When is the artist/photographer a revolutionary. . .?

[Landrum Kelly]

<blockquote>

<p>For me photography - and <em>to photograph</em> - is primarily about perceiving, and only secondarily about looking.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>As stated, Phil, that sounds somewhat passive to me. That in turn might be seen to imply that more of the burden of composition is deliberately shifted to the post-processing phase.</p>

<p>--Lannie</p>

[aplumpton]

<p>Seeing and perceiving are entirely distinct from just looking at things. One of the first to write at some length about that was Freeman Patterson. I agree with Phil about the importance of the photographer's engagement with his subject, which goes beyond looking. I think that Lannie'ssuggestion that it happens in post processing is not entirely true, as perceivibng a subject for me entails mentally making an image in the camera (angle, approach, lighting, type of exposure, composition, ...) and not just looking at the subject and clicking.</p>

<p>The Palermo image of the two chairs gave me the feeling of two beings far apart and not in communication. The B&W there is effective.</p>

<p>My two chairs image did not recently translate to my taste as a large print, so I redid them this spring in an equally untrimmed orchard. There is a lot more going on in the image than the first one (the orchard is in full bloom) which I think is less convincing overall, but I wanted to include chairs in my exhibition in the collective memories sub theme. Here is the new image, and for what it may be worth, two others, in which the chair provides the subject, both physical and imaginary.</p><div></div>

[aplumpton]

<p>And the second</p>

[Norma Desmond]

<p>Something that's really helped my compositional instincts is the more literal work I do at Plowshare, where I often use composition to tell a specific story about what's going on, the work people are doing, and the surroundings they live and work in. It comes much more naturally to me now to include story-telling elements in my shots and has made me much more aware of the impact on storytelling composition can have. I find that now translates to getting more layered shots and textured shots even when I'm not doing Plowshare stuff. In a weird way, being more literal has helped me when I want to be more metaphorical.</p>

[Landrum Kelly]

<blockquote>

<p>When framing in the viewfinder I try to give the image some leeway in order to not be constrained or tied too much to a given composition, though the main overall composition of the finalized image is usually also what appeared in the viewfinder. But the pictures taken are always sketches.</p>

 

</blockquote>

<p>Phil, that is the way I shoot, too, unless I am shooting with the 12-mp D3s, which doesn't give me as much leeway for cropping. In that case, I will pay more attention to composition through the viewfinder.</p>

<p>--Lannie</p>

[Landrum Kelly]

<blockquote>

<p>I think that Lannie's suggestion that it happens in post processing is not entirely true, as perceivibng a subject for me entails mentally making an image in the camera. . . .</p>

</blockquote>

<p>That is not what I said, Arthur, but it doesn't matter.</p>

<p>--Lannie</p>

 

[aplumpton]

<p>Sorry, Lannie, I reread your comment more carefully. Point well made. I was battling my server to keep on line and read it too hastily.</p>

<p>Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone in Baddeck, Nova Scotia, but the telephone company that today bears his name here cannot keep my internet connection alive....they keep protesting that their line is not overloaded at night, send technicians that make unproductive in house line changes, like a deputy minister seeking to add something new to his reign.</p>

<p>So another attempt at aforementiined image 2 in the chair saga, now that my connection is restored, for a few minutes at least:</p><div></div>

[aplumpton]

<p>and the third chair photo (I will stop at that, although other chair photos attempt different effects than these): </p><div></div>

[Norma Desmond]

<p>I really like Arthur's last photo which I believe I commented on in his portfolio. It's energetically framed and the shadows play with the geometry of the chair creating a good diagonal feel. I think the soft blue color goes well with the lighting and way the corners of the chair are softened by the shadows. There's also something shocking (revolutionary?) about not seeing the legs, so the seat feels somehow disembodied, which makes the object seen as sculptural as it is sit-worthy.</p>

<p>Blue room is interesting though I think a bit less successful. I think including the ceiling was a great compositional move. And I also like how the amount of ceiling and the amount of floor seem pretty equal. That might otherwise put me off, but the weight of the ceiling is so much heavier than the weight of the floor and that more than makes up for whatever balance there might be in the yardage of floor and ceiling in the photo. It's an interesting still life, for sure but there's a bit too much Magritte for my taste. That sort of strange juxtaposition of objects, the hung mantle with no fireplace for me is maybe a little too obvious. I also find the chair a little too perfectly placed. The other two photos each have an element of whimsy and blue room feels a little uptight. </p>

<p>Interesting and worthy series.</p>

[Landrum Kelly]

<p>Arthur, I wish I had your models. Both photos are very good, but the last one is truly something to be proud of.</p>

<p>As for the other, I don't think that you should show so much of both the ceiling and floor. One (at least) needs to be trimmed a bit, in my opinion, lest the photo be too centered top to bottom. Still, I am not sure. It might work as is.</p>

