<snip>The challenge for those of us of a mind so to do, is to look for locations which have not been covered to such depth. Or, as George Barr points out, to go looking for the beautiful in places where others do not see it. One of the greatest proponents of these ideas is the British photographer, David Ward. He may not be well known on the left side of The Pond but his images are an object lesson in 'found beauty' (for want of a better term). [a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=220296\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]
David Ward is an example of what I was talking about in my first post -- an exceptional craftsman, but not a significant artist. I thank George for his temperate reply to my first post, which was somewhat over-enthusiastic, but the point I was making there is that pushing craft, and doing craft exercises, will not make you a significant artist. One of the problems with the whole confused field of photography is that people constantly talk about Art, but what they're really getting to is a kind of craft.
I have no problem with craft. I'm a serious and successful craftsman in a field in which there are great artists; I never wanted to be one, for a lot of complicated reasons, but I take my *craft* seriously and work hard it. I just don't confuse what I'm doing with art.
Art is about ideas. It's not about finding undiscovered or unappreciated places in the world. America wasn't undiscovered when Robert Frank did "The Americans." The discovery was in his idea, not in the place; it was in his head, not on the other side of the lens.
The impressionist and post-impressionist painters took the most inane realities -- houses on a hill, crows over a wheat field -- and turned them into great art, because they were exploring concepts like the effect of light on external realities, the impact of nature on our psyches, and so on. The landscape could be anything...
One thing that has always stuck with me from Luminous Landscape is that Mike Reichmann once told the story of how he went to the right place at the right time (I think the Grand Tetons, but it could have been Yellowstone) and there were a lot of other people there and when the sun came up or went down, whichever it was, they all took their photos. I don't doubt that his were perfectly exposed and strikingly beautiful, but...What did he just do? Whatever it was, a lot of other people did exactly the same thing at the same moment, the only difference being in the levels of technique. Could you call that any form of art? I'm really interested in that question: "What was he doing?" (Don't tell me "camera testing" -- that'd be too easy.)
If you want to be an artist, ideas are what you worry about; if you want to be a great craftsman, then you can without the slightest twinge of guilt go looking for the most brilliantly composed mountain glade with aspens in the sunlight. It looks great, it sells for $100 for 13x19 pigment print in an edition of 150; but I'll tell you what, it ain't art. And if you load up your truck with photo equipment and head out to New Mexico, you may get your craft going, but unless you have an aesthetic concept that you're putting to the test, you're going to get pictures, but you won't get art.
JC