On Aug 16, 2012, at 2:38 AM, Jostein Øksne wrote: > > > My own thoughts after these meetings is that the common denominators for > "photography as art" seems to be these things: > > Firstly that you have some message you wish to convey, using photography as a > tool. Your success as an artist will ultimately depend on your skill at > communicating that message. > Secondly that you cater to an audience that has the openmindedness to take in > your message. Displaying your imagery in places that have to market > themselves as exhibiting "fine art" may miss the target audience. > Thirdly, that artists manage to finance their projects up front, before the > images are even created. Sales are just bonus. This may be a unique thing for > Scandinavia because of the way governments work up here, but scholarships > could work the same way in the rest of the world I guess. > > And last but not least, that "art photographer" as a carreer is a narrow > niche and certainly not for us duffers. > > Jostein :-)
I find the whole question of what is art to be a form of mental wankage of the highest order. About the only question that makes any sense is "does this person find that object, or action, beautiful, or artistic?". I have on occasion, read various artists statements, and for the most part they seem to fall somewhere between marketing gibberish and adolescent braggadocio. I can't figure out who they are supposed to impress, much less fathom who would take them seriously. For that matter, it often seems that the further along the spectrum towards "fine art" something is considered to be, the further removed from being something that a normal person would consider interesting or attractive. My reaction to the Eggleston exhibit a bunch of us went to in Chicago was that the vast majority of the photos there were no better than the vast majority of PESOs on the PDML. For that matter, you could have taken his 40 or so best, and put them up against the 40 or so in Augenblick, and the PDML work would have easily stood up in quality. Yes, we had 40 photographers versus one of him, but he covered 40 years, rather than just one from the PDML. As for someone like Peter Lik, just take it as a given that if he's considered a top level photographic artist, then I'd rather stay a photographic hobbyist. After discussing a few technical details with "art photographers" I really think that what separates an art photographer from a photographic hobbyist is merely marketing and a finely developed sense of pretension. It sure as hell isn't technical skill or quality of work. -- Larry Colen [email protected] sent from i4est -- 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.
