Luminous Landscape Forum
Site & Board Matters => About This Site => Topic started by: Christopher Sanderson on September 21, 2018, 05:35:01 pm
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Today, we have published Andrew Molitor's latest essay (https://luminous-landscape.com/photography-is-selection/) with his thoughts on photography
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I really enjoyed this essay, as I think Andrew has achieved a fine balance in the distinction between selection and creating. I agree with Andrew that by its very nature a photograph begins life as an act of selection - it is capturing what's there in the way we see it. It can become creative in the manner we make those selections and what we do with the original photograph there after. Thanks to our current digital technology the possibilities for what I would call "creative value added" are limitless. But it starts as an act of more or less thoughtful selection.
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Unless of course we create the reality and the photographic subject in some way,
- for example just google Landart,
- or painting with light,
- or arranging a still life for photography.
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Unless of course we create the reality and the photographic subject in some way,
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- or arranging a still life for photography.
In which case you are not a creative photographer, but a creative still-life arranger ;)
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This, to my mind, is a spurious, simplistic proposition.
Whilst it may indeed apply to some types of photography, it simply refuses to acknowledge others have a different genesis.
In fact, I am aware of having travelled this conversation here, on our beloved LuLa, more than once. In earlier debates, as in this one, it is conveniently ignored that the fashion photographer, the portraitist and the still life photographer do a helluva lot more than select: they make something exist that did not, and would not have existed without them. Granted, there is selection as in the sense of the knowing decision to go shoot something, but that's no different to the process that confronts the painter or the architect: without that motivator and further selective decisions, the painter could just as well not set up his canvas; or, could as easily throw a tube of blue at the canvas as red. Silly, isn't it?
Photographic history may be interesting per se, but in no way does it further the argument.
This article may appear convincing within a landscape photography context, and it most certainly is in tune with my own perception of the genre, where the prime elements appear, to me, to consist of little but strong hiking boots, and unlimited patience waiting for God to pull something out of the hat for the snapper. The snapper's contribution is then indeed a matter of selection and editing via voting with his feet or going slowly and more comfortably (and with less damage to said feet) courtesy his latest zoom. Landscape people have a lot of faith in wide zooms... and of zoom telephoto lenses too, come to think of it.
Somewhere along the proposal the little matter of creativity was ignored, denied and reduced to nothing more than editing what the net dredges up from out of the swamp. There are genres of photography where no swamp or net is used at all, more a flight with a wing and a prayer. I like that more.
Rob
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The point, though, is that selection is and always has been looked down upon, viewed as lesser than creation,
and it ought not to be.
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... the fashion photographer, the portraitist and the still life photographer do a helluva lot more than select: they make something exist that did not, and would not have existed without them...
How so? The model, portrait subject, and still life exist on their own before, during, and after the snap. Excactly the same as the landscape. The model strikes a pose, and your job is to press the button at the right moment to capture her creation, just as it is when “God” strikes a tree with a beautiful light.
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The point, though, that selection is and always has been looked down upon, viewed as lesser than creation,
and it ought not to be.
Ah, Andrew and I in agreement again, after a while 😉
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Perhaps “opportunism” should be used in place of “selection” for it is ‘waiting for Godot’ rather than “creation” out of the wisps of the mind ?
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How so? The model, portrait subject, and still life exist on their own before, during, and after the snap. Excactly the same as the landscape. The model strikes a pose, and your job is to press the button at the right moment to capture her creation, just as it is when “God” strikes a tree with a beautiful light.
Of course the model already exists, as does the photographer. As does the painter and the canvas he intends to use, and the brushes, knives and paints. But you do a lot more than have her "strike a pose" because you direct and, if she's any good, or can even empathise with you, you both go places you would not otherwise reach. Far from being her creation or yours, it, the image, only exists because you were able to finger-to-finger, in manner temporarily divine. Without directing and emotional response to direction and understanding of it, nada. Club pictures; Hollywood vs. home movies.
And here's the thing: you can't ever do it again in exactly the same way. As with people's kids: same parents, different kids with different looks, abilities and personalities.
Still life: I do not mean a photograph of a rock.
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...because you direct ...
Which makes you a director, not a photographer. Same person, different hats. It doesn’t even have to be the same person, or even a person. If art director is present and directs the shoot, you (the photographer) just press the button when you select the right moment. Enter new technology: a camera that autonomously takes pics at ten per second as long as the model moves. Art director then selects the best shot. No photographer needed.
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The painter can create a representation of something that exists or can create a representation of something that doesn't exist. Both approaches involve creativity.
