WEEKLY DISCUSSION #23: Duane Michals - singing women / singing men

[Mark Z]

<p>Julie, I like the idea of Michals using some cubism in the photos. As you said, he seems interested in time, whether through a sequence of images or multiple exposures, or in the case of the singing men and women, different perspectives on the same subject. Kind of like the way Duchamp tried to solve the problem of motion in painting. It could be he was also addressing the surrealist quality of photographs. He admired Magritte, a surrealist, and Michals might be commenting on photos in a "this is not a pipe" sort of way. He tells us the people are singing, but we don't hear any singing, and in fact there aren't even people. The photo is a surreal image, black and white, two-dimensional, and is actually not people singing.</p>

<p>He seems to reverse the thought in a photo from one of Stefan's links, called "There are Things Here Not Seen in This Photograph". In one of Stefan's links is a quote from Michals: <em>"But photographs fail all the time and all I did when I started writing in my pictures was to respond to the limitations of the medium. I don’t write captions. Captions tell you what you are looking at, but my texts tell you what you can’t see. I’ve always thought that photographs don’t tell you enough. They describe very well. But when I write, I am pointing at things that can’t be seen. All this came from the frustration I felt about the silence of the still image." </em><br>

<br />Sarah and Stefan commented on the differences in appearances and gazes of the men versus the women. The women do seem to be looking into the distance, possibly focused more on the aural experience, whereas the men seem to be more aware of each other and more engaged visually. It could be a comment that men are generally visual creatures, and women are more in tune aurally.</p>

[Landrum Kelly]

<p>If I were a writer of fiction, I think that I could start a novel with some of these scenes. I am imagining, for example, if I had met <strong><a href="/photo/16594355&size=md"><em>Tess</em></a></strong> in a situation similar to that portrayed by two men--not necessarily a back alley, but on a sidewalk somewhere. In fact, she came into my ethics classroom ten minutes late for that meeting and almost two weeks into the course--in order to add the course at the last minute. The class just stopped when she pushed the door closed behind her, and I looked at her as if I were transfixed. If I had met her on a more or less empty sidewalk anywhere, I would have had to have stopped to look back as well. Different situation? Every encounter is different in some regard.</p>

<p>Thank you for an interesting choice, Stefan. I will say more when I have had time to read a bit more.</p>

<p>--Lannie</p>

[aplumpton]

<p>Perhaps surrealism is a better analogy than cubism, which mentally deconstructs a subject from different angles and then reconstructs it, but maybe the three singers are a good example of a sort of graphical serialism (normally applied to music, as the structural principle according to which a recurring series of ordered elements (like the three individuals engaged in like activity, or in a row, like in music examples) are used in order, or manipulated in particular ways, to give a piece unity. One can see one singer rather than three, as if Michals is in fact describing a singular person or condition.</p>

<p>Another who applied cubism to photography was Picasso, who inherited a camera with a broken lens. The fractured image results amused him and some say that this led to the invention, with others, of cubism.</p>

[charleswood]

<p>From Fred's link to some of Michals work: http://www.photo.net/casual-conversations-forum/00cY2Q</p>

<p>Paradise Regained. Begins clothed. Ends with the 'fig leaf' shielding the guy, but the woman's privates are exposed. As I read that origins story, the fig leaf was how god knew they were aware of themselves, they of course being Adam and Eve. So has Michals not finished his sequence? Why wouldn't he expose 'it' in a 7th exposure and show both subjects exposed? True, the he subject is exposed to the her subject and his exposure is hidden from only our view. But didn't A & E only cover themselves when they heard god coming, not covering themselves from each other? So is she in paradise and the he isn't? The problem is, the she is the only of the two subjects exposed to us, and so I think Michals left a conflict in the photo itself, which isn't paradise, conflict being present still. The problem is, the failure perhaps is, that the photographer left 'it' covered from the viewer, leaving the viewer to wonder why. That's a problem. I mean, it's not a problem that I can't see it, I just think it should be there. Did he think that with women there's nothing really there to see so why not show that area?</p>

<p>Anyway, there's a lot of personal stuff exposed in his work.</p>

[charleswood]

<p>ooops, I meant the link to be: http://anthonylukephotography.blogspot.com/2011/06/photographer-profile-duane-michals.html</p>

<p> </p>

[Landrum Kelly]

<p>Charles, I think you've linked back to the thread.</p>

<p>--Lannie</p>

[machts gut]

