Philosophical / Metaphysical Question - What Attracts Us To Beauty In The Landscape?

[david_hempenstall1]

Sal,

 

because even though i'm a beer drinker and love a cold schooie at the pub with mates watching a rugby match, every so often its good to sit down over a meal and converse while enjoying a bottle of Mudgee wine.

 

from this day forth let this wonderful concept be called 'variety'.

 

then again, you could always just live on beer.... seemed to work for at least one of our prime ministers (australia).

 

this forum is fantastic for getting quick techie stuff when something needs checking, and certainly is not the best place to have any real conversations or experiences with what we are involved in, but every so often it's good just to break from the mould and become involved in a brief chat where people are going to go off in all sorts of directions....

[keith_laban]

But does the <i>"fundamental nature of beauty in the landscape"</i> nessecerily touch something deep inside us all?<p>I admit I strive to capture "conventional beauty" in the landscape, but frankly when I succeed the only part of me it fundamentally touches is my pocket. Succeed and I have a potentially commercial shot but an image that more often than not leaves me cold. Like art porn, perfect young bodies, perfectly shot, but ultimately bland and sexless.<p> When viewing landscape images I long for truth, the imperfect, the experience of being in a real landscape.<p><a href=http://www.keithlaban.co.uk>www.keithlaban.co.uk</a>

[dave_t]

So far OT it's almost OT: you might enjoy Evan Eisenberg's (? I think that's right) Ecology of Eden. Sometimes he goes a bit around the bend but it's a good read that's relevant here.

 

<pedantry>

BTW, Gaia is a hypothesis, not a theory. That is, it isn't testable, so it cannot be refuted. Which, of course, doesn't mean it isn't right. Not necessarily, anyway.

</pedantry>

 

<even_more_OT>

In one of the (many) Chinese creation myths, the Earth came from the death of a protohuman/demigod, whose breath became the wind, one eye the sun, the other the moon, whose hair became plants, etc. The parasites on his body became people. Is that why the other great subject is the body? ;)

</even_more_OT>

[john_kasaian1]

Why? Because beautiful landscapes are nicer to look at than butt-ugly landscapes!;-)

[david_bennett1]

My first post - bear with me!

 

Mike,

 

I think that beauty in landscape as also a time, in the sense of

"moment in time" affected thing. You are sensitive to the same

landscape giving different emotional response at diferent times.

I don't think that there is necessarily one response to a particular

scape, it\s a matter of how we are feeling at the time (as well as

lots of other variables....

 

my 2p. Tthanks for the fascinating thread.

 

 

david

[upscan]

Mike: I think that human beings crave organization and delight in the surprise of finding it. We respond with pleasure when the landscape unexpectedly presents us with harmony, in either color, form and texture and particularly when it does so unexpectedly and in rich variety. Human beings are blessed with faculties that enable us to see and appreciate the harmony and infinite variety of the universe in as far as we can reach it or it can reach us. A bit of mystery adds to the attraction and when it comes to the landscape, mystery is never far away. I believe too that human beings are ephemeral as their pleasures are concerned and that what they perceive as beauty fades with overexposure. I have my doubts that the mule skinner that has gone 1000 times down the grand canyon will remain as impressed with its grandeur as much as the first time he laid eyes on it. The usually somber, bored and inanimate expresion of the museum watchman may be more indicative of the fact that the treasures with which he cohabitates day after day exhausted their last surprise long ago, than of the lack of any sensitivity on his part. Is beauty then a joy forever? I do not know, but for the artist its search can only end with death.

[john_kasaian1]

Mike,

 

My lame attempt at humor aside, I think Jim Galli is right on. I might add a Thomist view that the Soul loves It's Creator, and is drawn to It. The attraction to a beautiful landscape would, St. Thomas Aquinas might postulate, be the Soul being attracted by an element of the grand creation of God. The most beautiful landscapes I think, like people's lives, are uncluttered by what is meaningless or distracting. Perhaps this is why the concious is repelled by the very thought of mortality and death(What? No stuff?), while the Soul longs to return to it's Creator. The Soul "overrides" the concious when we look at a beautiful landscape. Ansel's cliffs will kill you. Weston's surf will tear a ship apart. Clyde Butcher's swamp is full of critters only too happy to inject deadly venom or brunch on the unwary. Sella's peaks are among the most inhospitable places on earth and the desert isn't filled with places with names like Death Valley for nothing. Yet these are the images that speak to the Soul that is not afraid of mortality. The same could be said for ruins, be they anasazi or european monasteries. Our world would tell us something very bad happened here---people died, civilizations died. The Soul looks beyond that and sees something of great beauty because it(the ruins) have endured, spared for whatever reason, for awhile anyway, by the Creator, and remain a monument to other Souls(who the Soul loves because they too, were created by God) that have gone "home." Thanks for a very intrigueing thread!

[john_kasaian1]

...oh, and beautiful landscapes are nicer to look at than butt ugly ones!(did I say that already?);-)

[mike_troxell2]

"beauty in the landscape and why it touches something deep inside us"

 

Why? Because we (photographers) see things differently. We see the beauty that is there. If we wern't able to see it then we wouldn't be photographers. Which brings up the question, Do we see things differently because we are photographers or are we photographers because we see things differently?

[emrys]

Wow, what can I say? I just got up (it's just after 7 here) and I honestly didn't expect to see so many great replies. What's so wonderful also is that there are no right or wrong answers to this, simply different views, all of which (so far) have been thoughtfully put.

