How we feel about what we do

[vrankin]

<p>Alan, I'm giving away lots of framed prints (and camera equipment), too. It's very rewarding and liberating! Ironically it has also put my work on more walls.<br>

As to the current technical requirements of camera club submissions - we're asked to keep file dimensions down to 1024 pixels on the long side. It's a real equalizer. 8 MP of resolution ends up being plenty good enough.</p>

[danielheller]

<p>Howard - sorry to hear that you had to throw away that stuff. Kids do not see the value at least not when they are young, and perhaps never. Some wake up to realize that they have nothing to hold in their hands or to memorialize, and then it is too late. How do you know your images would not have been someday "...valued for their historical and technical merit...". These things happen way after... maybe... or maybe not.<br>

Alan - I can fully sympathize with you about your work hanging in the garage... My wife did not want to hang my oil paintings in the living room. Not that she did not like them, it was just, you know, the colors did not match the color of the couch... EDUCATION. We fought a little bit, my ego was deeply hurt, but I got over it.<br>

Marc+1</p>

[vrankin]

<p>Thanks Dani, for your compassionate comment. Actually as a self-taught photographer I did a lot of experimental work in the early years. My more matured eye recently told me that much of it frankly wasn't that good. But it did teach me a lot about the various technical aspects of light, metering, camera controls; about choosing films, chemistry and paper that would ultimately shape my better work. There is still plenty of the good stuff from each decade, even after pitching so much out. I saved the better work that will leave a more significant record of our children and their child. There may still be some "aha!" moments for them, when I'm gone.</p>

[charleswood]

<p>So if the spirit of an age is overly materialistic and individualistic we'll have the same in that culture's art, like the merely representational art in the Socratic sense of Emin's dirty mattress where a fellow with some skill get's attention for having nothing much to say in his significant space. Most of us having nothing much to say in art or otherwise really, and our individualistic age is oddly marked by our mediocre repetitions of images valued for the comfort they bring as in a sunset, any one just like the other, not individual at all, not individual enough for anyone to particularly care. But if you have something to say that isn't common, you'll find a way to say it, art or otherwise, and if you don't, you aren't an artist really. It's all about what you have to say, and most images on photo.net don't say much at all. The question then is, how do we find something worth saying? Something that isn't just the lowing of the herd, and if you had it to say, the question is also, why would you say it?</p>

[Norma Desmond]

<p><em>"if you had it to say, the question is also, why would you say it?"</em></p>

<p>Something to say . . . and to show.</p>

<p>Why? To be seen, to be heard, and to engage people in dialogue. To increase visibility and awareness of certain others. Also as a personal means of catharsis, an outlet.</p>

[AlanKlein]

<p>It's all been said before. <em> There is nothing new under the sun. </em>Only adaptations of what was.</p>

[charleswood]

<p>The thing is I like the herd part of me too. But I think that to be more, and to have more to say, one has to come out, come out, wherever you are and stop pretending with everything and just come out. The reason we communicate is that we are compulsively communicative as a species, call out every little thing the way birds do, or so I say to excuse myself.</p>

[charleswood]

<p>Alan, is that from Every Picture Tells a Story (Rod Stewart), what you said about that it all's been said before?</p>

[AlanKlein]

<p>The <em>Book of Ecclesiastes.</em> </p>

[charleswood]

<p>I understand that book is quite old.</p>

[AlanKlein]

<p>Yes. No photos.</p>

[dan_south]

<p>John Cage's 4'33 isn't music. It's a social experiment, like the emperor's new clothes. It identifies those who are comfortable enough to admit the truth.</p>

<p>If you would like to hear some music, listen to Steve Reich or Edgar Varèse. Both are more influential than John Cage.</p>

[sarah_fox]

<blockquote>

<p>It's all been said before. <em> There is nothing new under the sun. </em>Only adaptations of what was.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Alan, the world around us changes every second of every day, and it will continue changing forever more.</p>

[AlanKlein]

<p>It changes, but there is nothing new.</p>

[sarah_fox]

<p>New: <a href="http://www.graphic-fusion.com/phphotoop01sm.jpg">http://www.graphic-fusion.com/phphotoop01sm.jpg</a></p>

[charleswood]

<p>Quoted by Alan<em> -There is nothing new under the sun.</em><br /> <em><br /></em>As I get older the burden of my past, my experiences, and my coalesced understandings tempt me to express myself with pat, weighty sounding nuggets that I've found just dismissively wrap up my disappointments with a grey bow. If you catch me doing that please thump me on the head and yell "Wake up!"</p>

<p>Rene Daumal "Far within me, where the memory of what I am is still unclouded, a little child is waking up and making an old man's mask weep. A little child looking for mother and father, looking with you for protection and help - protection from his pleasures and his dreams, and help in order to become what he is without imitating anyone." Come out, come out, wherever you are.</p>

[AlanKlein]

<p>Maybe I've reached the point where if I can get small satisfaction out of something I created and make someone else smile a little because of it, then I've accomplished enough. Maybe a lot. The big dreams of conquering the world seem to have been quieted in me.</p>

[danielheller]

<p>The big dreams should always stay alive.</p>

[Allen Herbert]

<p>"There is nothing new under the sun"</p>

<p>Capture a moment of us...you and me and our fellow travellers.</p>

<p>We are all still hidden in so many ways.</p>

<p>See what you can find about us.</p>

<p>A journey of adventure/ discovery about us.<br>

.</p>

[AlanKlein]