The photographer can create a representation of something that exists or can create a representation of something that doesn't exist. Both approaches involve creativity.
To suggest that one approach and or discipline is dredging something up from out of the swamp and the other is more akin to divine creation is both a simplistic and spurious proposition.
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Which makes you a director, not a photographer. Same person, different hats. It doesn’t even have to be the same person, or even a person. If art director is present and directs the shoot, you (the photographer) just press the button when you select the right moment. Enter new technology: a camera that autonomously takes pics at ten per second as long as the model moves. Art director then selects the best shot. No photographer needed.
What nonsense Slobodan; it's same person same hat (creative hat) because they happen at the same time. As both involve making something happen and exist for that briefest of moments within an aesthetic context, it is creation. You may have a point where an AD is not also the photographer. But then committee seldom makes art; more does it tend to buy or dictate what it might be.
Of course, you may feel inclined to wear two hats at once, which out in the polar regions may make some sense.
I avoid those extremes as much as I can.
:-)
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... it's same person same hat because they happen at the same time..
I already provided a counter-argument: "It doesn’t even have to be the same person, or even a person."
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I already provided a counter-argument: "It doesn’t even have to be the same person, or even a person."
Which in this context makes no sense at all. We, or especially Andrew, were writing about photographers as humans, not machines.
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In any case, creativity, especially as a goal in itself, is overrated. What matters is the impact on the viewer, and this can be achieved with or without (much) creativity (narrowly defined).
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The art of selection is not a creative act?
The art of selection itself to me is a creative act, because it resonates with somethign intangible within me, and that's my creative heart. My inner vision.
It starts within, and not without. And we all need tools to express this creativity. The object to be photographed can also be seen as a tool of sorts.
The without, the "what I see out there" is an affirmation of that intangible within me that is suddenly woken up in an "aha" moment.
The giving of myself to the visual and the receiving, the answering as-it-were, of the visual back to me creates an internal energy, a creative moment and flow, and is often the foundation for hours of this energized shooting engagement.
Also, shooting style, is a form of more than just selection. It says something about the mind, the creativity within, the inner vision of the photographer. For example, people have told me that I have a particular style. Is a photograph by Alfred Eisensteadt the same as one taken by Annie Leibowitz? Of course not. Style to me is creativity. Just like Picasso, Rembrandt; I see selection as mere process of the creative. Give those two photographers the same scene and see what they do with it; they will select according to their creative inner vision. This inner vision always precedes the actual scene to be shot.
Selection, as you call it, is therefore a primary act of creativity. A painter selects colors, brushes, canvas size, etc. Many (not all) photographers select scenes as part of their creative expression.
I manipulate images like crazy and you could say that I do graphic arts based on images I shot. I often shoot with a pre-conceived idea in mind and a then find and indeed select something appropriate to shoot. Yes, I then select, but at heart is a different more primary inner visionary process.
True, in that sense, all creativity is an art of selection. Like my brother who is a sculptor. He selects marble or granite, certain tools, hammers, etc.; he also depends on the material of what he can do with it (not all stones can be turned into what one envisions; there are limitations due to the inner structure of the stone).
I select in my mind what I want to achieve, what my creative mind desires. My choices. Choices are always selections,; selections of possibilities, even dreamed up ideas that cannot be realized. In that sense, this article uses the right term/word. But at the same time it just is so much more than that.
I improvise music on the piano. Is that being selective or creative? Isn't it both, all at once at the same time? Does one precede the other? I personally don't think so. One creative musical sequence leads to the "selection" of the next, and this process goes well beyond the issue of what comes first. I believe they are simultaneous. And when you improvise, who's in control? The tonality? The key? The mood? The style? Who's listening? The lights? Ambient noises? Feedback?
Often all of it!
In that sense, despite the otherwise intriguing point made, I still find the article a bit unnuanced, and I would encourage Andrew Molitor to expand it, refine it, and be creative with it.
Below is an image I shot this way on purpose with a 6x6 camera, with the express purpose of turning it into a composite of some sort. That is: I saw it, and then it got my creative juices flowing and then I came back to it with the right camera and shot it and then manipulated it later on. No creativity happens in a vacuum, but builds on what already exists and evolves it further with creativity. This is true for architecture, painting, music, etc.
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This thread illustrates perfectly exactly what I wanted to address in my piece.
We are witnessing in real time the, I hesitate to say desperate, let us say instead "firm and vigorous" rejection of the idea that photography is not at its core simply selection
as if there were something wrong with that
My thesis is simple: there isn't anything wrong with that.
