FKVPhotoGraphics wrote:
I just ran across a comment on another thread about someone describing himself as a "lowly art photographer".....made me wonder....what do you consider yourself to be???....an art photographer or a commercial photographer...

Personally I enjoy the artistic side but in reality I have to make a living at what I do .....so I guess I'd have to describe my work as commercial only because I get paid to produce it....admittedly it may look artistic at times....but it's all for the money....

Art, with the goal of learning how to create images that sell.

Digital Soup wrote:
Porno looking to get into Vogue, or at least take over the world!

ROTFL!

Ivan123 wrote:
I think I might be that "lowly art photographer" you refer to.  Like everything else I post on these forums, that was at least a bit tongue in cheek.  What I mean when I say that is that I shoot precisely what I want to shoot without any consideration to its commercial value.  And not just through choice but because I don't know how to do any different.  I do show my work in galleries and I sell some prints.  But for the life of me, I cannot figure out what will sell and what will not.  For example, on my portfolio, "Concave Curves" sells a lot of prints.  I love that photo but I don't think it is my best.  I REALLY love "Stark Nude:  In Reversal," I think it is one of the best things I have ever done.  Never sold a print, not one.  (It is one of the few prints I have done that people actively DISlike.  And please note it is a pre-PS darkroom print.  On silver!!!!)  Some prints, like the "Bending Nude" I sell a lot of and I understand that.  I love it and I understand why other people might love it.  But I have had gallery owners suggest that I do more photos that are hotter sellers and I just look at them slack jawed.  I have no idea what to do.  I know the images I like but I have no idea how to create images other people will like.  Obviously I would be a complete failure as a commercial photographer.  So I make the best of a bad situation and call myself an art photographer.

Very interesting answer.....if I understand you correctly......if you could market yourself to sell more of your work....you'd be quite willing to slip into the commercial side.....

I'm of the opinion that knowing how to market your work is the only difference between art and commercial.......seems that as an "art" photographer it's the gallery owners who for the most part create the sales of your work....so in effect they are marketing for you......

I guess the grass always seems to be greener on the other side.....because I'd love to be shown in art galleries.....but don't consider my work of sufficient quality.....but my work is very marketable to the general public....and I do know how to market it for myself.......it's getting confusing......

Probably simpler to say we're opposite sides of the same coin......

FKVPhotoGraphics wrote:
I'm of the opinion that knowing how to market your work is the only difference between art and commercial.......seems that as an "art" photographer it's the gallery owners who for the most part create the sales of your work....so in effect they are marketing for you......

I guess the grass always seems to be greener on the other side.....because I'd love to be shown in art galleries.....but don't consider my work of sufficient quality.....but my work is very marketable to the general public....and I do know how to market it for myself.......it's getting confusing......

Probably simpler to say we're opposite sides of the same coin......

******

No.  That's not the difference between art and commercial.  First comes the definition of art.  Myself I tend to gravitate in between 2 definitions:
1) Art is something that sits on its ass in a museum, or
2) art is a prayer made visible.

Art I make from the heart, or compulsion, or obsession.  I don't make it with an eye towards sales.  Commercial is for a client or made with an eye towards sales.

Good artists can be excellent at marketing.  And commercial photographers may suck at it.

oldguysrule wrote:
"Some people's photography is an art. Not mine. Art is a dirty word in photography. All this fine art crap is killing it already."
Helmut Newton

I agree with Helmut and others before him that said the same thing. I use the word "art" only when it helps me get the model naked.

Gregory Garecki wrote:

I agree with Helmut and others before him that said the same thing. I use the word "art" only when it helps me get the model naked.

What you don't consider is that Helmut Newton and the others were universally admired and defined as artists. Sort of like Einstein saying something to the effect that he was not a genius but he tried hard.
Alexwh

Gregory Garecki wrote:
No, to me Newton was a photographer that took really good pictures. Photography has something that most of the arts don't have - it fools people into believing that they are looking at the real thing. If you use photography as art you are not being true to the medium. I'm not saying that there is anything wrong with using photography as art but you are giving up the thing that makes it so unique.

