13756652 )</p>

<p>Where is Fred when we need him?</p>

<p>--Lannie</p>

<p> </p>

[Landrum Kelly]

<blockquote>

<p>whether it is more or less artistic from</p>

 

</blockquote>

<p>I meant to say "whether it is more or less artistic than."</p>

<p>--Lannie</p>

[Landrum Kelly]

<p>Amidst all of this talk of criteria as to what is or is not art lies a potential dark side that we have not really addressed in depth--the ever-present threat of governmental repression.</p>

<p>Governmental repression in all realms is never far from my mind. After posting a new question (on the BART cell phone shutdown) to the Off-Topic forum this morning, I was astonished at the knee-jerk conservative response in the name of "security." That impelled me to ask what <em>The New York Times </em>might have to say. I found only this:</p>

<p>http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/08/12/bay-area-authorities-cut-cell-coverage-to-thwart-protestors/?hp</p>

<p>Now even a news article?? Just a blog?</p>

<p>What has all this to do with art, you say? Everything. From allusions to Potter Stewart in this thread (or the first one--I forget) to other legal cases about defining pornography, some are quick to see the authoritarian implications of too glib a rationale for declaring something "lacking in artistic value" or being "without redeeming social value." I am used to being misunderstood on these matters, but let no one think that the topics are unrelated. When Hitler took over, not only was art regulated, but communications were totally controlled, gays were gassed along with Jews, etc. The list of horrors goes on and on.</p>

<p>I offer opinions as to what I find artistic that others might find quaint, but I am am careful not to say that other things are not art. I only say what I like--I give my typical emotional preferences. I typically like what is wholesome and what seems to have been created out of a sense of "purity of motive." The point of so saying is <em>never</em> to justify repression, however. I impose no eligibility requirements as to what is entitled to be called"art."</p>

<p>Just a few reflections and caveats on a bright Saturday morning over here on the East coast. . . .</p>

<p>--Lannie</p>

[Julie H]

<p>Luca, what if I went all new age on you and claimed that these "things," all of which I just claimed can be made into art ("anything can be made into art"), don't really exist. That "things" are frozen and I'm already gone by the time you get there. That what's going on is all process and relationship and that art makes those "not-thing" processes and relationships apparent -- makes the latent not-thing fabric of living/lived process and relatioinship come to the mind like an image coming up in the developer. All things can be made into art by becoming not-things. By making the not-thing goings-on apparent in a not-thing kind of way (LOL! I don't think Luca likes this kind of talk ... ).</p>

<p>[Lannie, the air in your rainy picture doesn't seem rainy enough to me. The picture should be more humid.]</p>

[Landrum Kelly]

<p>Julie, how can "not-things" be lacking in humidity?</p>

<p>--Lannie</p>

[Julie H]

<p>The quickest way is to use a blow-torch.</p>

[je ne regrette rien]

<p><strong>Julie</strong>,<br>

I read it 6-7 times and now I think I've got it!<br>

And</p>

<blockquote>

<p>All things can be made into art by becoming not-things.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>I think this is very important and true.<br>

Photos which show us not-things are art. A photographer turning the things shown into not-things creates works of art.<br>

The more I think of it, the more I like it.</p>

[DawsonPointers]

<p>Thanx for this thread, Luca.<br /> Due to the interesting geology of the region that I live in, nature tosses rocks out of my backyard that are 'unusual'. One rock looks like a turtle (presented), another like a helmet, another like a dinosaur's head. In the absence of an artist, is it art? Is the recognition of such pieces enough to make them art? Is their accurate portrayal art? What about a sunset? How much deviation does an accurate portrayal differ from an artistic interpretation for the latter to be considered art? Was Ansel Adams an artist or a very good photographic technician? Is a Robert Bateman an artist or a technician recording images using available means?<br /> Regards, John</p><div></div>

[sjmurray]