You can fuss about whether the word "photography" stretches to cover lighting or not, post-processing or not. I don't care much, and that is to miss the point.
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This thread illustrates perfectly exactly what I wanted to address in my piece.
We are witnessing in real time the, I hesitate to say desperate, let us say instead "firm and vigorous" rejection of the idea that photography is not at its core simply selection
as if there were something wrong with that
My thesis is simple: there isn't anything wrong with that.
You can fuss about whether the word "photography" stretches to cover lighting or not, post-processing or not. I don't care much, and that is to miss the point.
Andrew, who exactly are the “photographers and critics have felt that it is somehow lesser than the creative arts in which the artist actually makes things, actually creates things?”
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Rob, given your previous posts in this thread I find it strange that you celebrate Saul Leiter for dredging it up from the swamp and yet feel somewhat aggrieved when it transpires that he is very capable of directing the action.
Following on from the propositions in your previous posts, it begs the question, what of Street? - which is essentially working with whatever is dredged up from the swamp. Can then Street be considered a creative genre?
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1. Rob, given your previous posts in this thread I find it strange that you celebrate Saul Leiter for dredging it up from the swamp and yet feel somewhat aggrieved when it transpires that he is very capable of directing the action.
2. Following on from the propositions in your previous posts, it begs the question, what of Street? - which is essentially working with whatever is dredged up from the swamp. Can then Street be considered a creative genre?
1. What Leiter did was simply this: he wandered around his local swamp looking for interesting bits he could isolate and turn into something perhaps invisible to, if not just overlooked by, the "man in the street" though, at the same time, I see no evidence that Saul gave a fig about the opinion of the man in the street; probably as little about him as would that man about the images Saul could see. Considering that he kept piles of boxes of his stuff stored and not looked at in his apartment, I think it shows he had no interest in showing the work to a wider audience. He did have a few moments in public shows, but they went nowhere.
In that sense, his photography of New York is mainly one of selecting and editing what lay around. He also shot a lot of stuff with his friends, lovers and people he had close ties with in the city. Much of that is on show in his two-volume black/white books by Steidl; in some of the shots of girlfriends he is very creat¡ve indeed, whereas in others, merely happysnapping.
However, Leiter earned his crust not from his windows and reflections or personal snaps, but as a fashion photographer working for over twenty years for one of the big two - Harper's Bazaar - as well as for Nova and a variety of show-biz magazines. So yes, in his case, he was able both to take what architecture and city life offered, as well as to create from scratch with his fashion work that, at the time, had the models wondering what the hell he was doing.
Some people are blessed with both abilities: selection and creation, others not.
2. Street. Can it be considered creative? Strictly speaking, probably not; when it works, most certainly as the manifestation of a very keen and observant eye in action, coupled with an aesthetic sense of equilibrium or its considered, instinctive sense of when the opposite is appropriate. In some cases a death wish could also be an advantage. Where it suffers is in its absolute dependence on things happening that the snapper can not control. If he tries to do that, he has lost and moved into another genre.
I must go and wash the terrace before the Sun hits it and renders work impossible.
Rob
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Jees, all of a sudden I feel the need to do something more creative. Perhaps a haemorrhoid cream product shot would suffice?
;-)
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Jees, all of a sudden I feel the need to do something more creative. Perhaps a haemorrhoid cream product shot would suffice?
;-)
That could well depend on whether simply product or use of it.
No idea if there is a sub-species of specialist model for this, as there is for hands, fingers and tits. You could try to find out... maybe a combination of the two model talents?
Wear a mask, both for the sake of your health and sensitivities, as much as for creator effect. Steven Meisel always wore a hat in the studio, and it got him all the Italian Vogue covers...
;-)
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Once again, excellent examples of Homo Sapiens pretty much on the way out as we have been to taught understand her. All, differently wired, and limited by the wires as to perception, such arguments will be distant memory in well less than 50 years. My grandchildren will participate, and their children well on their way to bright new worlds if there was enough quality wiring to catch on in time to the new beings by which Homo Sapiens is replaced or mere artifacts of this time on the curve. Who ever dreamed we would be the lucky (?) few to witness this leap? How we are wired will be the smallest, if significant at all, part of the equation. Head in sand arguments such as these feel very much as distractions from "realities" of the current air we breathe. Easier not to acknowledge the speed we are gaining as we hurtle down this road~
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Once again, excellent examples of Homo Sapiens pretty much on the way out as we have been to taught understand her. All, differently wired, and limited by the wires as to perception, such arguments will be distant memory in well less than 50 years. My grandchildren will participate, and their children well on their way to bright new worlds if there was enough quality wiring to catch on in time to the new beings by which Homo Sapiens is replaced or mere artifacts of this time on the curve. Who ever dreamed we would be the lucky (?) few to witness this leap? How we are wired will be the smallest, if significant at all, part of the equation. Head in sand arguments such as these feel very much as distractions from "realities" of the current air we breathe. Easier not to acknowledge the speed we are gaining as we hurtle down this road~
Well said, Patricia.