You can be a photographer who takes good pictures who happens to be an artist.

A couple of months ago a Steichen photograph sold for a million two hundred and change.  Steichen also shot fashion, editorial and was in charge of photography for the US Navy during WW II in the Pacific theater. As far as I know Steichen, Newton,  Diane Arbus and many more never thought anything was wrong with using the medium of photography as an art form. As a matter of fact Arbus got depressed on the day after an opening of hers. She slipped into a warm tub and slit her wrists.

The richest and most famous contemporary painter/photographer in the world today is Gerhard Richter. I admire his work. There is not doubt in my mind that he is an artist. But in this world we live in your opinion and mine really don't count. Or do they?

Gregory Garecki wrote:
No, to me Newton was a photographer that took really good pictures. Photography has something that most of the arts don't have - it fools people into believing that they are looking at the real thing. If you use photography as art you are not being true to the medium. I'm not saying that there is anything wrong with using photography as art but you are giving up the thing that makes it so unique.

For many years anybody in the 20th century that tried to depict Jesus Christ in anthing but long hair, etc was rediculed. For centuries the painted images of Christ were the real thing. When photography came into existence in the 1830s the painters felt cheated about being the only ones to convey reality so they shifted into expressionism.

And paradoxically, in the 21st century with the universal availability of Photoshop manipulation the reality of photography is in retreat and is suspect. Women in MM do not have skin pores. Is that reality?
Alexwh

Gregory Garecki wrote:
No, to me Newton was a photographer that took really good pictures. Photography has something that most of the arts don't have - it fools people into believing that they are looking at the real thing. If you use photography as art you are not being true to the medium. I'm not saying that there is anything wrong with using photography as art but you are giving up the thing that makes it so unique.

*******

But a photo is never the real thing.  unless you are writing and thinking in 2-d from a square 6x6.

Tim Hammond wrote:
Commercial photography is a vocation the practitioner chooses to pursue as long as it's profitable.  Art photography is an obsessive hunger that pursues the practitioner, even if the pursuit leads to a debtor's grave.  All you have to do is look at my tax return to know which category I'm in.

Again we are trying to define art photography as oposed to commercial photography by looking at the photographer's intent. That is not enough. You can be a commercial photographer and be a failure. You can consider yourself an art photographer and be bankrupt. In some cases time will tell as in Van Gogh who was never able to sell a painting while he was alive. (or at least that is what the records say). Wegee was a newspaper photographer with a passion. Dead he is is an artist and his photographs are art. Harold Edgerton's technical photographs using a high speed strobe are now considered art. His intention was the recording of a reality that none of us could see such as how exactly did a balloon explode when pierced by a bullet.
Alexwh

alexwh wrote:

Gregory Garecki wrote:
And paradoxically, in the 21st century with the universal availability of Photoshop manipulation the reality of photography is in retreat and is suspect. Women in MM do not have skin pores. Is that reality?
Alexwh

If people think that it is then it is. I said "fools people into believing".

Gregory Garecki wrote:

alexwh wrote:

Gregory Garecki wrote:
And paradoxically, in the 21st century with the universal availability of Photoshop manipulation the reality of photography is in retreat and is suspect. Women in MM do not have skin pores. Is that reality?
Alexwh

If people think that it is then it is. I said "fools people into believing".

And without in any way trying to offend anybody, the fact that one has "published" photographs as a photographer or as a model in an on line community does not prove that one is a photographer or a model. Some of us may be "fooled into believing it." It helps one's confidence but there has to be more in the end if one is going to pursue the career of photography or modeling.
Alexwh

KM von Seidl wrote:
But a photo is never the real thing.  unless you are writing and thinking in 2-d from a square 6x6.

But a photo is a real thing. It's a piece of paper with an image on it. What people seem to confuse is that piece of paper with an image on it with what was in front of the camera when the picture was taken (I'm trying not to use the R word). We, photographers, should take advantage of that but not be fooled ourselves.

alexwh wrote:
Again we are trying to define art photography as oposed to commercial photography by looking at the photographer's intent. That is not enough.