<p>I must admit I am impressed by the willingsness and involvement to react on photos that are perceived as less strong in Michals body of work (no irony here). A german proverb says: "Stille Wasser sind tief" (still waters run deep).</p>

[AJHingel]

<p>I'm not sure there is much "stille wasser" around and if there is, it is shallow, unless someone invents it to the benefits of a discussion like this.</p>

[machts gut]

<p>For small fish like me it appears deep.</p>

[charleswood]

<p>Is <em>A Letter From My Father</em> (ALFMF) considered a stronger or weaker work of Michals?</p>

<p>Since Michals augments the image with text, ALFMF might be one where Michals thought the image didn't convey enough without the added text. That's interesting because although the photo doesn't tell a story replete with details it nevertheless strongly suggest that there is a story drifting in the air that surrounds these three family members. Each subject's expression is serious, there is no eye contact between any of them. The mother's gaze is a disconnected, powerless gaze off into the indifferent distance, her look the most distant and disconnected, conveys to me that she is there in body only and that her spirit has long since been quelled, surrendered to the father's immutability.</p>

<p>The father looks at his pictured son and that son looks resolutely downward and away. All mouths are closed, set in frowns. The parents are in the same plane suggesting that they stand together on an issue that exists between them as parents with their son, the son in the foreground suggesting that there is a son/parent conflict of a sort. Though the parents stand in the same plane suggesting they are on the same side in the conflict, the mother leans away from her husband, telling body language, telling me that her role in these situations is to do her duty as the father's wife and stand with him.</p>

<p>In the conflict, the parents are linked to each other and behind them is a suggestion of how that linkage feels to the sons: feels like a brick wall. Communication is not going on here, conflict and differences prevail in the moment, and trying to communicate at such times can feel like hitting one's head against a brick wall. I think Michals' presentation in the photo is concise. It looks like, from the mother's expression, that she isn't necessarily happy with the stand she is taking with the father, her expression looks like a resigned and unhappy support for the father, required support. Although she gives that support her body language shows her leaning away and that she isn't linked to the father by a physical touch. Nor does the father touch her. Nor does the father touch the son, nor the mother touch the son, nor the son touch either father or mother. They just stand there in their moment of conflict and consequent emotional isolation, affectionless. It looks like all are required to be there, but don't want to be there really.</p>

<p>And Michals wants to say something to us about that touchless communication. Was his text necessary to the story or does the photo succeed on its own? I'm not sure I would have picked up on the issue of lack of affection without the words. You?</p>

<p> </p>

[Norma Desmond]

<p>Charles, interesting thoughts and questions worth pondering about Michals's <a href="http://createbuilddestroy.com/wordpress/?p=8621">PARADISE REGAINED</a> series. I wonder if it doesn't go along with his more circumspect and even somewhat closeted/clandestine approach to gay themes in his work. Of course, this is a very heterosexual mythology he's involving himself with in this series. Still, though, the reticence to expose the man could be a personal reticence on his part and could also be his acknowledgment of the prevailing norms of a good part of society where the completely nude male is less accepted and acceptable than the nude female counterpart. As I see it in his <a href="http://www.studium.iar.unicamp.br/zero/chance.htm">CHANCE MEETING</a> series, he does seem drawn to the more clandestine (and in this case, ritualistic) side of gay life . . . the cruising of the back alleys, mostly hidden from the light and the mainstream, where BOTH participants are checking each other out and it is not a one-way street. That dance is a well-known one in pretty much all gay circles as are the locations well-known where one can perform this ritual successfully. Again to contrast with Mapplethorpe, Mapplethorpe likely would have shown us the guys having sex rather than the ritual dance performed before the more overt act. And in the Adam and Eve series, I could imagine Mapplethorpe wanting to shoot the guy with an erection rather than behind the fig leaf. Different sensibilities and different takes on similar themes. Mapplethorpe more out there, more aggressive, more of a rabble-rouser. Michals seemingly more sensitive, more withdrawn, more uncertain and yet taking the risk of showing something not often seen. Michals seems to be acknowledging, personalizing, and sticking his head out of the closet but very aware of it. Mapplethorpe seems more like an activist compared to Michals, who was not. Both are important aspects of a gay male sensibility to be aware of and exposed to.</p>

