what IS "art" in photography all about?

Hi!

That´s a funny thing, "Art" - at least for us here in Germany . .

"Art" is something very "serious", very "important" . . and somehow very "academic" over here.
You´re hardly an "artist" when you didn´t study at an "art-academy" with a "famous" professor, who had at least once his work shown at the "Documenta" . . .

In my eyes "art" is what a human being expresses, visualizes him-/herself with. No matter what that is - a painted stick, a song, some stones glued together or even a washing-away scribble in the sand on a beach (as Picasso did once) . . or maybe even a photograph . . .

What makes a "good" and "individual" picture a piece of "art"?
Is it different in the US? Sometimes european painters, musicians or even photographers have to have some sucess abroad to be accepted as "artists" when they come back to Europe . . And vice-versa, as i learned . .

Isn´t that funny?

best, Klaus

Klaus,

Ah, the definition of succes..?

One of the most praised and recognized recent artists in the Netherlands was a Rock singer, long time hard drug user and, as soon as he found out that his life style had eaten away his body, he jumped off a hotel to flee from reality (leaving a wife and child..).

Now does it take such a personality to be a true artist or if you are talented and persistant enough to become technically skilled you reach ability others may experience as special or even as art?

(I am sure Rachel will be able to add a couple of words about the definition of "succefull" in this respect ..)

Your succes has been recognized returning to Europe?

Martin

Latching on to the abroad thing - It's the same in every field. Civil engineers went to Africa to build their first bridges after grad. If they didn't fall down, they could build 'em in Europe.

At other times, if you go abroad to work, you do not have the distractions of home/family, you just get and and do what you went there to do. A bit like the 'assisted fare' folk who went to oz from UK some years ago. They had to work to survive. Some found they liked it, got on fine, others didn't. But the ones who worked hard out there would have probably got on OK working hard back here. And then there is the hype, and who is going to know the relative importance of, say, an art gallery in a town they have never heard of.

Best wishes,

Ray

Hi!

Ok - i used the term "success". That´s the wrong term. Success you can have with lots of things - i have success as an advertising photographer, Liberace had LOTS of success with . . . music ;-) and so on.

My thoughts are about the term "art" in our understanding. Another understanding is the term "art" in the "art"-business. And again a different understanding is the term "art" in the mind of my mother . .

I read "fine art" photography . . , "fine art"-prints, "fine art" whatsoever . .

best, Klaus

Hi Klaus,

See, I told you so! How can you get an answer if you can't define the question? If you find it difficult, who else can help you? It's the use of this hairy, fairy, word - 'art'. You need to qualify it with an adjective or more. a) Then you need to qualify your test methods. Then you get into arguments. Then you leave it, niggling at the back of your mind, until someone gives you a poke to see if you are still there.

I intended drawing a Venn diagram, or something. But since I know I can do that, eventually, to satisfy my craving, there is no point in doing so. If I did so, then I'd be back to plan a) above.

Plan b) was to escape from plan a)

and I've lost my smilies... ;-) will have to do

Best wishes,

Ray (in torment)

Hi Ray!

You´re right - it´s useless to reflect about. It´s better to act .

best, Klaus

Art is Seduction*


Charlotte

Art? let me think…

Nicolas Claris said:

Art? let me think…

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Au contraire, mon ami! Art? Don't make me think ;-)

Cheers,

Cem

Cem Usakligil said:

Au contraire, mon ami! Art? Don't make me think ;-)

Cheers,

Cem

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Art comes from the heart. No thinking allowed.

Kathy and Cem…
I guess you are talking about decoration, not art.
Art is not always to please
Art is not always to be pleasant

Being pleasant or not pleasant, art calls you, touch your emotion, make you feel repulsed or in adoration, isn't that the early beginning of thinking?

Kathy Rappaport said:

Art comes from the heart. No thinking allowed.

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Well Kathy, the inititail idea is a thought. So that first part is one thought. The physcial form of something. Next there is an intention to externalize that thought. So now we have at least two thoughts. Then we have to take the picture reflexly without further thought such as "Yes, I've got a CF card in the camera." and "No, I don't have to go to the bathroom just yet".