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Or as the late, great, John Laurie would have it, we're doomed, doomed...
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Well said, Patricia.
Pass the bong around, please! ;)
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I guess I am happy to be a happysnapper. Can I use that term? Or has Rob trademarked it? ;)
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doomed...
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Once again, excellent examples of Homo Sapiens pretty much on the way out as we have been to taught understand her. All, differently wired, and limited by the wires as to perception, such arguments will be distant memory in well less than 50 years. My grandchildren will participate, and their children well on their way to bright new worlds if there was enough quality wiring to catch on in time to the new beings by which Homo Sapiens is replaced or mere artifacts of this time on the curve. Who ever dreamed we would be the lucky (?) few to witness this leap? How we are wired will be the smallest, if significant at all, part of the equation. Head in sand arguments such as these feel very much as distractions from "realities" of the current air we breathe. Easier not to acknowledge the speed we are gaining as we hurtle down this road~
Deep, Patricia, but as ever, there's a but lurking in the background.
A site such as LuLa, with pretensions to being more than just another gear freak site, has to have (and keep) some alternative conversation going to make it interesting and worth repeated viewing.
That's where the few people like Andrew (of this thread), and also Russ, who just writes so damned well - become worth their contributing weight in gold. We may or may not agree with them, but they do provide the basic material, the propositions with which to connect.
Do you really believe that all of us who are so-called "figs" or even just benign old curmudgeons of one sort or another, would still bother hanging around were it not for the intellectual stimulation we sometimes derive from what we find to read here? The photographs, I might hear you offering, but let's be straight: if you want photographs alone, then good old Doctor Google has enough to satisfy every taste, from the historical to the ridiculously contemporary.
Frankly, it's the observation of those different wiring diagrams and motherboards interconnecting that brings the interest.
As for our following generations? I doubt they will care very much about photography; it will probably seem such a quaint old idea not worth more than a few minutes' trawl through a junk shop... there will always be junk: we have created so much of it.
Rob
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Why do you/we all seem to get our knickers in a twist when discussing photographic creativity and what it is all supposed to mean? In fact why do we even have to consider and analyse this same subject over and over again until the cows come home?
All I know is that if we all get some sort of deep visceral satisfaction out of doing it and no one gets harmed in the process, then surely that is reason enough to do it and be damned why or what it means to others, or whether it is a creative process or not.
So let us imagine this, I am standing there in my living room looking at a bare wall. I go out and I shoot something that touches some part of my inner being (whatever that is, so let's not go there shall we). I go home, I print it and I mount it on my wall. So now where there was once nothing, there is now a picture hanging in the place of that nothingness. So did I just create something? Yes of course I did and yes I might have done some selection to pick out what elements from the the entire world that I wanted to appear in the image, or the light, or the time of day or year etc, but the final product and the very thing itself that I am now looking at, I created.
But if we were to push the discussion even further in the direction you have tried to point it Andrew and continued on through to to its ultimate conclusion, then wouldn't I be right in saying that there is no such thing as creativity at all, because all there ever is and will ever be is selection? Such as a painter who selects the colour of paint to use, who then selects the type of canvas and brush to use and then selects where to daub the paint on the canvas, to turn into a piece of work that they have selected to produce. Each separate part of the process, can be looked at if we wished, as being no more than a step by step selection process that leads to a conclusion and therefore no creativity was ever required - but we all know this isn't true, so why do we find it hard to say that photography is also a creative process, but by different means?
Or how about producing a sculpture, where all anyone needs to do is to keep selecting which bits of marble to chip off the block in turn, until we produce our very own version of the Venus de Milo - which I am sure a modern day robot sculpting arm could be programmed to do repeatedly and precisely.
So for me, creativity is simply the act of me bringing something into this world that did not exist before and would never have existed unless I created it.
It is fun to discuss this creativity in photography, but that is all we can ever do, because whatever anyone decides in their own mind, there will always be someone who thinks the opposite, but ultimately, if what you "create" or "select" satisfy you as a photographer, then who cares how anyone else wishes to define it?