<p>I mentioned to a friend last night that I thought Mapplethorpe's work was more graphic and Michals's more idea-oriented. Arthur nicely addressed the fact that Michals is an artist photographer. He is that, much more than a political one though the political is in there for sure if even at a more personal level. Mapplethorpe's craft, my friend suggested and I agreed, is astounding. I don't know that Michals crafted his photos and series as well as Mapplethorpe did but I think his sensitivity, ideas, and soulfulness do come through where Mapplethorpe seems to have a bolder and colder outlook.</p>

[Mark Z]

<p>Fred, from the limited amount of Michals's work that I had seen prior to this week, I had not picked up on his gay themes. I probably would not have guessed at his sexual orientation based on his work, and until now did not know he was gay. Like Stefan commented about his early encounter with <em>Chance Meeting</em>, that theme wasn't something I considered, and my own interpretation was quite different. So, thank you for the bit of enlightenment on another way to look at <em>Chance Meeting</em>.</p>

[charleswood]

<p>I remember a film that explored the interpersonal relationship between two gay men and included affection and eroticism, the latter causing some to walk out of the theater and I was apprehensive about how far the film would go with the eroticism. (Only A Natural Thing). At some point in the film I began to recognize all the dynamics of a relationship and forgot that all the familiar issues were between two men, the film melded that all to the point where there were just issues between two people. The film explored two men and their differences and how that worked out between them in a relationship and I assume as to personality type that one could have been a Michals, one a Mapplethorpe. Anyway, I can process Michals' information content; with Mapplethorpe for me it's too much information to process (I imagine it's too much, having avoided actually looking at his work). Others may process information differently than I do and may be glad that a Mapplethorpe puts more information out there.</p>

<p> </p>

[machts gut]

<p>Comparing Mapplethorpe to Michals, I see most of Mapplethorpe's work (maybe with the exception of his portraits) as sexual. Even his flower photos I can't see without having his nudes in mind. In Michals photos sexuality is important, but more on the level of desire. Michals said: "To fulfil a fantasy is the quickest way to destroy it". He seems also more interessted in the gender aspects and in the psychology of course. I remember a quote by Freud, who said: "All sexuality is psycho-sexuality" and I agree with him about that. Although this argument has been used to try to "heal " people from their homosexuality, which was probably not something that Freud intended. It's not a question of right or wrong, rather than from understanding. Understanding and opening the eyes for the more general aspects of desire. I think Michals would probably not have taken his photos like he did, if he wasn't gay, but in my opinion he is less a gay photographer than Mapplethorpe (I see, this is slippery ground and maybe not justified). BTW I like a lot of Mapplethorpe's photography and read the book by Patty Smith about their relationship (can't remember the title right now). Michals and Mapplethorpe have very different biographies and therefore different approaches.</p>

[Julie H]

<p>Stefan gave the Michals quote, "To fulfil a fantasy is the quickest way to destroy it." This doesn't mean that he won't <em>show</em> the fantasy; just that he won't "fulfill" or show its (or any if there are many possible) conclusion(s) to or from it. Problems or ambiguity interest him; answers or conclusions don't.</p>

<p>Here are more Michals quotes for you to ponder re the issue of "fulfillment":<br>

.</p>

<p> </p>

<blockquote>

<p>"To me, the important thing is not what you see; it's what you don't see. [ ... ] The exciting thing to me about sex is that it's all in the mind, just as all our experiences are in the mind. Sex has to do with fantasy, with role-playing, to a very large extent."</p>

<p>"It's not a question of the amount of flesh shown often what is <em>not</em> shown is more exciting than what is shown."</p>

<p>"There's not much difference between doing an erotic sequence between a man and a woman and an erotic sequence between two men."<br>

.</p>

 

</blockquote>

<p>Evidencing his uneasiness about his own sexuality, the first, below, makes me laugh (surely he is telling us as clearly as he can, given the symbols ... ); the other two I take with sympathy:<br>

.</p>

<p> </p>

<blockquote>

<p>[Describing his photograph "Man with a Knife"] "Here the skin is being dented with a knife (which also serves as a phallic symbol), rather than pierced by arrows [re St. Sebastian]. There's a tension in the fact that the man is restrained in some way, with his arms behind him, and that the knife in my hand is really pressing the skin. I felt the little edge of nervousness and yet fascination associated with the possibility of danger. It is the same with fire; I like to photograph it and yet I am afraid of it."</p>