Not by his intent, by his motivating force.  The intent of a commercial photographer and an art photographer may be identical, but the driving force behind their intent is what differs. The commercial photographer volunteers.  The artist is conscripted.

alexwh wrote:
You can be a commercial photographer and be a failure.

Yes, then you quit and find another way to earn a living ...

alexwh wrote:
You can consider yourself an art photographer and be bankrupt.

... as opposed to the art photographer who can not quit, even if he never sells a single print.

alexwh wrote:
In some cases time will tell as in Van Gogh who was never able to sell a painting while he was alive. (or at least that is what the records say).

who can not quit, even if he never sells a single print.

alexwh wrote:
Wegee was a newspaper photographer with a passion. Dead he is is an artist and his photographs are art.

with a passion is the operable phrase.  His motiviating force was primarily to create and enlighten, not just to earn a living.

alexwh wrote:
Harold Edgerton's technical photographs using a high speed strobe are now considered art. His intention was the recording of a reality that none of us could see such as how exactly did a balloon explode when pierced by a bullet.

Again, his motivation was to enlighten.  He didn't create photographs for their commercial value.

So, I stick by my argument that the difference is in the motivation.  They are not mutually exclusive.  An artists may (rarely) earn a living from his art, so he may be both an art photographer and a commercial photographer.  A commercial photographer may be driven to create imagery, even if his business fails.  But a photographer who has a choice about being a photographer, at least in the long term, is not an art photographer.

alexwh wrote:
Some of us may be "fooled into believing it." It helps one's confidence but there has to be more in the end if one is going to pursue the career of photography or modeling.
Alexwh

As far as I'm concerned if you have a camera and you take pictures you are a photograper and if you have an aspiration to pose in front of a camera you are a model. Maybe not a very good or successful photographer or model but still. Or maybe you are way ahead of your time. Like van Ghogh.

Gregory Garecki wrote:

As far as I'm concerned if you have a camera and you take pictures you are a photograper and if you have an aspiration to pose in front of a camera you are a model. Maybe not a very good or successful photographer or model but still. Or maybe they are way ahead of their time. Like van Ghogh.

And if you have a gun you are a soldier. And if you have a general's uniform you are a general. In the 19th century and in the 20th, too, they had legions of men who placed one arm inside their jacket and thought they were Napoleon. Most spent their days in asylums. The difference between a piano player and a virtuoso piano player is that only one of them is a musician.
Alexwh

alexwh wrote:
Tim Hammond  you write:

"So, I stick by my argument that the difference is in the motivation.  They are not mutually exclusive.  An artists may (rarely) earn a living from his art, so he may be both an art photographer and a commercial photographer.  A commercial photographer may be driven to create imagery, even if his business fails.  But a photographer who has a choice about being a photographer, at least in the long term, is not an art photographer."

You tend to think that an artist is someone like Joan of Arc who hears voices and realizes she has no choice. What I find difficult to understand, in your above paragraph (that seams to make a  lot of sense), is that it is far too logical for it to be uttered by a passionate artist. You and I would both agree that passion is rarely logical.
Alexh

No, I tend to think that an artist is someone who, no matter how successful they are or how rich they are, feels empty and unfulfilled in life if they don't have an outlet for their creativity.  No voices.  Just a hole to fill.

I'm not sure I would agree that passion is rarely logical.  I used to buy into the myth that all artists are illogical and irrational, but I've learned (mostly through trial and error) that creativity and rationality are not mutually exclusive.  I belive that a passionate artist can make a conscious decision to sustain considerable loss of financial and social resources in the pursuit of personal fulfillment, even if that decision appears extremely irrational to someone evaluating the decision from a different view point.

Perhaps this recent post in my blog will help to better explain where I'm coming from: http://www.bthphoto.com/blog/bthblog.html/1

alexwh wrote:
And if you have a gun you are a soldier. And if you have a general's uniform you are a general. In the 19th century and in the 20th, too, they had legions of men who placed one arm inside their jacket and thought they were Napoleon. Most spent their days in asylums. The difference between a piano player and a virtuoso piano player is that only one of them is a musician.
Alexwh

You are getting into how good someone is at what they do and that is a judgement. Bad photographers are still photographers. Same goes for the models. I don't buy that recognition makes you a good photographer or model. For example in my opinion Alfred Steglitz was a terrible photographer and people still think he was good. Why? It's my opinion that it was because he was rich and that he was an asshole. Both of those qualities help tremendously in achieving fame.

