I'm reluctant to involve real artists in the discussion about photo's.
There is not much craft left in photography as it is these days. Even the final subject, the print (if there is a print), is most of the time a cheap paper spitted out a cheap inkjet with refill inkt.
I wonder how much of the so called 'fine art' images here on LULA are effectively craft-full finished in a skillful and well executed proper presented print. Prints on good material, printed in consideration with the place where it will hang, skillfully mounted, etc etc. I guess: 0% and I accept 0,5% error in my estimate.
Do we, photographers, have a so called art-form without the craft and lies the art in the cerebral effort to find the right moment to push the button? Or is it in the preparation, the set up, the organization of the props and models,....?
Sometimes I feel photography is a self indulged medium, and photographers an exponent of it, and it has nothing to do with art. A nice tool to grab what is there or snap something put in scene, with the attitude of 'art' and the nature of fake.
(speaking about intellectual masturbation,....... Tsss)
I like the ideas you put forward, Ivo. I also like the way that when you make a direct link to something I have penned, it instantly shows me my frequent typos, typos that I obviously never see whan I check before posting. Quite amazing, that.
............................
To print or not to print.
For a while, I used to buy Hahnemeuhle (I always have to check the spelling) papers and print what I though worth the cost. I even had illusions of selling stuff and financing my "fun" that way. In the end, HP stopped supporting my printer and, after I raged at them for a couple of years, I realised they'd actually done me a huge, money-saving favour: there was suddenly no need to grow the stack of cardboard boxes enclosing beautiful prints, archivally stored in invisible polyester print sleeves. Silverprint 0: Rob C 1. I won!
Today, the final destination - unless I get ripped off - is my website, where I can flip through stuff whenever I want too, marvel at my own major and minor miracles and feel much better than I did before I peeped! (Is that also mental masturbation, he asked?)
Yeah, I think the photographic artform has changed; it used to be about craft, both at the shooting and the printing or lightbox stages. Today, much of the shooting skill is in defeating the camera's intentions and taming it to allow you to retain mastery of the situation. After that, you slip into the zone where you sit on your ass and repeat and repeat and repeat until you get to what you want. There is no penalty for not knowing what you do; it simply doesn't matter anymore (that Mr Holly still gets everywhere) because you can switch off, go and sit on the can or just have a cup of tea - hopefully, not both at the same time; you can go out for lunch or even cook it, if creativity is your thing, and even go on holiday and, unless the computer dies of loneliness in your absence, not a thing will have changed, no solutions will have gone off, no temperatures will have dropped - or gone up - and suddenly, as now, you get to that Damascene moment when you say hey, isn't that just like sculpture and drawing?
I submit that
all art is self-indulgence. The sane mind only does it because of that drive, the drive that comes with its own reward even when nobody else wants to offer glittering prizes and open cheques... if that desire isn't there, I see no purpose to any of it because, as a business, for example, it is amongst the most difficult and the least financially rewarding - for most people doing it. As hobby, what do you get if not a rare ego-stroke? Nothing at all, beyond delusion. Frankly, better reading a good book than producing lousy pictures that only your mother or sister can bear to say are Great. (It's what sisters and mothers often have to do. It accounts for the rise in gin sales since the advent of digital cameras. In the UK, gin sales have rocketed of late, which may or may not be directly linked to mirrorless camera sales.)
Oh well, time for coffee before having a shower and making myself presentable for lunch. I don't want to smell like the other person's fish.
;-)