Dave
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Why do you/we all seem to get our knickers in a twist when discussing photographic creativity and what it is all supposed to mean? In fact why do we even have to consider and analyse this same subject over and over again until the cows come home?
All I know is that if we all get some sort of deep visceral satisfaction out of doing it and no one gets harmed in the process, then surely that is reason enough to do it and be damned why or what it means to others, or whether it is a creative process or not.
So let us imagine this, I am standing there in my living room looking at a bare wall. I go out and I shoot something that touches some part of my inner being (whatever that is, so let's not go there shall we). I go home, I print it and I mount it on my wall. So now where there was once nothing, there is now a picture hanging in the place of that nothingness. So did I just create something? Yes of course I did and yes I might have done some selection to pick out what elements from the the entire world that I wanted to appear in the image, or the light, or the time of day or year etc, but the final product and the very thing itself that I am now looking at, I created.
But if we were to push the discussion even further in the direction you have tried to point it Andrew and continued on through to to its ultimate conclusion, then wouldn't I be right in saying that there is no such thing as creativity at all, because all there ever is and will ever be is selection? Such as a painter who selects the colour of paint to use, who then selects the type of canvas and brush to use and then selects where to daub the paint on the canvas, to turn into a piece of work that they have selected to produce. Each separate part of the process, can be looked at if we wished, as being no more than a step by step selection process that leads to a conclusion and therefore no creativity was ever required - but we all know this isn't true, so why do we find it hard to say that photography is also a creative process, but by different means?
Or how about producing a sculpture, where all anyone needs to do is to keep selecting which bits of marble to chip off the block in turn, until we produce our very own version of the Venus de Milo - which I am sure a modern day robot sculpting arm could be programmed to do repeatedly and precisely.
So for me, creativity is simply the act of me bringing something into this world that did not exist before and would never have existed unless I created it.
It is fun to discuss this creativity in photography, but that is all we can ever do, because whatever anyone decides in their own mind, there will always be someone who thinks the opposite, but ultimately, if what you "create" or "select" satisfy you as a photographer, then who cares how anyone else wishes to define it?
Dave
Sound argument well put.
But as I wrote earlier, it's the "debate" that fills the cracks between interminable geek-speak and images. Left to those two, there would be almost nothing left to call LuLa's own. Unless you treat it as a holiday bookings site.
Rob
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Like it or lump it, capturing an image, any image, selected or directed, good, bad or indifferent, an image that prior to capture didn't previously exist, is in itself a creative act.
Sometimes, often even, we need to get over ourselves.
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Like it or lump it, capturing an image, any image, selected or directed, good, bad or indifferent, an image that prior to capture didn't previously exist, is in itself a creative act.
Sometimes, often even, we need to get over ourselves.
You mean like stamping out a hubcap in the factory? As if didn't exist until it did, that should fit the outline...
:-)
Rob
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I have now read several sides of the select or create arguments, but as yet no one has stated why it matters.
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At some point the painter, having selected a number of things, actually applies paint to the canvas.
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Your reply #34.
Can you point me to the post from which you cut this sentence, please?
Rob
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At some point the painter, having selected a number of things, actually applies paint to the canvas.
Yes Andrew, the painter then 'selects' where they wish to place the paint on the canvas, as well as how thick they wish to apply it, the colour of it, whether they want to use a certain technique such as or pointillism etc, etc, etc.....
Have you ever watch the video "Tim's Vermeer"? Because if you haven't then you will be blown away at what can be done when you choose (select) the method you wish to use to paint a masterpiece. You see Tim Jenison is and inventor, but is also someone who has never painted anything in his life, in other words he is absolutely not an artistic painter in any sense of the word. Yet through selecting the materials and the same methods that he thinks Vermeer also secretly used, he was able to create a work of art as good as anything Vermeer ever did. Which as it turns out, were/are all actually photographs, but using paint instead of ink or emulsions etc.
So do you think Vermeer is or was an artist? I certainly do, but it also turns out that Vermeer was no more (or less) than one of the worlds first ever photographers.
In fact anyone reading this who wants to enjoy a jaw dropping evening of entertainment, should seek out this video - here is the trailer (http://sonyclassics.com/timsvermeer/).
I bet if you watch this video, you will want to have a go yourselves, but does it make Vermeer's work any less artistic or creative? No of course it doesn't. But does it mean Vermeer only used selective processes and had no artistic skill whatsoever when he created his body work? Then yes it probably does.
Dave
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Your reply #34.
Can you point me to the post from which you cut this sentence, please?
Rob
Rob, it looks like a case of bad quote formatting, resulting in his own words looking like your quote.