<p>How revolutionary is it? I don't really care. It stands on its own, both for those who know the history of pictures like this, and for those who do not.</p>

<p>--Lannie</p>

[Norma Desmond]

<p>Addendum, the more I look at blue room the less "uptight" it seems and the element of whimsy is actually creeping up on me, in the strange angles and play of architectural design element lines on ceiling, walls, and floor. The red rug really works in context of the mish-mash of angles and lines. The objects and their placement is where any uptightness for me remains.</p>

[Julie H]

<p>OP: "When is the artist/photographer a revolutionary challenging the prevailing order ... "</p>

<p>My guess for the future is as written by Baudrillard:</p>

 

<blockquote>

<p>Simulation is no longer that of a territory, a referential being or substance. It is the generation of models of a real without origin or reality: a hyper-real. The territory no longer precedes the map, nor survives it. Henceforth, it is the map that precedes the territory.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>.</p>

<p>I think that this is happening, and that photographers are particularly sensitive to its happening. I also think that, as we well know in this forum, many photographers have, do, and will continue to fight tooth and nail against this revolution (which will not -- they never are -- be all-inclusive or monolithic).</p>

[aplumpton]

<p>Fred, your literal acompanyment of your Plowshare images strikes a chord with me. Whether such notes become part of the product or not, and they can merit that amalgamation, the interaction of the photography and the writing can be quite motivating and to some extent revolutionary in the process of perceiving an activity or place.</p>

<p>I am indebted to yourself and Lannie for some very good critiques of the images, totally appreciated. The uptight feeling is a very good reaction as I did position the chair with the false fireplace, red rug and table and chose an angle avoiding the right side window but attempting to suggest its presence by the lighting. The room is in a 1900 era house purchased by some friends and it was in the process of change (this room becoming a bathroom), with the mantle finally placed on another wall and other elements of old furniture introduced, but with the ceiling and wall colors maintained. My only regret, now that it has evolved differently, is that I did not play more with the idea evoked by the apparently disparate elements than I did.</p>

<p>Is revolutionary the ability to capture a scene that is no longer as it was, or that is revealed differently than how it is seen by most viewers, or one that may be considered as never was? Maybe that is the revoutionary nature of photography, if not the photographer?</p>

<p>Phil, thanks, but if I had but a tiny fraction of what is in that Van Gogh I would be extremely happy.</p>

<p> </p>

[Norma Desmond]

<p>Arthur, when I talk about the Plowshare photos being more literal, it's not because of the accompanying text. My point was that I developed a better feel for the power of composition through making the photos themselves more literal, through making them tell more literal stories or at least show more literal moments. I could then take that expressive skill and utilize it in less literal endeavors. My other photos, outside of Plowshare, are often less literal. With Plowshare, the goal is usually to show how things are. That's not often the goal with my other work. In both, I want viewers also to feel something or at least I want to express with feeling, but I also want to convey more accurate info about Plowshare. Accuracy is not as much a concern in my other work. I agree that the text then adds to all that, but I was talking about the photos themselves being literal, aside from the text.</p>

[aplumpton]

<p>Ah, comunication in addition to composition in your process and in the service of your photos. I think I better understand your approach, and why your Plowshare images connect so well. I was thinking of the effect of writing and photographing as feeding on each other, which is another thing.</p>

[Landrum Kelly]

<p>Arthur, I looked at your blue room picture on a bigger monitor this morning. I think that your crop works just fine after all. I love the picture.</p>

<p>You are doing some really fine work these days--<em>really</em> fine work. There are those who talk a lot about all the art that they are making or have made. You just go out and do it.</p>

<p>--Lannie</p>

[Landrum Kelly]

<p>I've said all that I have to say on this topic.</p>

<p>Thanks to everyone for their contributions.</p>

<p>By the way, I posted perhaps a half hour ago a new thread, "If you could choose. . . ?" on this same forum.</p>

<p>As of this writing, there are three responses, but I cannot respond to those responses to my own thread on Casual Photo Conversations! Nor can I respond to the last poster to one of my threads on the Philosophy of Photography forum, either!</p>

<p>So, once again, if I do not respond to you, it's nothing personal--not on my end, at least. Am I still banned? Is there a machine or software error? I have no idea at this point.</p>

<p>What is my ontological status at this point? That is, do I exist on Photo.net or do I not?</p>

<p>Stay tuned. . . .</p>

<p>--Lannie</p>

[Landrum Kelly]

<blockquote>

<p>By the way, I posted perhaps a half hour ago a new thread, "If you could choose. . . ?" on this same forum.<br /> As of this writing, there are three responses, but I cannot respond to those responses to my own thread on Casual Photo Conversations!</p>

</blockquote>

<p>For what it's worth, I can now post again to my latest thread on this forum.</p>