<p>"Someone from my generation doesn't simply go around asking people to pose [in the nude]. Recently I was photographing a man who was doing me a favor by posing. I'm almost embarrassed to publish the photographs. I keep thinking he's going to be upset, and I don't like to upset people."</p>

<p>"In my work with the nude, I try to deal with my feelings as openly as I can. All we can know for sure is what we feel; all else is assumption. It is often painful to be honest in our response to the body. There are some aspects that make us uncomfortable, that we have difficulty making public."<br>

.</p>

 

</blockquote>

[Gup]

<blockquote>

<p>I seldom comment on these threads because if you love the guy/his photos you're considered very smart, knowledgeable, perceptive, and generally "with it". Should you find the work dull, uninspiring, pedantic - well, you're obviously a troll, a boob, or a neophyte who doesn't know his betters.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Patrick, I don't agree with your post at all. When Fred proposed this weekly feature last year he wrote this:</p>

<blockquote>

<p>A couple of thoughts, particularly about those who consider themselves "unschooled." Please, please, please participate. You don't have to know the photographer or the context to form an impression of what you're seeing. Sure, you may not be able to put it in historical context or talk about how a photo does or does not fit into someone's larger body of work, but you can look and describe what you see, tell us whether you like it and why or why not, how it makes you feel, what it makes you think about, ask questions about how it might have been made. I know I get a lot out of ALL reactions to photos and think everyone can definitely add to the discussion. Of course, if you'd rather just read along and not contribute, that's fine too but I hope nobody would feel unwelcome from sharing whatever thoughts they have. Articulating these things is a good way to get ourselves to look carefully and be observant, not a bad thing for any photographer.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Personally, I have no formal arts training, rarely, if ever, critique a photo and usually choose to just read this thread and learn what I can. I always learn something. Being a landscape photographer by nature probably stems from the fact that I barely have an artistic 'bone in my body'. This I learned by raising two talented artists. However, if I come across something here that I don't like or think has merit, I know I will say so. <br>

As far as this week's discussion is concerned, I'm not moved by any of the shots provided in the link as much as I am to the written word images Michals created. Reading his thoughts, prose and perceptions really captivated me. He views the world as only an artist can.<br>

Being more of a technician with the camera I am always drawn to the 'flaws' I see in a photograph and here there are many, in my opinion, focus, exposure, etc., but, of course, that matters so little to most viewers of the work. It's by reading this thread that I learn to see beyond my prejudices.<br>

I now return you to regular programming...</p>

[dhbebb]

<p><em>I seldom comment on these threads because if you love the guy/his photos you're considered very smart, knowledgeable, perceptive, and generally "with it". Should you find the work dull, uninspiring, pedantic - well, you're obviously a troll, a boob, or a neophyte who doesn't know his betters.</em><br>

In agreement with Gup's post above and Fred's words, I hope that readers of these threads will have noticed that, while I have gained quite a lot of experience of photography in 60 years or so and have along the way become familiar to a certain degree with the language of art criticism, I almost never use this when discussing pictures but take the view that photography is a visual medium and says what it has to say without words.<br>

It can be USEFUL to compare a particular picture with another by the same worker, or another worker, or to sketch in some historical or sociological background to a picture, or even in some cases to imagine what camera or technique was used, but is never ESSENTIAL.<br>

Art snobs like to sneer at the attitude which they express as "I don't know much about art but I know what I like!", ignoring the fact that art is MEANT to have an emotional impact and that emotional reactions are thus highly valid, with no one person's emotions being any more important or valid than anyone else's.</p>

[Julie H]

<p>"Art snobs like to sneer ... " and so do anti-art snobs. [Responding to David Bebbingtion, not to Gup Jeffries whose post I found a good description of an intelligent reader with an open mind.]</p>

<p>Okay, let's be patronizing and not use any big words in talking about nude photography. Here's Ralph Gibson (RG) being interviewed by Eric Fischl (EF), picking out just the part that has no big words:</p>