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This discussion has (predictably, I suppose) veered wildly from the the point I was making on the front page, and I don't really want to get embroiled in a debate about whether the word "photography" right includes the various acts of creation that surround it.
I think it is pure sophistry to claim that you cannot distinguish between "selecting" and "creating", as per my remark about applying paint to the canvas.
Tim did engage in creation, as did Vermeer, in ways that I do not when I mash the button on my camera. Try as I might, I cannot see as how that is possibly open for discussion, it appears to me to be simply factual. The word "create" means something, after all.
Dragging in the word "artist" now potentially opens another door, but again circles back to the Victorian debate over photography, and my original thesis.
The idea that in order to be an "artist" one must "create" is also wrong, at least in the modern understanding of what those two words mean.
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This discussion has (predictably, I suppose) veered wildly from the the point I was making on the front page, and I don't really want to get embroiled in a debate about whether the word "photography" right includes the various acts of creation that surround it.
I think it is pure sophistry to claim that you cannot distinguish between "selecting" and "creating", as per my remark about applying paint to the canvas.
Tim did engage in creation, as did Vermeer, in ways that I do not when I mash the button on my camera. Try as I might, I cannot see as how that is possibly open for discussion, it appears to me to be simply factual. The word "create" means something, after all.
Dragging in the word "artist" now potentially opens another door, but again circles back to the Victorian debate over photography, and my original thesis.
The idea that in order to be an "artist" one must "create" is also wrong, at least in the modern understanding of what those two words mean.
So now you are speaking of your own interpretation of what you do selectively or creatively, when as you put it, you mash the camera button down, and so you must also accept that others may have differing views on what they believe to be their creative process and that these other and quite possibly opposing interpretations, are just as valid as everyone elses, including yours and mine.
So when you said "I think it is pure sophistry to claim that you cannot distinguish between "selecting" and "creating", as per my remark about applying paint to the canvas." I wasn't trying to be obtuse there Andrew or trying to trip you up, I was just trying to show you the futility of this debate. Because on one hand you say we photographers select and do not create as a painter does, yet when I show you an example of where an esteemed world famous and highly valuable artist, turns out in fact to have been no more than a photographer using paint instead of ink, then by your own interpretation he must have selected and not created, yet you come back and say no he created. So is it paint that makes it creative???
But when it all comes down to it, these are just words and semantic contortions and as I said previously, why should we care what titles people want to put on what we do, when all that really matters is that we are driven to do it and to it as well as we can and in a way that satisfies something deep within each of us.
I am out of this discussion now Andrew, because I feel as if I am beginning to annoy you unnecessarily and I do not want to do that, as I totally respect your opinion and enjoy reading whatever you write, as it is always enjoyable and thought provoking and well written, but hey, as the old playground saying goes, you started it.. ;)
Dave
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Photographers do many things, many of them are creative. But not all of them, and not a particular and essential one:
There is a moment, a piece of the puzzle, an element which is not creative but selective. I call that *the essence of photography" and can, I think, argue that word choice coherently. But whether you call it "photography* or "Sandra" it has its own magic despite not being an act of creation.
It is as fully capable of generating Art as is sculpture or painting, despite the fact that the latter are acts of making, of creation, and the former is not.
It is fully a peer of creation.
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It is more or less exactly this debate which spurred my essay in the first place. We're seeing all the usual moves:
"I move lights around"
"I do a lot of photoshop"
"By pressing the button I create because electrons something something"
"Is not selecting actually the same thing as creation?"
all to justify photography AS an act of creation. Which suggests, frankly, an urgent desire to identify oneself AS a creative, not as a, as it were, selective. Virtually everyone in this thread appears to be offended or upset, at least slightly, at the idea that what they do is not at its core creative but rather selective.
There is a curious parallel with the Victorian gentleman who argued, cogently and loudly, that photography WAS NOT ART because it was purely mechanical, at the bottom. The response was to add all manner of creative "stuff" to the mechanical processes, and we wound up with the worst excesses of the Pictorialists.
My aim is not to demean you as a "mere selective" but to uplift you, to validate and empower you, as a "selective". And, by all means, move lights around and photoshop all the night long in addition!
The Victorians, as well as both modern critics and photographers, confusedly assume that it cannot be Art unless it includes creation.
Any photographer knows that, even if you stick to the purely mechanical, if you move no lights and do no photoshop, sometimes by a mysterious alchemy, pretty good pictures turn up anyways.
So it became clear to me that Art must be separated from Creation (something Duchamp was at some pains to teach us almost 100 years past). Once Art is free to roam, it might as well be attached to Selection to see if that works, and when you try it out, lo, it does.
