Great thoughts and comments. I appreciate your sharing. -- Bruce
Friday, January 19, 2007, 10:01:57 AM, you wrote: GD> Overall, Bruce, I love your work so these comments are in no way a GD> reflection on that. GD> For most of the non-photographer people I talk with at the galleries, GD> natural scenics are what they think of when they think of the words GD> 'photography' and 'art' combined. And most of them will ooh and aah GD> for about ten seconds when a superb, truly grand scenic in the GD> classic AA mould is put in front of them, then move on and forget it GD> entirely. And that's one out of perhaps a thousand landscape scenics GD> that attract their attention for *that long* !!! GD> What engages these folks' eye and mind with far more staying power GD> are photographs that relate human beings and the creations of human GD> beings to the world, to other humans, to each other: emotional GD> expressions of human context in the universe. The variety of images GD> that do this is much much broader than photos of flowers, trees, GD> sunsets, mountains... in my opinion anyway. GD> There is certainly a place for all kinds of photographic expression GD> and lovely florals, beautiful mountains, spectacular sunsets are GD> definitely a part of the game. However, a sunset is a sunset: a GD> moment in time unique in the universe, perhaps, but one out of GD> thousands we experience in our lifetimes. Photos of people and the GD> human world connect us to time, history and our own individual GD> mortality in ways that a sunset cannot. GD> I was at one of the local photo group meetings last Wednesday GD> evening. The presentation this time was by a photographer who went on GD> and on about how his highly manipulated florals were being created in GD> a traditional way and bridged from the modern to that tradition, they GD> were symbolic representations of "ineluctable beauty standing against GD> the hand of Man's destructive power". Those were his exact words ... GD> Gag me before I laugh out loud. I thought some of them were pretty GD> nice flower pictures, but not a one of them could hold my attention GD> for more than a few seconds of "a pretty flower" and then I move on. GD> Godfrey GD> On Jan 19, 2007, at 9:21 AM, Bruce Dayton wrote: >> I appreciate your candor, Boris. I guess I have to ask, how, most >> other photographers also develop a more common motif, that no one >> comments on getting used to them? Godfrey, Juan, Kenneth and others >> all shoot mostly similar types of scenes - is it because nature is >> more boring than people or what? I'm more curious here than defensive >> - just trying to figure it out. >> >>> Bruce, I like the bridge shot the most. Is it Golden Gate? >>> >>> The rest is good, but somehow I am starting to get used to your >>> work in >>> a certain way. The bridge shot is nice deviation from your most >>> common >>> motif of calm tranquil nature. >> -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net