<p>Thanks to the moderators for resolving that problem.</p>

<p>--Lannie</p>

[aplumpton]

<p>Lannie, maybe the moderators could find employment if they wish at my telephone company that regularly banishes me from cyberspace. </p>

[Uhooru]

<p>Revolutionary art is always theory driven, before, during and after its creation.</p>

<blockquote>

<p>Artist/photographers (as the stated target of this thread) such as Moholy-Nagy, the Bechers, Stieglitz with his 'Equivalents' -- all very much theory driven at all stages.<br>

Even less-art and more-revolutionary figures like Muybridge, Marey, and Kepes were theory driven.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Julie, of all the people on these threads you always say the most interesting things in an interesting way, even if I don't always agree. I don't know if categorically all ground breaking work is theoretical, but I will agree that the producers tend to be thoughtful about their work. I'm thinking of Walker Evans, Diane Arbus, Winograd, Lee Friedlander, but then again, the examples I gave may just support your statements. </p>

[Julie H]

<blockquote>

<p>"Walker Evans, Diane Arbus, Winograd, Lee Friedlander"</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Friedlander, while one of the greatest photographers of all time, and probably the best of the four, IMO, is the one out of that bunch that is not a revolutionary, to my mind.</p>

<p>Here's why. Setting aside revolutionaries that work on <em>possibility and potential</em> (Moholy-Nagy, Muybridge, Marey and Kepes), focus on those who work on <em>what has been and what is</em>. That's what your four do/did.</p>

<p>Empathy is the ingredient that is at the heart of their innovations. Think of empathy as a kind of umbilical connection between photographer and subject 'out there.' In, for example, W.E. Smith and Dorothea Lange, empathy is two way, both felt and exerted >>> and <<<. August Sander, on the other hand, exerted but did not feel; he imposed/invested his own characterization from the top and his subjects are seen in those terms: >>> only. As did the Bechers, but with innovative twists that I think make them revolutionary in spite of Sanders priority (which I won't get into now).</p>

<p>Walker Evans turned Sanders on his head. He took himself out of the empathy pipeline, allowing the subject to be itself, without comment from him. All <<<< with the reverse shut off. He didn't color or contaminate what was incoming; he let it be. Note that this applies to in/out of empathy, not to choice-of-what, which Evans was superb at making.</p>

<p>Winogrand, IMO, is the most revolutionary of all of the above because rather than play with the empathy channel, he simply cut it off. Scissored it. Snip. The channel is closed entirely. Goodbye and don't bother me. He was only interested in what stuff looked like <em>in the photograph</em>. No empathy in and no empathy out. The picture is no longer tethered either to Winogrand or to its subject 'out-there.'<br>

.</p>

 

<blockquote>

<p>"A still photograph is the illusion of a literal description of how a camera saw a piece of time and space. Understanding this, one can postulate the following theorem: Anything and all things are photographable. A photograph can only look like how the camera saw what was photographed. Or, how the camera saw the piece of time and space is responsible for how the photograph looks. Therefore, a photograph can look any way.</p>

<p>[<em>line break added to make this a little easier to read</em>] Or, there's no way a photograph has to look (beyond being an illusion of a literal description). Or, there are no external or abstract or preconceived rules of design that can apply to still photographs. I like to think of photographing as a two-way act of respect. Respect for the medium, by letting it do what it does best, describe. And respect for the subject, by describing as it is. A photograph must be responsible to both." — <em>Garry Winogrand, 1974</em><br /><br />.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>And, in case there's doubt, <em>"It's not YOUR picture, it's MY picture!"</em> — Garry Winogrand's answer to a guy who told him not to take his picture. <br /><br /><br>

Diane Arbus is ... more complicated. I think she's revolutionary but not in the ways that the obvious qualities of her pictures, the things they're known for, do. On empathy, she's almost traditional in her two-way feeling/exertion of it. But, and again, this is my opinion, I think that there are things about how she, as a female, worked that I see as a female versus how men get her work. Briefly (I won't go into this in detail), her pictures seem permeated by Diane -- they seem to smell of her, to radiate Diane-ness in ways that have nothing to do with empathy. A sort of casting of herself, both in the theatrical sense and the throwing-out sense of that word. Enough, though. I've lost you by now ... <br /></p>

[aplumpton]

<p>At this mature stage of this OP it is good to read Julie's interesting analysis of who she considers revolutionary photographers. Her knowledge of the subject exceeds that of most of us here and she always presents facts that, despite my interest in photographic art, I will probably never assimilate, as I do not spend enough time to research and read. Funny, I never considered the statement of "I want to see what something looks like photographed", of Winogrand, as very exceptional. Maybe my admiration for Winogrand is limited and my feeling is that he was simply a very good recorder of human life, passing in rapid succession before his wanton lens. One could say the same of the very first crude images from Niepce (1825?) or Fox-Talbot and Hershel in the mid 19th century as targeting "to see what something looks like photographed." Of course it was. And that is but a one line theory of approach, just that. Introduction of empathy, passion, aesthetics, or a desire to show something not normally associated with a subject on the part of the photographer (which I adhere to in my own work) just developed naturally thereafter in photographic history.</p>

