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Author Topic: Photography is to art what golf is to sport  (Read 64337 times)

Goodlistener

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Photography is to art what golf is to sport
« Reply #40 on: January 14, 2008, 11:23:03 pm »

I agree with you, in part.  But the exceptions such as Ansel Adams or Edward Weston for instance, are so wonderful.  And I agree with you in another way too.  I'm not about to play pro football, or for that matter be a runner and mess up my knees.

Photography is accesable enough art for me and I enjoy the past time, especially sharing wonderful images and the emotions that follow with others.
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woffles

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Photography is to art what golf is to sport
« Reply #41 on: January 15, 2008, 12:42:10 am »

Try doing an 8 hour or longer wedding shoot while trying to think artistically the whole day and also dealing with the technical, logistical and whatever other side of it you can keep track of.  Someone sitting on their butt playing with clay or sketching on a piece of paper doesn't even begin to compare.  I've trained more for this then a lot of athletes train.  About two years so far of constant learning.  So, yes, it's an art, and a lot higher art then you think if one truly aspires for it.  Doing "real" art tends to bore me pretty quickly.  That's why I stopped drawing years ago.
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Ray

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Photography is to art what golf is to sport
« Reply #42 on: January 15, 2008, 01:58:37 am »

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For photographers, the differences between "snap shooters" and serious photographers, is that snap shooters generally arent interested in creating something but are merely capturing something. Serious photographers are thinking and composing and studying their subject matter to attain a certain result. How well they accomplish that task, is again, the subject of whether is to "good" or "bad".
Michael
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Interesting you should mention that. Usually when I happen to observe someone using a P&S camera, they point the camera at the subject and seem to wait an inordinate amount of time before pressing the shutter. They seem to be examining the image on the LCD screen with great intensity for ages and ages. What are they waiting for? The right facial expression? Making sure they've got the composition right and haven't chopped off anyone's right ear? Perhaps they're just waiting for someone to yell at them, "Take the bloody photo now."

Perhaps they're really just attempting to be artistic. However, if they're waiting for some momentary change in the scene that might make it more interesting, they'll probably fail to capture it due to the excessive shutter lag of most P&S cameras.
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larsrc

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Photography is to art what golf is to sport
« Reply #43 on: January 27, 2008, 05:36:24 pm »

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I'm not saying that golf is not a sport, but I am saying that it is a much less demanding sport than other sports - after all, it's a sport that can be played by semi-invalids if they have enough money for a golf cart.

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While I don't agree with the assessment of photography as "art lite", I can see the similarity between golf and photography in another way: Both are activities that a lot of people do at an amateur level, whereas many other sports/arts are more the area of highly trained people.  Thus both get the labelling of "anyone can do it".  In fact, most people can pick up a golf club or a camera and fairly quickly get to the level of "not awful" - try that in glassblowing or boxing or ski jump or opera!  The often overlooked fact (that I'm becoming more and more painfully aware of:) is that the distance between bad and good in both golf and photography is much smaller than the distance between good and great.  It's just Sturgeon's law applied: 90 % of everything is crap.

-Lars
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Rob C

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Photography is to art what golf is to sport
« Reply #44 on: January 28, 2008, 06:41:44 am »

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While I don't agree with the assessment of photography as "art lite", I can see the similarity between golf and photography in another way: Both are activities that a lot of people do at an amateur level, whereas many other sports/arts are more the area of highly trained people.  Thus both get the labelling of "anyone can do it".  In fact, most people can pick up a golf club or a camera and fairly quickly get to the level of "not awful" - try that in glassblowing or boxing or ski jump or opera!  The often overlooked fact (that I'm becoming more and more painfully aware of:) is that the distance between bad and good in both golf and photography is much smaller than the distance between good and great.  It's just Sturgeon's law applied: 90 % of everything is crap.

-Lars
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That Sturgeon sure knew what he was talking about! Pity so many have to prove it online.

Rob C

Stuarte

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Photography is to art what golf is to sport
« Reply #45 on: January 28, 2008, 08:56:14 am »

I was discussing golf and sport recently with a former PT instructor in the Army, a guy who boxed, did biathlon, canoing, football and a bunch of other sports, some to a very high level.  He also plays golf and remarked that of all the sports he has played, golf is the greatest revealer of someone's true character.  

Regarding the sportiness or otherwise of golf, it was a bit of a non-issue for him.  To play it really well requires skill, patience, stamina and a good eye.   Not to mention a lot of dedication and practice.
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Sfleming

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« Reply #46 on: January 28, 2008, 11:38:31 am »

Here's my cliched contribution:

99% of 'modern' or 'contemporary' art is pure BS.
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Sfleming

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« Reply #47 on: January 28, 2008, 11:41:00 am »

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Here's my cliched contribution:

99% of 'modern' or 'contemporary' art is pure BS.
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To this I must add:

99% of the art world makes me want to vomit.
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Rob C

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« Reply #48 on: January 28, 2008, 04:09:25 pm »

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To this I must add:

99% of the art world makes me want to vomit.
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Or, of course, join it at the right level?