So with this minimum of two thoughts, we can have art. If we have no reference to other thoughts then guess what, Kathy, you may now have yourself a surrealist. There the work is unfiltered by morals or other imperatives.

That Kathy is surrealistic art!

Otherwise thinking ia always involved in art.

Love you Kathy!

Asher!

Roses are from the heart, yes, but art is from another place. It comes from the parts of us where angels audition!

Lost in translation....

Cem Usakligil said:

Au contraire, mon ami! Art? Don't make me think ;-)

Cheers,

Cem

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Nicolas Claris said:

Kathy and Cem…
I guess you are talking about decoration, not art.
Art is not always to please
Art is not always to be pleasant

Being pleasant or not pleasant, art calls you, touch your emotion, make you feel repulsed or in adoration, isn't that the early beginning of thinking?

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....LOL

Talk about being totally misunderstood despite the added wink at the end.
What was I "thinking"? (pun intended)

Seriously though, I replied as such due to the fact that this topic has been debated to death before and it usually ends up taking the form of defending one's viewpoint zealously against others'; kind of like the faith related debates. So I usually shy away from taking part in such debates. Regarding this one, I was merely trying not to dedicate any of my already diminishing brain capacity to it. Hence the quote: "don't make me think".

In other words, I did not mean to say at all that no thinking should be included in the process of art creation and appreciation, au contraire!

Phew, hope this one comes over correctly ;-)

Cheers,

Cem

Cem,

The practical importance I have for this is how it covers one's own needs hopes and ambitions. For my own work, I have done a lot of thinking as to what I want to do and for what reason and how might I know that what I've done is worthwhile. So in that context, one just has a reference for evaluating where one might be in one's quest to deliver a picture that we at least think is art we want to show as our work.

I love to learn from what others apprecaite as Art.

Every time I discuss this, I'm able to find a little more to my understanding of this. Hopefully this might be related to being able to sell photographs as art!

The right answers to this topic for each of us might be worth $1 or $100,000 depending on luck, persistence, talent, orginality and did I say luck!

Asher

I was not thinking of the longevity of any of my songs, but I am extremly pleased with the lasting effect. - Graham Nash -

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I intend to think, what Klaus mentioned about the attitude towards art, well yeah, I experienced that first hand when I studied music, and I always thought of it to be ridiculous. I saw a totally unknown pianist performing Scriabin, Rachmaninov, Beethoven, Schubert, Bach and a homegrown Beatles medley on a single evening, and on a scale that would have caused Horrowitz to break into tears applauding him. Dressed in decade old jeans, T-Shirt, red wool scarf from his girlfriend, a leather Jacket and a felt Hat that had seen better times in deed, totallyh not bothered about any flippin bourgeoise convention of arts, he had pure Sex with a Steinway Concert Grand that evening and provided that Model D-274 with multiple orgasms.

He played a monster program, and the mature levels of technique and musicality was truly mindblowing. He never recorded anything, other than for friends on a tape, I still have some tapes, and has not come to international honors or shook the hand of the queen of England or something worse. <grins>

Asking him once, "Why do you not go and record with the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra or similiar and get your records out?" he answered, " Why would I want to have that stress? I live and breath music every single day, that's enough for me!"

This profound answer reflects my very own attitude towards art today, I live it, I breath it, it is part of my daily life, and that is enough for me in deed. Others studied arts and became art critics, it is their Job to enrich us with their thoughts, and I gladly leave it up to them to perform such elevated levels of brain contortion. <grins>

One thing sometimes makes me struggle though. The last 48 hours I was installing a bespoke cinema system at a friends place, and while this was a lot of head scratching, crawling on knees and finetuning, the result was very convincing. Watched pieces of David Attenborough's "Planet Earth"on Blue Ray over the 46" KLD-46X3500 Sony Flagship HD Screen, whoaaa!

