So Fotofest....POLL
It's Great! I plan on checking out ten or more shows! | 7 (19%) |
Eh, I'll go to a couple things. | 8 (22%) |
Could care less... What's the difference? | 4 (11%) |
Photo is dead. | 17 (47% |
Do photographers read? Do they go online? Maybe they just don't care for this blog, or maybe they actually think their own medium is D-E-A-D! I personally feel photo is boring... Not much excites.. but maybe I'm just not looking hard enough? Let's hear what you have to say. I leave these posts open to conversation with YOU, but unfortunately, the only comments we ever get here are from people complaining (under anonymous) about a non-art related post. Yet, when I post my majority art material, the same people don't comment. So apparently they ARE more interested in "gossip". I even did a little smack down to Houston taggers over the Obama mural, but they didn't bite. I'm sure taggers can read (small sentences), so where were they? We get around 400 hits a day, so speak up!
So have you seen any interesting photography in the past five years? ten? 20? If yes, then post some info or links.
Next question: What would you like to see more of in this blog?
UPDATE:
Finally, some heartfelt replies:
Thanks for the comment. What does everyone else have to say of the institution of photography? How is it broken? When it wasn't broken, what was it like? How can it be fixed. I'm interested especially what Sebastien says: "Imagine your favorite songs or novels discussed solely in terms of historical context, structuralist dissection, possible meaning, social impact. How about the wit, the beauty, the elegance, the emotion of these things. Whenever I read something about my medium in an art rag it reads like autopsy. No wonder people think photo is dead."
I think it's because of photography being championed above all other mediums by leftist political ideologues like October magazine that is still stuck in the world of "historical context, structuralist dissection". How do we get over that? Should we? Have we? Are we?
Posts
Photo is not dead Sean, but the institution of Photography is broken. How can photo be dead when Robert Adams, William Eggleston, Goldin, Sebastio Salgado, Araki, Gibson, Misrach, Eptsein, Christenberry, Moriyama, Struth, Shore, Meisel, Lee fucking Friedlander are still working. People like Wolfgang Tillmans, Juergen Teller, Jason Fulford, Zoe Strauss,Lars Tunbjork, Naoya Hatakeyama, Paul Graham, Simon Norfolk, Philip Lorca-DiCorcia, Roe Etheridge, Mike Slack, Alec Soth are working full force. People like Jason Evans, Esko Mannikko, Boogie, Michael Schmelling, Ed Panar, Bill Sullivan, Rinko Kawauchi, Jason Lazarus, Todd Seelie, Shen Wei, Katy Granan, Thomas Holton, Alejandra Laviada, Ryan McGinley are just starting to wow us.
The photos you see in institutions are often chosen by people with a background or interest in either Photography as conceptual strategy or Photo-journalism. That includes most of the faculty at the photo-schools. Imagine your favorite songs or novels discussed solely in terms of historical context, structuralist dissection, possible meaning, social impact. How about the wit, the beauty, the elegance, the emotion of these things. Whenever I read something about my medium in an art rag it reads like autopsy. No wonder people think photo is dead.
No knock against folk like The Atlas Group, Jeff Wall, Fred Wilson, Gregory Crewdson, Vik Muniz, Sophie Calle, Lorna Simpson, Christopher Williams, Thomas Demand (some of these artists I find amazing and vital) But they are not the children of Talbot, Atget, Stieglitz, Evans, Lange, Frank, Arbus i.e. the main body of photography as an artform. Can you remember a moment in painting when the Sean Landers, Peter Davies school or Magazine illlustrators where given precedence over Cezanne and Velasquez? Because it happens repeatedly in photography.
I think it was Lorca-DiCorcia that said that photography is a foreign language that everybody thinks they can speak. Like any art it takes time, attention, and knowledge to fully appreciate.
For those out there that prefer to enter any concept through words, I would recommend you start with Robert Adams, Stephen Shore, Vince Aletti, Szarkowski. I apologize for this posts haphazard nature, I was not expecting such a blow and I'm still reeling.
3/18/2008 05:02:00 PM