<p>EF: <em>What do you think is the hardest part of the body to capture?</em><br /> RG: Feet.<br /> EF: <em>Feet?</em><br /> RG: I don't like toes. I don't like ears. I've mastered hands. I can do hands.<br /> EF: <em>You have a love affair with hands.</em><br /> RG: I really like hands.<br /> EF: <em>Why don't you photograph ears? Do you find them ugly or obscene?</em><br /> RG: I hate them. I hate them because there are too many shapes and lines and forms. An ear will be next to a cheek, or a nose, or an eye. The mouth if probably my favorite part of the face to photograph. I consider the nose to be an enormously expressive part of the human face. Eyes, of course, are transparent pools that reflect the inner self, but the ears are just kind of jumbled shapes for me, and I spend half my time taking the model's hair and pulling it over her ear before I do the picture.<br /> EF: <em>Do you think of the different orifices as a sort of invitation to penetration on some physical or psychological level?</em></p>

<p>... Uh, oh. Getting into big words. I'd better stop.</p>

<p> </p>

[dhbebb]

<p><em>let's be patronizing</em><br>

That's something you do really well, Julie! It's only the relevance to Duane Michals' work that escapes me :-) !</p>

[Norma Desmond]

<p>Maybe <a href="http://longitudephotography.files.wordpress.com/2011/07/duane-this-is-my-proof.jpg">THIS PHOTOGRAPH IS MY PROOF</a> suggests that, as Michals would say, what lays hidden is more important than what's seen. Seems like time filled in the blanks. The future was hidden but maybe there was something unrecognized at the time under the surface. What this photo once meant (love) is no longer. Now it means something else (loss). I take <em>"Look, see for yourself"</em> under the photo to be meant ironically.</p>

<p>But could Michals have photographed the loss when or after it was occurring? Maybe his way of getting the photo to show the loss (or at least <em>what</em> was lost) was to alert us to the change by writing under it. What we cannot see in this photo may be more important than what we can see, but is that the nature of photos, or is it his own flaw? By writing, and alerting us to what was lost, has he missed photographing the loss itself or the feeling of loss?</p>

<p>Michals says, <em>"Photography deals exquisitely with appearances, but nothing is what it appears to be."</em> Compare this to what Avedon says:<em> "I have great faith in surfaces. A good one is full of clues."</em> Has Michals found and shown the clues? For that matter, has Avedon?</p>

<p>________________________________________</p>

<p>Stefan, I agree that Michals may be a less gay photographer than Mapplethorpe, in that Michals is more circumspect and broadened his work beyond just photos depicting sexuality or a gay sensibility.<br /> <br /> Strangely, Michals may also be the more gay photographer if gay people don't exist with just a gay identity but are also in the world having a shared human sensibility. <br /> <br /> Michals seems to show his own gay dilemma (about privacy, about cruising, about the closet, about his own reticence and where he might fit in), whereas Mapplethorpe seems to emphasize a singular sexual and overt attitude. <br /> <br /> Speaking of what lays hidden, I question how self aware Michals is. Maybe in showing and <em>not</em> showing what he does, he is revealing himself, but accidentally(?). I see his own hesitation about his sexuality. I sense that if Michals had just a bit more self awareness, his photos might have a little more depth.<br /> <br /> Mapplethorpe did a bit of selling out, wanting to be part of the whole art scene and the Warhol clique. In his art photos, I don't ever sense Michals selling out. Mapplethorpe shows a somewhat one-dimensional awareness of himself, with little sense of struggle, tension, ambiguity, or uncertainty, things that seem evident in Michals whether he was aware of how much he was actually revealing about himself or not.</p>

[charleswood]

<p>Some quotes from Michals from this link provided by Stephan in his OP: http://selfselector.co.uk/2013/12/11/showing-the-things-we-cannot-see-an-interview-with-duane-michals/</p>

<p>"I am not a typical gay person anymore than I am not a typical photographer. I was never interested in promiscuity, or dressing up like a woman or hanging out in bars."</p>

<p>That seems like Michals trying to distinguish himself from the stereotype of what a typical gay is or the stereotype of what gays do all the time. Its kind of odd that he would say that typical gas are promiscuous, dress up like women, and hang out in bars! That mischaracterization is where he seems concerned with not being viewed as a stereotype, but he ratifies the stereotype in trying to distinguish himself from it! Fred, is that kind of statement from Michals of the type that causes you to question Michals' self-awareness, an example of what you might consider as hesitation in him?</p>

