Hi Doug, (take everything I say as not an argument, but more or less musing)
I don't know the history of Eggleston or how/why he became famous. >From the exhibit I saw, I suspect either some beatniks in a coffehouse somewhere or some art professors who talk vs. do, were looking for deeper meaning and stared at some photographs long enough until they thought that they'd found it. Realizing he could achieve fame and/or money by doing more of the same he set out to deliver what the 'intellectuals' wanted. The above may not be true, but it's the sense I get, because if I were to show a similar set of photographs, which would be quite easy to produce, I'd be uniformly chastized. If a person deliberately sets about shooting in what I'd call a 'crappy snaphot style', is it good because it was deliberate as opposed to haphazard? Or is it good because it reminds people of the way things were in years gone by and hence evokes an emotion? I called his photographs crappy because I found them largely devoid of any discernible style or intent, and I did not find them aesthetically pleasing. I did not enjoy the majority of them individually nor did I see any cohesiveness as a group. If that was what he was shooting for, he achieved it. > And what I'm trying to do, somewhat clumsily, is get you to articulate those > reasons. What I'm trying to get at is that we all have our templates, as > photographers, and sometimes to our detriment. How often do we take the lazy > way out and just rely on the rule of thirds to compose a photo instead of > taking the time to think about what composition really suits the subject > matter best? The rule of thirds is not the only game in town, and the same > can be said for any other compositional/sharpness/exposure/color habit we > get into. Yes, I deliberately tried NOT to articulate the reasons why I would consider a photograph good, and leave it open to interpretation. :-) Why? Because I KNOW, that sure as grass is green, if I elaborate on some specific criteria that someone will argue the opposite or the exception, and point out to me (as if I'm a total idiot) that I cannot be the sole arbiter of what makes a good photograph (and I can't). So I did not fall into the trap. :-) I do however agree with your statements above. The formula for making a good photograph is wide and varied, and we can easily become trapped in our formulaic way of seeing and producing. That, in essence, probably becomes our style, but it's certainly good to keep an open mind and consider that our subject at the time could posiibly benefit from a different approach than our norm. > The same can be said for how we view photographs. We like best those that > are like what we shoot, as photographers. The trick is to separate our > photographer selves from our viewer selves and go from there. Can we do it? > Can we look at other photographs, or do the years seeing the world through a > viewfinder ruin that for us? It should not ruin it for us, but as individuals we all have preferences and tastes in both subject and style. Certainly we can learn by trying to see thinngs differently than our own personal norm. Tom C. -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