While I was stripping wires and hauling speakers around, I was thinking about framing pictures, and wondered whether this is art or not. One could argue, no it is a craft, not art, then again, one could argue as well, it has to be a craft first, but could become art after that. I intend towards the latter now, hence have a somewhat broader definition of art for myself.

@Klaus, about that german attitude towards art, not living there anymore since so long, and amongst the funniest things I ever heard about that attitude was this:

"... They can be so tight arsed in deed....If you shove a piece of charcoal up their shaft, and wait a little bit... PLOP... you get a diamond back...."

@ Kathy, 100% ____ Signed!

I'm trying to communicate here. I'm a communicator, I like to communicate, and if a million people buy it then we've touched a million people, if only 10 people buy it, then we've only touched 10, and that's important, because I'm satisfied with only 10. But, I love a million. - Graham Nash -

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Hehehe

Isn't art considered to be a (man-made) tangible construction (in our specific case, by means of photography) that usually has the intention to invoke emotion? Following proper logic, that doesn't automatically mean that everything that invokes emotion is also art!

So to answer Asher's question: "I love to learn from what others appreciate as Art", it should trigger an emotion. And someone with the proper skills is more likely to be able and consistently produce works of art.

Bart

Bart_van_der_Wolf said:

Isn't art considered to be a (man-made) tangible construction (in our specific case, by means of photography) that usually has the intention to invoke emotion? Following proper logic, that doesn't automatically mean that everything that invokes emotion is also art!

Bart

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Hi Bart,

Generally I agree although I want to nitpick on the usage of "tangible"
According to the Compact Oxford Dictionary, tangible means:

• adjective 1 perceptible by touch. 2 clear and definite; real.

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In which case, all kinds of art such as unwritten poetry or live music would be disqualified from being art.

Also, extending the same logic:
- not all art evokes emotion

Don't you just love these discussions, wonderful! LOL

Cheers,

Cem

Klaus Esser said:

...Sometimes european painters, musicians or even photographers have to have some sucess abroad to be accepted as "artists" when they come back to Europe . . And vice-versa, as i learned . .

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Hi Klaus,

I believe that at a micro scale this principle applies to any profession. If an artist, scientist, doctor, etc, grows up in a small, secluded environment such as a village or a town, the townsfolk tend not to take them very seriously since they have known him/her when he/she was a small, snotty child, as it were. It’s a small group’s dynamic, one cannot easily excel in such an environment. To my mind, the key to this phenomenon may lie in the fact that the process which one goes through towards becoming and expert in their field has been visible to the group along the way. So any achievements are only gradually appreciated, if at all. So when one has been elsewhere and achieves fame there, the process has not been visible and the results make a real impact on the group where the person originally belonged to.

Mind you; these are just some musings on my part. As such, I cannot prove and/or substantiate any of them.

Cheers,

Cem

Bart_van_der_Wolf said:

Isn't art considered to .....consistently produce works of art.

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That is exactly what I always miss Bart, the word art in iteself is insufficient to me, artwork, hits the nail better for me personally.

Being at the very beginning of all that, the below took me quite some work, but it ended up to be a heap of shite in my book, so it is for the trashcan, talk about creating a lot of stuff until you get the one that you really can be proud of, it is a lot of hard work in deed.

Hello to all!

Thank you for your thoughts! I know this is a theme which is hardly discussable.

I try to find out the differences in seeing especially photography under the aspects of "art" in different countries.
We all know that there is a very thin line between "decoration" and "art" - i mean Nicolas named it precisely and Asher exactly hit the point when he says:
"the inititail idea is a thought. So that first part is one thought. The physcial form of something. Next there is an intention to externalize that thought."

Despite the fact that "art" is always decoration too - this thin line challenges me. And that influences the intention how to "externalize a thought" when it comes to act, i mean.

Of course: what is "art" commercially in the end is defined by the art-business. I think under this - commercial - aspect art is "made" by agents and gallerists.

And here, by the way, the difference "art" or "decoration" means a lot to the artist´s prestige and acceptance.

best, Klaus

What a topic!