<p>Do Julie's presentation of facts always correlate with her theses? That is always a difficult extrapolation that I for one cannot always master. I am tempted to raise an eyebrow on her example of Arbus. I wonder if what she is saying is not simply that Arbus had a style of photography rather than that of casting herself out, and beyond the nature of the subject or the subject matter. Perhaps she knows Arbus as a person intimately enough (via reading, etc.) to suggest that was what she was doing? Or is that not what we all do in our more humble revolutionary ways when we chance to photograph something? Where does it and me meet?</p>

[Landrum Kelly]

<blockquote>

<p>Winogrand, IMO, is the most revolutionary of all of the above because rather than play with the empathy channel, he simply cut it off. Scissored it. Snip. The channel is closed entirely. Goodbye and don't bother me. He was only interested in what stuff looked like <em>in the photograph</em>. No empathy in and no empathy out. The picture is no longer tethered either to Winogrand or to its subject 'out-there.'</p>

 

</blockquote>

<p>Photography sounds like a banana republic subject to numerous revolutions, even<em> coups d'etat.</em> What is declared revolutionary today is declared reactionary tomorrow. Yes, sweeping [revolutionary] change occurs in one direction, but then the counter-revolution or reaction sweeps back in the other direction. Each school of thought thinks that it is avant-garde and that the other is "old school" or whatever. One of my profs in the 70s called "Marx the greatest reactionary I have ever read." Mind-boggling perspective. </p>

<p>Everything always in flux: Is history "going somewhere" here? Well, it is going in the opposite direction there.</p>

<p>Who has it "right"? Well, hell. . .</p>

<p>--Lannie</p>

[aplumpton]

<p>That (of your professor) is a novel and incomprenhensible view of that person and his ideas. As I understand it, the term 'reactionary' or the view and policies (often far right wing) meant 'to restore the status quo ante', when applied to photography, has probably a need to define what status quo of what era is being referenced. Maybe a pictorialist photographer today is a reactionary? But photography is a soft art that accomodates at the same time different approaches or styles, without many being bothered or effected by it, with a reaction to something different being "OK, whatever lights your fire." Those involved in contemporary ideas in politics involve revolutionaries (we must go forward) and reactionaries (don't lose what we have or once had). The softer field of photography seems to have the same issues, although arguably much less important than society issues. Is Eggleston a revolutionary or a reactionary photographer, or neither? Is doing research about a theme or subject to be photographed revolutionary? The leaders would seem to be the teachers and master of arts groups in photography, working in colleges or living on foundation grants, less often having photography as a manner of putting bread on the table. Will their research lead somewhere in a revolutionary sense? </p>

[Landrum Kelly]

<blockquote>

<p>That (of your professor) is a novel and incomprenhensible view of that person and his ideas.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>I found it refreshing and insightful, Arthur. My professor, Keith Legg (formerly of Berkeley), did not make the comment in a flippant manner. There are left-wing and right-wing reactionaries (and it is not always about a particular status quo), but I suspect that Keith Legg saw Marx as a reactionary because of his way of looking at scientific innovation and the resulting social change. Right or wrong, his was a perspective worth considering, in my opinion.</p>

<p>In any case, I always liked the young Marx better than the Marx of <em>Das Kapital</em>--and, yes, I went through my phase where I just had to read everything he ever wrote, as I did most of Nietzsche during that phase of my life as well.</p>

<p>I've had my inoculations and immunizations now. I don't tend to get infected with everything novel I read as easily as I once did (forty to fifty years ago). I've also learned to keep my crap detector turned on. The stuff is everywhere. I keep the crap detector especially at the ready when I am re-reading my own stuff.</p>

 

<blockquote>

<p>Is Eggleston a revolutionary or a reactionary photographer, or neither? Is doing research about a theme or subject to be photographed revolutionary? The leaders would seem to be the teachers and master of arts groups in photography, working in colleges or living on foundation grants, less often having photography as a manner of putting bread on the table. Will their research lead somewhere in a revolutionary sense?</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Eggleston revolutionary or reactionary? Relative to what, Arthur? Toward the view that art had to be in black and white, he was, if not a true pioneer, bold in his approach to color photography.</p>

<p>Research as revolutionary? I never thought about that. How useful is that way of looking at research? How much revolutionary work in any field gets funded? I have no idea.</p>

<p>You ask good questions, Arthur.</p>

<p>--Lannie</p>