Rob C might claim "direction" as a creative act and I will not deny him that. But I am certain also that Rob would admit that in the end it comes down to pressing the button >now< rather than.... >now<, that is, to an act of selection.
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It is more or less exactly this debate which spurred my essay in the first place. We're seeing all the usual moves:
"I move lights around"
"I do a lot of photoshop"
"By pressing the button I create because electrons something something"
"Is not selecting actually the same thing as creation?"
all to justify photography AS an act of creation. Which suggests, frankly, an urgent desire to identify oneself AS a creative, not as a, as it were, selective. Virtually everyone in this thread appears to be offended or upset, at least slightly, at the idea that what they do is not at its core creative but rather selective.
There is a curious parallel with the Victorian gentleman who argued, cogently and loudly, that photography WAS NOT ART because it was purely mechanical, at the bottom. The response was to add all manner of creative "stuff" to the mechanical processes, and we wound up with the worst excesses of the Pictorialists.
My aim is not to demean you as a "mere selective" but to uplift you, to validate and empower you, as a "selective". And, by all means, move lights around and photoshop all the night long in addition!
The Victorians, as well as both modern critics and photographers, confusedly assume that it cannot be Art unless it includes creation.
Any photographer knows that, even if you stick to the purely mechanical, if you move no lights and do no photoshop, sometimes by a mysterious alchemy, pretty good pictures turn up anyways.
So it became clear to me that Art must be separated from Creation (something Duchamp was at some pains to teach us almost 100 years past). Once Art is free to roam, it might as well be attached to Selection to see if that works, and when you try it out, lo, it does.
Rob C might claim "direction" as a creative act and I will not deny him that. But I am certain also that Rob would admit that in the end it comes down to pressing the button >now< rather than.... >now<, that is, to an act of selection.
Andrew, I can’t tell whether you are serious or just being a gadfly to try and evoke a response that will mollify some insecurity you have. You seem content with the debate, so at some level your silly little piece worked. I guess.
But really, this just had me rolling. From the above:
My aim is not to demean you as a "mere selective" but to uplift you, to validate and empower you, as a "selective". And, by all means, move lights around and photoshop all the night long in addition!
Hilarious!
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Ahmmm...
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I am perfectly serious, and I assure you that none of my insecurities are in play here. I will check with my therapist next time I get a chance, though, and will let you know if I turned out to be wrong on that point.
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This appears to be another debate on how much photoshopping is allowed before a picture goes from a "natural" "unedited" photo to digital art.
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It might get there, Alan, but it does not strike me as there yet. I will be well out of it, should it get there.
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A distinction without a difference. :)
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OK I'll add my two cents.
God creates, man crafts.
Or, how about: Am I creating an omelet with onions, green pepper and cheese but only crafting two fried eggs?
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OK I'll add my two cents.
God creates, man crafts.
Or, how about: Am I creating an omelet with onions, green pepper and cheese but only crafting two fried eggs?
Close, but regarding the fried eggs: one might possibly be eating the fried eggs?
In the hallway of my first studio, the top floor of a somewhat Dickensian block, I had framed a good replica of a fried egg. I called it Motherhood. I don't know what the females who wandered that hallway thought. They never brought it up. But then, they didn't eat it, either.
People are weird, I find.
Rob
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Close, but regarding the fried eggs: one might possibly be eating the fried eggs?
In the hallway of my first studio, the top floor of a somewhat Dickensian block, I had framed a good replica of a fried egg. I called it Motherhood. I don't know what the females who wandered that hallway thought. They never brought it up. But then, they didn't eat it, either.
People are weird, I find.
Rob
When I was in business, I had a framed picture of Avedon's "Natasha Kinski with Snake" on the wall behind my desk. It was pretty risque at the time. When people would visit me to discuss business, I would watch their eyes sneaking a peak of Natasha during our talks. I would keep a straight face and enjoy their squirming. I guess I was pretty weird then. Still am.
https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-OpiVbMSmrHQ/ULZ8BB2vduI/AAAAAAAACnI/DljNUkPNvFg/s1600/Nastassja%2BKinski%2BPython%2B01.GIF (https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-OpiVbMSmrHQ/ULZ8BB2vduI/AAAAAAAACnI/DljNUkPNvFg/s1600/Nastassja%2BKinski%2BPython%2B01.GIF)
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The Art of Photography:
Where an artist stands before a blank canvas or block of marble, photographic artists' begin their creativity on an already painted surface: the former through inspiration, imagination and spirit - begin placing lines and shapes (whether forming a realistic image or one of abstract qualities) that can take minutes, weeks or months to complete. The latter - sees the entire world in front of their lens - and similarly, begins the process of creativity through inspiration, imagination and spirit. The photographic artist can "see" what many do not. The art of capturing a piece of reality inside a specific frame (composition) takes as much cerebral energy as artists from other genres of art. Though, we must also contend, photography skill sets, both mentally and technically, are far easier to learn and even master, than other forms of artistic expression. Nonetheless, the photographic artist is no less an artist than a painter, one who sculptors stone or sketches with charcoal and ink.
