Forums >
General Industry >
When is a photograph fine art?
Sorry about the redundancy by at times my.palm pilot repeats itself. miguel Feb 20 06 06:51 pm Link well, it appears the fine art photography market just got a kick in the ass... http://www.pdnonline.com/pdn/newswire/a … 1002033354 Feb 20 06 06:52 pm Link Kirk McCann Studio wrote: This to me is a key ingredient in a photograph being considered fine art. It is about the subject as much as it is about the photographer, or sometimes nothing about the subject and all about the photographer or mostly about the subect and a bit about the photographer. In other words the creator of the image is there somewhere in the image. There is thought and purpose behind the image beyond just what something looks like. Feb 20 06 06:59 pm Link Kirk McCann Studio wrote: Feb 20 06 07:07 pm Link Bob Ross does rock! Grew up watching him as a little girl. I grew up sketching and painting, and only recently picked up photography with the idea to use the captured images as references for future paintings. I don't know what art is. I love it so incredibly much and I can't even define what it is. I never thought photography was an art until I got into it, and started noticing the work of other photographers. That opened my mind. If I had to define what art is to me, it is not the tool used but the expression demonstrated in the final product, no matter the medium. I love art because it is universal, and it is a release for me, I can express my utmost fears, my deepest passions and more with art. And I can feel these emotions when looking at some people's works. Feb 20 06 07:37 pm Link JenniferMaria wrote: Art is a work which, when observed, you can not turn from without offering a critique. Feb 20 06 07:47 pm Link Jayne Jones wrote: When I used to take pen, or brush to paper or canvas, my vision was before. When it comes to photography, it's both a fore and an afterthought. I think, for that reason alone, I didn't pursue painting and art illustration using pen and brush, or mechanical drafting and architectural design. Feb 20 06 07:57 pm Link emiliano granado wrote: His work is no where near as bad as the stuff I've seen being called fine art here in Phoenix, Az. He also doesn't seem to have a single photograph in that series where he's combined every possible faux pas. He also has strongly defined subjects in his work. You don't have to read the caption just to have a chance to understand his images. Feb 20 06 09:58 pm Link It's Art if it was done by Nan Goldin or Cindy Sherman...otherwise, it's photography. Feb 20 06 10:16 pm Link Kirk McCann Studio wrote: What? WHAT? Feb 20 06 10:18 pm Link Habenero Photography wrote: maybe the "art" aspect of those photographs was to repulse the viewer. to walk away so disgusted in the art world. and question the very nature of what is art. ha ha. i doubt it, but possible. Feb 20 06 10:27 pm Link Gret thread topic... When does photography become art? When is a photograph not fine art? Who knows... But isn't the artist more important than the medium? If an artist decides to use a camera, or a pencil, or a chisel does it matter as long as the product conveys the concept? Doesn't content trump technique? Feb 20 06 10:35 pm Link Marcus J. Ranum wrote: Art is the opposite of porn!!!! WTF!! Man I got in the game for the sex!!!!! Damn - I guess I'll have to go back to ceramics!!! Feb 20 06 10:40 pm Link Wow, I'm impressed by all this discussion. I've read everyone's remark's and appreciate them..thought provoking stuff. My art teacher always says if you can look at someone's work and tell who it is only by their style, not seeing their name affixed to the work, they are a master. I've also heard that if you look at a picture for more than a minute, it's a masterpeice. Next time you are looking at a new picture you really like, count the seconds you look at it. I think fine art, whether it be a photo or whatever, is something that silences you...makes you forget what you were doing or thinking for just a moment...and feel a reverence for beauty, whatever manifestation it takes. My original assertation that a photo only takes a moment to create probably wasn't very well thought out. Still, a painting(of some styles) can take several times over the time to create (or execute)than a photo. That's not to diminish to amount of forethought, planning, execution, post-production, etc., that goes into a photograph. Da Vinci worked on the Mona Lisa for 4 years. I doubt any photo, no matter how rare or perfect, can be worth the fortunes of paintings in say, the Louve. That's not to say most art isn't crap, because it is. That's also not to say I haven't seen exquisite works of fine art by many of you photographers here on MM. I aspire to be that good of a photographer, but my camera sucks!! Feb 20 06 11:55 pm Link i love fine art Feb 21 06 12:08 am Link Kirk McCann Studio wrote: Nah. Given enough quality time alone, you two will make beautiful pieces together. Just ask any legendary musician who was given a musical instrument and no lessons. If the mind, heart and determination, read: passion, is in it, eventually, player takes to instrument like a fish in water. Feb 21 06 12:13 am Link James Jackson wrote: Hold up here.... but that is a critique in and of itself. If a work can be so terrible or so uninspirational that you look, walk past, and can say I don't care about it, are you not critiquing [sic] that work based purely on the idea that you have no idea? Feb 21 06 01:46 am Link Kirk McCann Studio wrote: The problem with the above statement is that you are comparing works that have had