There is art and there are artists.

Some of the greatest artists never sold a painting in their lifetime.

Is it art because "I" think it is or because an authority tells me it is so. One need only read the criticisms leveled at now famous artists to grasp how difficult it is to recognize.

Artists do their art because they can't help themselves.

Aspiration is one thing, but achievement is something else. It is easy to be confused and too serious about ones talents.

Hi Nathaniel!

"Artists do their art because they can't help themselves."

Well - that surely was vanGogh´s way - and some others . . . once upon a time.
"Today" it´s very much calculating - what is artWORK - decoration - and what´s "serious" art.
I know some artists - among them one of the highest paid photograpers - who calculate the
differences very precisely. They develope a feeling for "accepable" work. They have to.

But that´s part of the art-business - and that´s not what i mean.

The term "serious" - which means "highly accepted" - is what i´m interested to find out where´s the borderline between "art" and "artWORK" or decoration or toying around with effects or so. The way of viewing pictures - "feeling" their meaning: are they "true", are they just "impressive" at the first glance, are they "real" - interests me.

(I realise my difficulties to express what i mean in english - i´m out of praxis in making complex things transparent.)

best, Klaus

... and of course... there is the cultural aspect....

What we in our western educated hemisphere perceive as photoraphic art might not be perceived as such in pther parts of the world, vice versa.

I always wondered do chinese people "read" photographs differently, I would assume so, although I am not sure about it. Hmmm, do we not have anyone from China around here on the fora?

i´m interested to find out where´s the borderline between "art" and "artWORK"

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Acceptance as you said is the one aspect, I intend to think the borderline is overlapping.

Georg Baumann said:

Being at the very beginning of all that, the below took me quite some work, but it ended up to be a heap of shite in my book, so it is for the trashcan, talk about creating a lot of stuff until you get the one that you really can be proud of, it is a lot of hard work in deed.

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Yes, for most it requires hard work, for a few naturally gifted it is easier, but still work. One does get better with practice. Your example image is only lacking something in the lower left corner, it just happened to be absent, and harder work couldn't make it appear. Something like a shrub or large rock would probably have done the trick, maybe cloning it in might help.

Compositional skills can be trained (requires work) to a certain degree, and recognizing the elements is part of the skills needed. Hard work alone is unfortunately no guarantee for success though, talent (which you have) is also required.

Bart

Art

Wel, as a former Hippie type, we created, often without thought, what was pleasing and visual and that to us at that time was art. So regardless of commercial or not, the definition of what is art will always be debated and of course is emotional. Give a kid a crayon and he will tell you he is making art. As photographers we are drawing with light. Some have more mainstream skills and there is standard of what is considered "good". If I create a piece of work that I find very pleasing, but, the highlights are blown and there is too much noise, you might not like it. So subjective.

Bart_van_der_Wolf said:

Yes, for most it requires hard work, for a few naturally gifted it is easier, but still work. One does get better with practice. Your example image is only lacking something in the lower left corner, it just happened to be absent, and harder work couldn't make it appear. Something like a shrub or large rock would probably have done the trick, maybe cloning it in might help.

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See, I wanted to show those turkise colored liches, the growth on the trees in front of that rotten wall. They only grow on trees in areas where the air is totally clean, which is the case where I live, the slightest industrial air polution, and they will not grow. I was told they were even used in little glas boxes attached to a wall on a house to check whether the air is totally clean in any given area. Then the little hill with the cloud in the back attracted my attention and of course the light. I know, it is pointless complaining, but it is shots like these were you can hear me cursing like a docker afterwards, whishing I had a Sinar or Hassy to capture every single detail. I never thought about cloning, in fact I never did. Interesting thought though. True Bart, a pile of turf in that corner would have been nice for example.

Just some thoughts, ..my opinion...


Art is many things at the same time all coming together.

sometimes its intentional, sometimes not. You have the artist and his personality and his vision and energy and background being injected into whatever medium he is using. Then you have the medium itself with its limitations and strengths and weaknesses.

