On Wed, May 12, 2010 at 8:51 PM, Mark Roberts <[email protected]> wrote: > > Tom, perhaps what's bugging you about Eggleston's work subconsciously > is that same thing that bugs me consciously about it. I'm not an > Eggleston hater - quite the contrary, I find I have a greater > appreciation for his work after seeing it in person and in a large > collection. I see some pretty good ideas at play and some pretty good > work resulting. What annoys me is the over-glorification of Eggleston > by the art world. It's as if, after years of dismissing color > photography, when the art snobs found one color photographer they > liked they overreacted to the point of near-deification, compensating > for past oversights by heaping excessive praise on work that didn't > deserve it. > > In short, I think his work does deserve praise, but not the ridiculous > adulation it's received from some quarters. >
Mark, Interesting perspective. I must admit that I've never known there was a predjudice regarding color photography in it's early days. I've of course noticed how black and white is often viewed as art regardless of the merits of the image, so maybe that's still a leftover from years ago. I'm sure some still deify B&W. You're basically right I think. What annoys me (to the degree I wish to be comfortably annoyed) is that I think an image should stand or fall on it's own merits. I saw three images in the Eggleston exhibit that I felt stood very tall on their own. I saw a handful of images that I thought were interesting, but I left feeling much the way I feel about some of my own images, i.e., if I'm not sure, then "no". The rest were rejects in my opinion. So in the end, I think I agree. I liked some of his work, but I cannot understand the wholesale carte blanche that appears to be granted. Thanks for providing that insight. It's made me think once again. 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.