<p>Luca said:</p>

<blockquote>

<p>My own photos are not art. I would like to think of my photography as craft with lots of trials and errors and a very small amount of viewable results. I don't pursue producing art, it's not my purpose. I rather prefer call my photos attempts to document.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Yeah, but why do you bother to "document" in the first place? Is it not creative expression on your part? How does it make you feel to get a "good one." And the other side of the coin is that even if you don't consider what you do art, you cannot <em>prevent </em>someone else from looking at it and thinking it is art. I learned this years ago when occasionally someone would pull one of my rejected darkroom prints out of the trash begging me to give it to them because they thought it was wonderful. It was art to them. I hope you can see what I am getting at.</p>

[john_macpherson]

<blockquote>

<p>The more I think about it, the more I am sure that a work of art is the product of an artistic process of research and creativity and experimentation.<br /> The "path element" which relates the creative effort and the artistic result.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>There's a brilliant example firing an arrow at a target and hitting yourself in the back.</p>

<p>Want to define for me what an "<strong>artistic</strong> process of research and creativity and experimentation" actually is? As opposed to one that's just "a process of research and creativity and experimentation" ??</p>

<p>Does one need to wear a beret and one of those natty aprons with smudges on it if doing the former? Does that make it 'artistic' and if not why not?</p>

<p>Or does one require an easel to hold one's thoughts whilst engaged in this 'artistic' process.</p>

<p>Mechanics and mechanical engineers (as an example) do this sort of 'research' using 'creativity' and 'experimentation' on their work all the time. Artist or craftsman?</p>

<p> </p>

[Julie H]

<p>John MacPherson, the mechanical engineer is looking for "things" not "not-things."</p>

<p>You're surely familiar with that old saw that goes something like "Give me a fish; feed me once. Teach me to fish, feed me forever."</p>

<p>The engineer has a problem; he is looking for a solution. If successful, he gives us a useful end. The artist goes looking for problems. If/when he finds them, he studies the problem, works with the problem, clarifies the problem, makes it stand out. He's not looking for a solution; he's exploring the "problem" (which he does not call a problem at all; those bumps, skips, jags, blips in the detection chamber, those irregularities, those "problems" are where things are not quite right are where one notices what's all around us all the time).</p>

<p>An engineer's solution to the "problem" of how to make a portrait is the WalMart studios or Olan Mills. You do this, you do that, a portrait is made (a fish is provided). An artist's approach to making a portrait is to see the "problems" presented by each person's face and make a picture OF those problems -- because that's where the particular person is apparent through the face. This doesn't get you "a" portrait; it turns you loose into the wide open terrain of who or what that person might be. (Teaching the viewer how to fish; opening the gates, rather than closing them.)</p>

[luis_g]

<p><strong>John Rowsell - "</strong>Was Ansel Adams an artist or a very good photographic technician?"</p>

<p>For his historical timespace coordinates, he was both. Ansel was a very good Modernist American West Coast landscape artist. Look at all the people who've learned how to slavishly replicate his technical choices (missing the point of the ZS, which was to enable photographers to make their own individual decisions in any direction). Most of them are mediocre to forgettable (if not painfully boring) as artists.</p>

<p>____________________________________</p>

<p><strong>Julie, </strong>kudos for carrying on. This made the thread for me:</p>

<p><a href="../photodb/user?user_id=423641">Landrum Kelly</a> <a href="../member-status-icons"><img title="Subscriber" src="../v3graphics/member-status-icons/sub10.gif" alt="" /><img title="Frequent poster" src="../v3graphics/member-status-icons/3rolls.gif" alt="" /></a>, Aug 13, 2011; 02:35 p.m.</p>

 

<p>Julie, how can "not-things" be lacking in humidity?<br>

--Lannie</p>

 

<p ><a name="00ZBMO"></a><a href="../photodb/user?user_id=3885114">Julie Heyward</a> <a href="../member-status-icons"><img title="Subscriber" src="../v3graphics/member-status-icons/sub4.gif" alt="" /></a>, Aug 13, 2011; 02:44 p.m.</p>

 

<p>The quickest way is to use a blow-torch.</p>

 

<p>Zen burn!<br>

___________________________________________________</p>

<p><strong>John McPherson - "</strong>Mechanics and mechanical engineers (as an example) do this sort of 'research' using 'creativity' and 'experimentation' on their work all the time. Artist or craftsman?"</p>