Some art has a political message behind it, some not. Some is staged, some is not.
Generally there is some sort of (or seems to be) spiritual connection with the more aestheticly pleasing works, I dont know what it is...

Basically to see an artist that lives to produce work that he/she cannot stop doing, thats beautiful to me. Beauty is pretty universal, but it needs context to be truley effective. And then again some art is just what the people individually see in it.

I suppose the amazing thing about art is that it is making us think introspectively, and inspiring us at the same time. Thats priceless in this world.

For me, art, science and religion all derive from the same source: a quest for meaning. Emotion naturally follows when a particular work (e.g., piece of art, scientific study, religious sermon, etc.) evokes reaction. There are three levels of reaction wherein a work:
1. Confirms preconceptions eloquently (e.g, "That's spot on!");
2. Initiates rethinking but leaves preconception mostly intact ("I hadn't thought of it in quite that way.");
3. Challenges them completely, with reactions ranging from change ("Hey, I was wrong before!"), incomprehension ("What the hell is that all about?"; "It's disturbing/pleasing but I'm not sure why."; "Nicely done but useless/irrelevant."), to hostility ("What a load of crap!"; "The originator is bad/immoral/wrong.").

The same three levels apply to both the creator of the work and its recipient, each of whom operate at different levels of skill and knowledge/experience, thereby encompassing a range of individual and communal reactions to a particular work.

This framework makes it possible to scale the individual and communal impact of a work. The following examples use communal impact as the metric but the principles apply equally at an individual difference level.

Level 1 encompasses decorative creations in art, scientific studies that elegantly replicate previous findings, and sermons that hit the target. What they have in common is they don't challenge preconceptions; they add nothing new to a person's/community's prior beliefs.

Level 2 encompasses growth/expansion of the beliefs of a person/community without challenging the core premises. Think of the famous White Fence photograph that reconciled naturalistic with then modernistic movements in visual art, Weston's erotic chili pepper, Cindy Sherman's work. Scientific examples abound, and in religion recall some significant sermons by Martin Luther King.

Level 3 encompasses creations that challenge premises within their discipline (e.g., photographers Man Ray, Jerry Uelsmann) or at a societal level (e.g., photographers Arbus, Mapplethorpe). Their work frequently evokes hostility, derision or ridicule (e.g., Charles Darwin in science; Karl Barth in religion) but sometimes finds immediate acceptance (Lange's Migrant Mother).

There is one more layer that must be added to the framework: the centrality/peripherality of a preconception in an individual's belief system. All the examples under Level 3 challenged preconceptions of wide communal centrality. The photographers mentioned under Level 2 probably made a Level 2 impact with other photographers of their respective eras but a Level 1 impact (if that) on individuals with a peripheral interest in photography.

Implications of the preceding is that a work of art/science/religion can be scaled on impact (Levels 1 to 3) and centrality within domains ranging from the individual through various grades of communal. I'm working on measures to do this.

Sorry if the preceding reads as too academic but no apologies because I am an academic. You've gotta be what you are, are the saying goes. I hope it's at least comprehensible.

Your framework is pretty acceptable to me !

a persons worldview has a heck of a lot to do with their artistic direction.

some of its probably not even conscious to them/us.


I guess a conclusion is that we can learn a lot about ourselves by our art.

both individually and as a people !

Martin Kuivenhoven said:

Klaus,

Ah, the definition of succes..?

One of the most praised and recognized recent artists in the Netherlands was a Rock singer, long time hard drug user and, as soon as he found out that his life style had eaten away his body, he jumped off a hotel to flee from reality (leaving a wife and child..).

Now does it take such a personality to be a true artist or if you are talented and persistant enough to become technically skilled you reach ability others may experience as special or even as art?

(I am sure Rachel will be able to add a couple of words about the definition of "succefull" in this respect ..)

Your succes has been recognized returning to Europe?

Martin

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HA! I just saw this. Now I must think of something erudite to add.