Rob C

Sfleming

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« Reply #49 on: January 28, 2008, 04:25:24 pm »

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Or, of course, join it at the right level?

Rob C
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What level is that?  My experience (personal and hands on) is that the higher up the ladder you go ... the more revolting it gets.
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Steven Draper

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Photography is to art what golf is to sport
« Reply #50 on: February 18, 2008, 11:38:56 am »

What a hot topic this is: My thoughts.

Art seems to be used as a general term to describe something that someone has created or is performing - dance, painting, sculpture, photograph, writing, music etc., that is the process of their creative vision.

However art is also used in the sense - "The art of making money" "The art of good parenting"  which implies that "art" refers to the practical application of a subjective decision making process in order to achieve the required goal.

Indeed there are some people who would imply that by applying a creative level of input to their task, job, role that they are artists by definition, i.e. The market trader who can pull a sale from anyone, the news interviewer who can always extract the answer...

And on the creation side of things, what about web design, marketing, advertising  etc.

As I see it something, anything, becomes art only during the moment that it is providing a connection between the person who created it and the person who is experiencing it. For example a finger smudge by a baby will be art while the creativity is enjoyed by the parents, but to many others it will just be smudges made by a baby. Putting a CD on as background music does not mean that the music is art, unless the listener is experiencing it. A picture or photo hanging on the wall is not art until the view engages with it.

So art is IMHO the process of connection between the creator and the receiver. What does add some complication to the debate is is it art if the experience is purely emotional. Lots of things create an emotional response that are not thought of as art, arguing, loving, news etc. So I would therefore suggest that while lots of art may well have an emotional element, the core connection must be an appreciation by the experiencer of the creative ability,level, gift, genius of the artist.

Someone who cannot appreciate the creativity cannot therefore be experiencing the art, even though they may well be receiving some kind of emotion.

This is why it is often easier to appreciate some forms of art "later" as the genius of the greatest artist is often not often understood by the general population  / art followers at the time of its creation.

Therefore IMHO art is the process of the creative appretiation by one person, of the person responsible for the media that they are experiencing.

Part of the problem with photography as art is that a massive amount of people just have no appretiation of just how difficult getting a great picture actually is. To many the difference in your great print and their snap is simple, well your camera is better, or you just take a few more than me, or today if you take thousands of digital images then surely one will have potential!
It would probably be true of painting too, but most people in the developed world have grown up with art at school, art books, folks with paintings or prints of "greats" on the wall and while they may actually not have any real perception or appretiation, they have received a conditioning to what and who  is considered to be a great painter.

However with a painting the fact that the artist "touched" the paint onto that canvas provides a greater sense of connection that cannot easily be connected with a photographic print, unless the creation of that actual print held some relevance to the photographer, i.e. their hands did the dodging and burning in the darkroom. The fact that the actual print you may have may never have been seen by the photographer is IMHO something of a problem that many people have with photography as art.

But if someone experiences  photography and appreciates the creativity that has been imparted on the final image at all stages of its creation by the photographer, how that input has enhanced or produced the emotion that they may well be feeling then yes it is art. If someone else just thinks its a snap shot of some twisted rope, a sunset, a tramp etc then it isn't art.
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larsrc

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« Reply #51 on: February 19, 2008, 04:29:40 am »

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What a hot topic this is: My thoughts.
[...]
Therefore IMHO art is the process of the creative appretiation by one person, of the person responsible for the media that they are experiencing.
[...]
But if someone experiences  photography and appreciates the creativity that has been imparted on the final image at all stages of its creation by the photographer, how that input has enhanced or produced the emotion that they may well be feeling then yes it is art. If someone else just thinks its a snap shot of some twisted rope, a sunset, a tramp etc then it isn't art.
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An interesting approach: Schrödinger's art! Only when somebody appreciates the creativity does something become art.  This does have the advantage that I can immediately call a number of recent exhibits non-art, as I see nothing creative about them.

It also means, however, that that Van Gogh languishing in soebody's attic is not currently art, but will only become so when it is found and appreciated. Furthermore, the intrinsic qualities of an art object don't matter to whether it's actually art -- if you don't get it appreciated, it's not art.

On re-reading your text, I find a second interpretation: Art is the process of appreciation, not the object itself.  Rotting pigs and paintings of Mona Lisa are not art, but objects that make (some) people do the process of "arting".  So an art museum is where one goes to "art", and thereby add some artiness to the things that make you art.  Thus, rather than art is whatever its creator says is art, art is whatever somebody else says is art.  Probably the more the better, the ultimate in art democracy.  Which of course turns "creating art" into a process of marketing, as getting people to call your object art makes it art.  

This interpretation is probably very realistic in the modern art world, but I can't say I like it.

-Lars
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Stuarte

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« Reply #52 on: February 19, 2008, 07:15:16 am »

With regard to Steven Draper's long and interesting post, I think we should beware of popular usage of specific terms.  The fact that people casually talk about "the art of ..." is just an example of appropriating a term from one domain of human activity and applying it to others.  It's also a good example of how that process tends to de-specify and hence de-potentiate the original term.  The same has happened to "philosophy", which is applied to anything from the collected works of great thinkers to the occasional pronouncements of occasional thinkers (e.g. "my philosophy is live and let live").