<p>Neither: Engineer/Mechanic. We have different words for specific reasons.</p>

<p>Julie explained this to John brilliantly, and though I could add a few smidgeons, I won't bother. But I did love his ridiculizing the artist with this:</p>

<p>"Does one need to wear a beret and one of those natty aprons with smudges on it if doing the former? Does that make it 'artistic' and if not why not?"</p>

<p>Which would be like saying:</p>

<p>Does one need to be the guy gazing at the engine room while his family is on deck enjoying their cruise, forget to get as haircut for months, think those yawning around them actually need more sleep, fix the electric chair before their own execution, the boss has several fail-safe firewalls between them and all clients, think that if it ain't broke it doesn't have enough features, etc. to be an engineer? Does that make it 'engineered" or not?</p>

<p><em>(Thanks, Internerd)</em></p>

<p>__________________________________________________________</p>

<p>Luca, a dead-serious question: How do you know your pictures are documentary?</p>

 

[User_4136860]

<p>Why are photographers so worried if their work is "Art", and seem to have such an inferiority complex about their photographs , the whole concept that photography is anything but craft is a relatively new concept originally promoted by photography galleries and photographers agents who were trying to sell their work and they have now begun to believe it themselves, even the Old Masters never considered themselves "Artists" in the modern sense but craftsmen like stone masons, wood carvers etc. were at that time.<br>

I often laugh to myself when I see people I know who are beginners who as soon as they can produce recognizable images of people and object call themselves "art photographers" and start growing goatee beards and I marvel at their capacity for self deception.<br>

I do however believe that some photographs can approach art in the conventional sense but very few and don't believe that any of mine in more than fifty years of photography have had that distinction.</p>

[john_macpherson]

<p>Whilst I enjoyed both of your eloquent responses, its interesting that neither of you addressed the point made by Luca I was seeking clarification of:</p>

 

<blockquote>

<p>The more I think about it, the more I am sure that a work of art is the product of an artistic process of research and creativity and experimentation.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Thats a real conundrum (in the proper sense of the word) for me. Who defines the process as 'artistic' with which we are then able to define that the 'processor' is an artist?</p>

<p>There's an implicit acceptance in the statement made by Luca that I find remarkably naaive (for want of a better word), and somewhat at odds with his probing and questioning and stated demand that things be defined.</p>

<blockquote>

<p>Seldom are definitions given. Agree on definitions was one of my purposes here. Apparently without success.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>So, what IS it that changes a "process of research and creativity" in to an "an artistic process of research and creativity"?<br>

Simply attitude, the beret and fancy smock? </p>

<p>And I'm not entirely sure, but did I detect in both your responses a feeling that engineering and mechanics cannot be creative?</p>

[Landrum Kelly]

<p>Luca, you have been documenting what you decided to see.</p>

<p>--Lannie</p>

[Landrum Kelly]

<p>Julie, I was hoping for a somewhat warmer approach to solving deficiencies of moisture than a mere blowtorch could possibly provide.</p>

<p>--Lannie</p>

[Landrum Kelly]

<p><strong>VARIATIONS IN CONNOTATIONS OF THE WORD "JUST," VOL. LXVIII, no. 23</strong></p>

<p>I would just like to document that I just discovered this work which someone else just simply created!</p>

<p>http://www.photo.net/photo/13830574&size=md</p>

<p>--Lannie</p>

[ilkka_nissila]

<p><em>So, what IS it that changes a "process of research and creativity" in to an "an artistic process of research and creativity"?</em><br>

When it has no utilitarian purpose. Engineers develop machines to help solve the practical problems that mankind has. Artists do not seek to solve a practical problem.</p>

[DawsonPointers]

<p>Maybe artists do seek to solve practical problems when they try to figure out how to achieve a result. I remember reading about how Graham Nash and his collaborators worked on a printing process so they could express themselves the way that they wanted to. That solution was to a very practical problem. Also, is a theoretical physicist working on the origins of the Universe an artist? It isn't a practical problem but it involves creativity and imagination.</p>