Lance A. Lewin
Lewins Photography Website (http://visualizingart.com)
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"Well to be perfectly honest, in my humble opinion, of course without offending anyone who thinks differently from my point of view, but also by looking into this matter in a different perspective and without being condemning of one's view's and by trying to make it objectified, and by considering each and every one's valid opinion, I honestly believe that I completely forgot what I was going to say." (pilfered from the Internet)
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"Well to be perfectly honest, in my humble opinion, of course without offending anyone who thinks differently from my point of view, but also by looking into this matter in a different perspective and without being condemning of one's view's and by trying to make it objectified, and by considering each and every one's valid opinion, I honestly believe that I completely forgot what I was going to say." (pilfered from the Internet)
Sounds like a perfect airport security id evaluator to me. ;)
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The Art of Photography:
Where an artist stands before a blank canvas or block of marble, photographic artists' begin their creativity on an already painted surface: the former through inspiration, imagination and spirit - begin placing lines and shapes (whether forming a realistic image or one of abstract qualities) that can take minutes, weeks or months to complete. The latter - sees the entire world in front of their lens - and similarly, begins the process of creativity through inspiration, imagination and spirit. The photographic artist can "see" what many do not. The art of capturing a piece of reality inside a specific frame (composition) takes as much cerebral energy as artists from other genres of art. Though, we must also contend, photography skill sets, both mentally and technically, are far easier to learn and even master, than other forms of artistic expression. Nonetheless, the photographic artist is no less an artist than a painter, one who sculptors stone or sketches with charcoal and ink.
Lance A. Lewin
Lewins Photography Website (http://visualizingart.com)
If you know how to paint, it's easier to add only the stuff you want on a canvas. Contrarily, the photographer is stuck with all that crap that's in the scene he wants to photograph and he has to figure out a way of removing it to leave only that which counts, often a more difficult task.
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But it is precisely 'all that crap' which makes photography distinctive and interesting.
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Sounds like he is dodging (or burning) the issue.
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I like that, Alan Klein - yes, as photographers we really are sorting through all the "clutter", as it were, in search something interesting: be it an abstract, impressionistic or realistic interpretations of the reality that defines our space.
Lance A. Lewin
Atlanta
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If you know how to paint, it's easier to add only the stuff you want on a canvas. Contrarily, the photographer is stuck with all that crap that's in the scene he wants to photograph and he has to figure out a way of removing it to leave only that which counts, often a more difficult task.
That's why studios use Colorama rolls. In the studios, not the toilets.
It also forces the photographers and their models to be more creative because they instantly lose the added advantage that a cleverly researched location will offer. Those advantages can consist purely of physical location-as-prop as well as the much more difficult to quantify (and price/justify) one of lending inspiration and enthusiasm without which pro photographic life is one mother of a drag. It's why some of us elected to be less wealthy but happy doing what turned us on, rather than following the money-bags mundane production line.
Rob
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I like that, Alan Klein - yes, as photographers we really are sorting through all the "clutter", as it were, in search something interesting: be it an abstract, impressionistic or realistic interpretations of the reality that defines our space.
Lance A. Lewin
Atlanta
That's not exactly what I meant. Our brain removes the clutter automatically when we look at a scene. Our brain is not aware of the tree branch sticking out of the head of the subject. It "photoshops" our images for us automatically. That's why so many of a shots don;t look like we imagined them at the time we saw them. Because our cameras can't filter out that stuff. It records everything.
So the photographer has to analyze a scene the he finds interesting. He then has to move around to compose the scene or come back another day or whatever, to remove all that stuff that a painter would not include in his painting in the first place. If there's too much negative space on one side of his canvas, a painter would just fill it in with some object. Another tree or rock or whatever. The photographer has to get it in there with something that's actually being photographed. This is why so many photos fail. When shooting real life, you're stuck with all these variables. You have to figure out how to eliminate them or "move" them in a way that makes the photo work aesthetically. The painter is free from these restrictions.
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Understood. :)