The Napoleon example is not a good one. If a guy thinks he is Ansel Adams because he has three pairs of sunglasses hanging from his neck I would say he has a problem.

I don't think that other people decide if you are or are not a photographer or a model. The first step on the road to being good at anything is to convince ourselves that we are what we want to be: a photographer, a model, a writer or whatever. Sure, some of us may seem pathetic with that label but I'm sure that most people who achieved anything where laughed at in the beginning. And most of us will fail but at least we tried.

Gregory Garecki wrote:
No, to me Newton was a photographer that took really good pictures. Photography has something that most of the arts don't have - it fools people into believing that they are looking at the real thing. If you use photography as art you are not being true to the medium. I'm not saying that there is anything wrong with using photography as art but you are giving up the thing that makes it so unique.

All photographs are lies.  They are illusions that look real, but all images created in a photographic process are manipulated and although they may look very much like the original scene, they are not true to it.

Gregory Garecki wrote:
No, to me Newton was a photographer that took really good pictures. Photography has something that most of the arts don't have - it fools people into believing that they are looking at the real thing. If you use photography as art you are not being true to the medium. I'm not saying that there is anything wrong with using photography as art but you are giving up the thing that makes it so unique.

So, perfect beautiful women, standing in front of seamless papers or fake back drops are the "real thing?" 

Art is art. Product is product.  I choose art.

alexwh wrote:
Tim Hammond: You write:

"No, I tend to think that an artist is someone who, no matter how successful they are or how rich they are, feels empty and unfulfilled in life if they don't have an outlet for their creativity.  No voices.  Just a hole to fill."

It is difficult if not impossible to find fault in that. But what has me wondering is why finances seem to be so important in your definition. That's troubling.

I stopped playing chess when I realized I was never going to be really good at it. Every time I lost, my only excuse had to be stupidity.

For a long time, while having successful gallery representation and doing work that satisfied my aspirations, I found it more comfortable to consider myself a a good commercial photographer who dabbled in art than an artist. I often would say, "No I am not an artist." Failure in art is much to damning and scary. There must be some reason for your delving so much into finances.
Alexwh

A non-artist photographer could go bankrupt or could win the lottery, and either might be sufficient reason to abandon photography and pursue other interests.  An artist could go bankrupt or could win the lottery, and the drive to create would remain constant. The only reason finances are relevant to the definition of art photography is because they are so conspicuously irrelevant.

An artist who is no good will still continue to create for the sake of self fulfillment. If he can only be satisfied by being really good at it then his ego is driving him rather than his muse.  Granted, every artist has both ego and muse, but one who can abandon art because the ego isn't satisfied must not have a very hungry muse to start with.

FKVPhotoGraphics wrote:
what do you consider yourself to be???....an art photographer or a commercial photographer...

Neither.




I'm a writer.  I just use my camera to do my storytelling now...

FKVPhotoGraphics wrote:
Very interesting answer.....if I understand you correctly......if you could market yourself to sell more of your work....you'd be quite willing to slip into the commercial side.....

I guess I don't understand the definition of "commercial."  If I could take exactly the photographs I want to take and more people wanted to buy them than buy them now, I would be happier.  For two reasons:  (1) money is nice and (2) words are cheap but putting hard cash down is a real endorsement and I confess validation is nice, too.  So I guess if there is no problem with my photographs and it is just a question of marketing them, then, sure, I would be happy to "slip into commercial" but if you mean do I want to learn to tailor my photographs to make them more commercially successful, then no, I have no interest in that. 

(And wouldn't know how to if I wanted.  Who was the band that sang the song about "selling out"?   They were ridiculing bad bands that talked about "selling out" as though they had a choice.  They could decide to "go commercial" and all become millionnaires but they decide not to.  Yeah, right.  I would delighted to become a millionnaire from my photographs, just don't know how.)