<p>Dani: I said the big dreams have quieted in me. But, I still have ego; I'm not dead yet! Also, the big dreams have shifted from conquering the world, a self-centered pursuit for the most part, to something more spiritual, more giving. Maybe I'm feeling this way because I soon turn 69 on Feb 1st. One seriously starts reflecting on life and its purpose and what's really important. </p>

<p> </p>

[Norma Desmond]

<p>Alan, some of us are simply talking about learning or saying something new (with our photography). That doesn't have to involve having big dreams or changing the world. You talk of something spiritual and more giving, which I can respect and relate to. Let me give you an example. I had a photo shoot with three friends this weekend, two of whom have volunteered to be subjects for me in the past and seem to enjoy doing it with me. One I was being introduced to that day. After the shoot, I got an email from one of them and I'll reproduce what he said to me:</p>

<p><em>"I enjoy working with you. It is very relaxing for me and a great opportunity to examine myself. The guys I have introduced you to do not normally get opportunities to work with artists like you and I think it is good for them as well."</em></p>

<p>That's not changing the world, it's not a big dream, but it is accomplishing something new and significant, obviously in my friend's mind and in mine also. I'm as focused on getting photos that mean something to me (and others) as I am on sharing the experience with the people I photograph. It's about sharing, relationship, and new pics, pics of individuals each of whom has value as such, as an individual and as part of a greater whole.</p>

<p>Each of us will determine our "purpose and what's really important." For some, it will be a bigger picture, for some a smaller. But the question is whether there are new things to experience and discover (about ourselves and others). I think there are and would be lost if there were not. Someone who's never been photographed and spends a day doing so with a photographer who cares is experiencing something new, as is the photographer. The pictures, if decent, may convey some of that.</p>

<p>I try to remember that no one quote or book of the Bible gives the complete story. Neither does the Bible itself. But even if one believes it's all there in the Bible, one might be better off not picking and choosing but instead grasping the gestalt of the entire book, which goes well beyond the laws of Leviticus and the pessimism many read into Ecclesiastes.</p>

[AlanKlein]

<p>Fred: I think we are agreeing with each other more than we disagree. Your positive experience with your friends is exactly what I'm talking about as well. It is that photography can be, should be, used for more than getting a 7 in the critique section, although there is nothing wrong with that either. Certainly I enjoy, need, an "atta boy" as much as anyone else. </p>

<p>What I am saying is that other things have started to become more important to me as I have gotten older and reflected on the empty feelings that often remain in spite of the mundane successes in life. There's got to be more than that. Ecclesiastes speaks of those feelings in a poetic way. However, rather than seeing pessimism in what he says, as some do, my take is that it is a enlightened guide to things that really count. And with the entire book attempts to take us away from the <em>I</em> to the <em>thou</em>. It flips the whole purpose of life from satisfying oneself to following God. </p>

<p>Quite amazing and meaningful if you can get there.</p>

[Norma Desmond]

<p><em>"What I am saying is that other things have started to become more important to me as I have gotten older and reflected on the empty feelings that often remain in spite of the mundane successes in life."</em></p>

<p>Alan, I can get behind this. But that's not what you were saying at first at all. What we're questioning is your assertion (through Ecclesiastes) that nothing is new under the sun. That's a completely different matter than your asserting that as you age your priorities have changed and that mundane successes don't matter as much. You've provided good reasoning for your current feelings about success and new kinds of positive experiences as you age. You've provided no reasoning, other than a quote from the Bible, for the idea that nothing is new and that everything that's said has been said before.</p>

<p>Just look at what you're currently saying, which is so relatable: <em>"other things have started to become more important to me"</em></p>

<p>The way I see it, that's a change in your experience and approach to life. Things are changing for you. Everything is not the same.</p>

[AlanKlein]

<blockquote>

<p>You've provided no reasoning, other than a quote from the Bible, for the idea that nothing is new and that everything that's said has been said before.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>I was explaining Eccesiastes. If you don't agree with what he meant, that's OK. But I don't have to provide some outside source to prove what he said is true and meaningful to me. My experiences are in line with his thinking. Maybe yours aren't. That's OK too. We all experience things differently.</p>

<p>In any case, maybe this interpretation can explain what he meant in more detail about nothing being new under the sun. I think most people who've lived a good while will identify with much of what's written.</p>

<p><a href="http://www.bible.ca/ef/expository-ecclesiastes-1-4-11.htm">http://www.bible.ca/ef/expository-ecclesiastes-1-4-11.htm</a></p>

[vrankin]

<p>Alan, that is an interesting open source commentary on Ecclesiastes. A few things are assumed that could be questioned. Though the writing is attributed to King Solomon, we really have no solid textual or historical evidence of that. The text itself identifies the writer as Koheleth, translated "preacher" with the historical "Son of David" perhaps a pseudonymous addition. Though the commentator interprets Ecclesiastes' assertion to be that life without God is meaningless, and God gives life meaning, God is neither named nor acclaimed anywhere in the text. It seems to other scholars that the conclusion of the writer of Ecclesiastes (the wisdom) is that since life is short and rewards are at best unsure and only empty ("vain") in the end, we should take pleasure in our work, our food and our drink while we are alive on the earth. This is ancient sage wisdom from the East: the value of simple pleasures, which brings me ironically back to the beginning question of this thread! So photographically I would say, being called an artist and receiving accolades for one's photography is pleasurable for a moment, but unreliable and not given to all who deserve (therefore "vain" or empty). Enjoy the images you are given to make while you walk under the sun. This is good enough.</p>