<p>What I might consider hesitation is Michals statement about what lays hidden being more important than what's seen. If, if the photo THIS PHOTOGRAPH IS MY PROOF (see Fred's link to it) is an example where what we see is a happy couple and what we don't see are those conflicts (developed or nascent) between the two that eventually result in distancing behaviors (being withdrawn, arguing, as well as spending more time away from each other): if that: then in the moment he penned the text, what in that moment of writing lay hidden and unseen from him that by his statement would then be more important than what we 'see', more important than the fact that he was writing something in one moment, something in the moment he wrote that was unseen and more important than the writing? In a sense, in each moment he is mentally distancing himself from what is seen, from what is the life that lays before him.</p>

<p>So Mapplethorpe: that one picture where the subject is, well, in the garb of a character with his butt to the camera. Does that photo also play into the mainstream stereotyped notions from which Michals was trying to distinguish himself? Is/was Mapplethorp as unhelpful to the goal of correctly perceiving, as unhelpful as Michals' ratifying a stereotype in a dialog with an interviewer? I mean, looking back in time, from the perspective we have now, from the perspective of a social change endeavor that has developed much from those days.</p>

<p> </p>

[Norma Desmond]

<p>Charles, that's why I think Mapplethorpe and Michals together tell a more complete (if still incomplete) story. One can't possibly look at one gay person's work and extrapolate to a picture of gaydom (a self-coined word) <em>per se</em>.</p>

<p>Michals comes across to me, both in his imagery and in his statements, as rather conservative. His verbal mischaracterization of gay people is pretty horrendous, IMO, but there is plenty of homophobia and misunderstanding even among gay people, who often do buy into weird views of gay people they inherit from all kinds of places. Internalized homophobia among gay people is common if not universal. How could we not have some self loathing when we've been told for so long we're sick, less than, legally and morally inferior, etc.?</p>

<p>But it's honestly not Michals's statements that cause me to question his hesitation. It's his photos. They seem hesitant, they seem to resist openness, dwell on closeted activities like the CHANCE MEETING series. He seems to adore certain males in his photos, but not quite take the leap of uncovering what he pretends is remaining hidden. For instance <a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-xLSLkOG-C8M/UZkO167gHtI/AAAAAAAAGq4/DAOGKfjTWPU/s1600/142.jpg">HERE</a>, where he's idolizing the two beauties, allowing them a look between themselves, but also keeping them at a distance. It feels reticent. It feels hung up. It's not the camera but Michals who is keeping something hidden and, IMO, I'm not sure he realizes to what extent and to what end.</p>

<p>There's often a political/social question of what effect radicals have on majority or mainstream impressions about the minority. While turning many people off, which Mapplethorpe may have done, they are also telling the world they just don't care what you think. And they are showing what it's like for them. Those are important gestures within any perceived social movement. I don't think Mapplethorpe or Michals really saw themselves as political movers and shakers, but they certainly play into the mix of perceptions of gay people, naturally. They are visible gay people communicating something personal. Mapplethorpe, to me, is very much about Mapplethorpe. There is a lot of ego in his work . . . certainly self confidence and some defiance. But I never took it as any sort of universal message.</p>

<p>Though Mapplethorpe is more graphic and, perhaps more hard to look at, his photos seem in touch with who he is and what he likes. He isn't faking it. He was really into the sort of stuff he's blatantly portraying. It's not his problem if people then stereotype gay folks because of Mapplethorpe's imagery. Michals, himself, is doing the stereotyping in his statements about gay people and actually seems deluded. It's as if he's not in touch, and simply misinformed. In short, Mapplethorpe isn't doing the sterotyping even though his audience might. Michals's statements, on the other hand, are quite transparently stereotyping.</p>

[Landrum Kelly]

<blockquote>

<p>"It did happen. She did love me. Look see for yourself!"</p>

</blockquote>

<p><strong><a href="http://longitudephotography.files.wordpress.com/2011/07/duane-this-is-my-proof.jpg">This</a></strong> is wonderful, Fred. Evocative work. Very, very evocative work.</p>

<p>Looking back at times so good, I have to remind myself that something actually happened in my own life.</p>

<p>Where did it go? Where <em>did</em> it go? (Next question: Why did it go? Better yet, why did it happen in the first place?)</p>

<p>--Lannie</p>

[shutterbud]

<p>I did a Google image search and also linked on the singers.<br>

I really can't see what the fuss is all about. I don't like the compositions, can't see many ideas worth exploring and don't in fact like the texture of his work. This is my honest opinion about the photographs I have seen.<br>

If one is not allowed to dislike something presented by another member, there is no point in showing it.</p>

[machts gut]

<p>No problem, Stephen.</p>