considerable time to mature against a process that hasn't been around as long. Considering that works in the Louvre tend not to be modern in nature (I believe most of those have been relegated to the D'Orsay, the Guggenheim, and various other more modern art museums the world over) comparing any photograph to something 4 times as old (the Mona Lisa) isn't a fair comparison. Monetary value alone can not be the sole basis upon which art is founded and that includes any painting, sculpture, installation, etc, especially when it concerns any one of the artists considered "The Masters". Feb 21 06 01:59 am Link Brandon Smith wrote: No... I'm talking about when you walk by an image and really don't notice it at all... Brandon Smith wrote: Nope...beauty is in the brain/genes of the beholder...in fact it's the same beauty for everyone... Brandon Smith wrote: These things too are covered in my definition of art. A urinal in a bathroom isn't art...you don't even notice it. A urinal hung on a wall in an art gallery...how can you walk away from it without at least saying "Well *I* could have done that!"...you can walk away from it, and you may despise it, but you've noticed it and you've been forced to critique it even if only internally. Brandon Smith wrote: Art is in it's ability to be critiqued. If you go based on the process or the meaning or the technique...or even the sum of the whole, you leave out many pieces that are excellent works of art, but didn't become art through traditional means. Brandon Smith wrote: In essence you're agreeing with me here, but I have to say that you have to limit it a bit more...an ad may make you respond to it by purchasing the product, but it may not be an artistic ad... The determining factor is if you bought the product because you noticed the product or if you responded to the ad for the imagery of the ad itself...and thus...critiqued the image Feb 21 06 02:20 am Link I don't know what the difference is between a photograph and one that is Fine Art. I hate using the term Fine Art in my bio here because I think any photograph can be Fine Art, from the candid street photographer to the Fashion and Glamour ads in magazines such as Interview (sorry for the plug, I just like the magazine quite a bit : - ) ). I use the term in my bio only because I don't do Fashion or Glamour work, but I've been wanting to remove it, actually. Maybe all photographs can be considered Fine Art as long as they have some idea or concept behind them, or are at least carefully and meticulously constructed as opposed to snapshots. A photographer whom I think is fantastic, Diane Arbus, definitely walks a fine line between the two. Feb 21 06 02:32 am Link Kirk McCann Studio wrote: When an art collector pays a photographer a shitload of money for a photo hanging in a gallery, the buyer purchases the rights to call it anything they want... Feb 21 06 02:58 am Link Eric Muss-Barnes wrote: LMAO... Feb 21 06 02:59 am Link Eric Muss-Barnes wrote: I suppose that could be an instance, also. Feb 21 06 03:01 am Link Kirk McCann Studio wrote: Glad you think so....everyone calls this my BOB ROSS photograph...I don't know if that is a good thing or a bad thing... Feb 21 06 03:04 am Link Where are the squirrel condominiums? Feb 21 06 03:12 am Link Brian Diaz wrote: YES. Feb 21 06 03:17 am Link I have been going thru the "is Photography art" and "It only takes a fraction of a second to create a photograph but a painter or sculptor may take weeks..months" for years. My graduation was almost blocked back in 1971 by an art department chairman who was sure anything as mechanical as photography was NOT art. 5 years later I was the first photographer to be exhibited in the Universityâs Fine Art Gallery. Then with the Republicans came the nudity is nasty ideology. I received a National Endowment and lost it when it was âdiscoveredâ? by higher ups that I shot mostly nudes. Iâve had a show shut down, another in Japan burnt in customs as pornography (Both back in 1975). Japan defined pornography at that time by the presence of pubic hair. No hair was art, hair was porn! In 1977 a University there showed the same photographs of mine and it was one of the highest attended exhibits for years to come. The laws had changed to intent vs. simply whether the image contained pubic hair or not. The same collection was shown at the University of Arizona in 77 or 78 and was sponsored by a womenâs right group. My images hadnât changed. The conception of them had. And that illustrates a couple of qualities of art⦠it causes discussionâ¦and it transcends time. An Edward Weston Nude looks as fresh today as when it was created over 70 years ago. So does an Ansel Adams image. How about an Arny Freytag image? His playboy work from 20 years ago looks silly today. No art there. Not even sexy anymore. Fashion trends come and go rather quickly. Some Irving Penn Fashion images are still endearing today, not for the ridiculous outfits popular in the 60s, but in the way he, or Avedon portrayed them. What is art? Art is like porn. Hard to define, not everyone agrees on which is which but we all personally know it when we see it. A lot of photographers call their work "Fine Art" to give it more class or to separate it from playboy and cheesecake. I try to make stamens, both visual, as in the interplay of light and colors, and emotional, as in the personal aspects of the discovery and revelation that occurs when a photographer and his/her subject make a connection and reveals that intimate moment in the image. Thatâs why I donât look for models. I look for a muse! Mike Feb 21 06 03:33 am Link |