 

I must rush off to work now, but I'll spend more time once I get there looking through these posts. Thanks again, for all your input.

 

Mike

[julian_thomas]

Mike, you might try reading Gadamer 'The relevence of the beautiful' or Adorno 'aesthetic theory' (you'll need a couple of years for the latter)

As to landscape - at one time nature wasn't beautiful, it was dangerous, untamed, beauty was progress. One thing I guess you'll have to address is the difference between 'pretty' and 'beauty'. A book that may help here is Witkin's 'art and social structure' Many landscape postcards are 'pretty' 'kitsch' - what has to happen for them to become beautiful? Also whereas most folk would agree that there is a universal concept called 'beauty' why do we all see it differently? I was reminded of that yesterday reading to amazon.co.uk reveiws of Friedlanders 'desert seen' - a book I love. One reviewer rated highly whilst another just couldn't see the point.

Best of luck

 

Julian - writing at speed

[emrys]

I've had a chance to collect my thoughts (and some breakfast from the canteen) so I'd like to reply to some of those who've been kind enough to post here.

 

Struan, I think perhaps my words were slightly misleading. I wasn't saying that everyone responds to the landscape in the same outward manner. I do believe, that for many (if not most) of us, it touches us in a way that few other things do. I'm not one to 'gasp in awe' but I did (at least on the inside) when I stood on top of Ben Lomond on New Year's Day and looked around me for a hundred miles.

 

Keith, the beauty (or the Sublime) that I'm speaking of is about as far removed from "conventional beauty" as it's possible to be. Give me the raw, untamed, wild and dangerous any day. As to whether that constitutes perfection or imperfection - who are we to say?

 

Dave T, I'm quoting from page 11 of "Ages of Gaia" here, by Jim Lovelock. "...The first Gaia book was hypothetical, and lightly written - a rough pencil sketch... this second book is a statement of Gaia theory, the basis of a new and unified view of the Earth and life sciences... I have called the science of Gaia geophysiology". While I agree that a theory must be testable, I'd say that Gaia theory is no more untestable than quantum mechanics.

 

This has been a most thought-provoking thread. Please keep the comments rolling in.

 

Mike

[neil_poulsen1]

One of your articles could focus on the geometry of landscapes. I took an art class from a friend, and it was excellent. He emphasized the importance of seeing and sketching the fundamental forms of a scene before even thinking about the detail. I could have said "shapes", but that would be too detailed. This was a powerful insight for me in sketching and photography. I inherently look for the "geometry" of a scene before photographing.

 

For example, I have a photograph I took in the John Day Fossil area in Oregon. It's a cliff with a rock in the foreground. The cliff stands out as three tall rectangles looming in the background, with an oval in the foreground. After adding all the color, the ground cover, the tumble weeds, it's not clear whether the geometry of this photograph will be obvious, or even be seen, by the casual viewer. But it's there, and it adds to the drama of the image.

[struan_gray]

I may have indulged my rhetorical bent a little :-)

 

The only time I've been on a Ben on New Year's Day it was

impossile to stand up, and it had nothing to do with the previous

night's imbibing. If you've done that sort of thing you know that

the attraction of landscapes is much more varied and subtle

than the conventional line. You will also know that most people

cannot see the attraction of the reality, and will fight hard to toe

the party line from the comfort of their sofas.

 

There is something deeply insincere about the conventional

sense of the sublime. When first formulated, its proponents

were careful to explicitly state that it was the result of gazing on

terrible danger while perfectly aware that there was no actual

personal risk. The latter part has been quietly forgotten, and for

many people landscapes in the grand style are simply

consumed at face value, like filmstars in gunfights, 9 ct gold on

the Shopping Channel ("So light on the wrist!"), and I Can't

Believe It's Not Butter.

 

This matters, because it is the conventional market that pays for

so much landscape photography in the first place. It both

reinforces the perception that landscape photography is a

worthwhile, desirable activity, and sets the rules for what is

regarded as 'normal' and 'right'. Also, it matters because there

are surprisingly many people who genuinely believe that once

we have a good photo on file, there is no need to preserve the

original. Traprain Law is a case in point.

 

I wasn't getting at you. I just think an introduction could use a

broader brush. If you spend a lot of time in the Highlands or on

the West Coast, you'll know how hard it is to keep small bits of

baling twine or orange fishing net out of the picture. Were I

giving a course in landscape photography I would start by asking

the students why they felt the need to exclude them. Other arts

don't (for example, Kathleen Jamie wrote a great piece in the

LRB recently on the delights of Hebridean flotsam), so why does

photography?

[clayh]

My personal feeling is that a landscape photo is not quite complete without at least

one white styrofoam coffee cup that has been discarded somewhere within the frame

of the photograph. This allows the bored viewer to play a sort of post-industrial

"Where's Waldo?" when contemplating the image.

[kevin_kolosky]

A lot of words written here and the answer is that due to the very subjective nature of beauty there will be a different answer for everyone who contemplates the question.

 

Moreover, isnt the very reason we photograph (whether it be nature of whatever) is to communicate WITHOUT WORDS. As Ansel used to say, (not exactly in these words) "I show you a representation of something I have seen and felt. I have done my part. Now it is up to you to add your own understanding based on who you are. If you don't agree with me, that's fine."

 

Kevin