On the subject of philosophy (literally: philo- sophia = love of wisdom) I have been struck at times by the way some professional philosophers live with a distinct lack of wisdom in their life.  It's as if philosophy for them is a separate pursuit that doesn't have a bearing on the conduct of their own life.

With regard to the discussion about art, there are many honourable, highly-skilled and highly-creative fields of activity that are not typically regarded as art: silversmithing and glass-blowing, for example.  I know little about either, but I'm sure they have their own internal hierarchies, with some piece being regarded as sublime, some being good and most of the rest being technically competent at best.

I guess everyone has their own subjective perspective on what is or isn't art.  From where I'm at right now, something approaches (my sense of the) sweet spot of art if it 1) is the product of inspiration AND 2) is executed with a particular degree of technical skill / mastery of the medium AND 3) expresses an idea or a vision or a meaning (which the artist may have planned consciously, or grasped intuitively).  These for me are just the threshold conditions for something to qualify as art.
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jjj

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« Reply #53 on: February 19, 2008, 10:42:55 am »

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I guess everyone has their own subjective perspective on what is or isn't art.  From where I'm at right now, something approaches (my sense of the) sweet spot of art if it 1) is the product of inspiration AND 2) is executed with a particular degree of technical skill / mastery of the medium AND 3) expresses an idea or a vision or a meaning (which the artist may have planned consciously, or grasped intuitively).  These for me are just the threshold conditions for something to qualify as art.
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Sometimes a great piece is executed with what most people would consider to be a lack of technical skill.  Matisse's La Danse compared to say a Rembrandt. So I'd say technical skill is not so relevant. Only the end result.
La Danse + Danae are both studies of the female form.



« Last Edit: February 19, 2008, 10:45:27 am by jjj »
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Stuarte

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« Reply #54 on: February 19, 2008, 11:00:30 am »

The whole thing is very subjective.  As I'm not a painter I can't comment on the technical skill it may or may not have required for the Matisse.  You could equally well have chosen Picasso's "Les Demoiselles d'Avignon".  

But if we assume that the Matisse piece took very little technical skill to paint, and that the end result is all that counts, then what is it about this (and comparable works) that makes it not just art, but celebrated art?

I suspect that despite appearances and despite comparison with the highly-skilled figurative artists of old, the Matisses and Picassos did take significant technical skill.
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Eric Myrvaagnes

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Photography is to art what golf is to sport
« Reply #55 on: February 19, 2008, 11:22:05 am »

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An interesting approach: Schrödinger's art!
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I love it! Art that is both dead and alive at the same time!

Thank you, Lars.
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jjj

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« Reply #56 on: February 19, 2008, 12:32:21 pm »

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The whole thing is very subjective.
And there you have the whole debate, in a nutshell.

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As I'm not a painter I can't comment on the technical skill it may or may not have required for the Matisse.  You could equally well have chosen Picasso's "Les Demoiselles d'Avignon". 

But if we assume that the Matisse piece took very little technical skill to paint, and that the end result is all that counts, then what is it about this (and comparable works) that makes it not just art, but celebrated art?
That it's not about technical ability. Art may be also of it's time, an impressionist painting today is nothing special. In it's day it was shocking, like Prokoviev's Romeo + Juliet,  like Picasso's Guernica, like Elvis was, Like the Sex Pistols were, like Damien Hirst was. The shocking becomes the banal, fairly quickly. Even more so with the WWW.

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I suspect that despite appearances and despite comparison with the highly-skilled figurative artists of old, the Matisses and Picassos did take significant technical skill.[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=175944\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]
Some of Natisses's later work I believe, were so simple due to his failing eyesight.
One IIRC was cut out pieces of paper.

If it looks good it is good. Whether it looks good, also depends on who is viewing.
So back to 'The whole thing is very subjective.'
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Stuarte

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« Reply #57 on: February 19, 2008, 01:03:41 pm »

Subjective indeed - which I guess keeps it endlessly fascinating.  

And with endless scope for the fine Art of the Con.
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walter.sk

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« Reply #58 on: February 19, 2008, 02:47:29 pm »

One aspect to consider is the process by which the artist makes the choices in producing the work.  One way to view this is as an aesthetic challenge or problem and working it through to some kind of conclusion.  This process is in some ways the art itself, and as important if not more, to the artist, than the actual piece.

There is also the element of mystery.  Good art is often provocative, in that it raises questions that are not answered, or even answerable; that makes the audience participate in some of the same search that the artist engaged in, or in a parallel search relevant to the audience.  This kind of art evokes participation by the audience, and can stimulate thought, emotion, comfort, discomfort, etc.

I suppose the goal of the artist also is considered in what is termed "fine art."  I don't think that Picasso's Blue Period came about because he needed something to match the material on his couch.

Anyway, these are just some of my thoughts.
« Last Edit: February 19, 2008, 02:48:38 pm by walter.sk »
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