4 thoughts on “Post your responses to Szarkowski here!”
This piece struck me as something very close to what the goal of this class is, a redefinition, a reinterpretation of something that has already supposedly been established, an encouragement to get out there and reinterpret the art of photography and art in general, to reestablish that which catches our eye and to think outside of the box we sit in. He urges us to see photography as done for itself rather than for the sake of the image being photographed. Szarkowski holds many of the same ideas as Adams does, and even goes so far as to reference him in this essay. He idealizes the form and the beauty that is inherant to it, while simultaniously glorifying the moment captured rather than specifically the thing. But I suppose what this could be interpreted as is the beauty of the scene itself, the intrinsic power attributed to a moment captured on film. What matters most, he seems to say, is not the scene, but the message of the scene, what we see and feel from it, and what we carry away.
One of my favorite lines from this goes thus…. “The more interesting of these might be described as black-and-white photographs made with color film, in which the problem of color is solved by inattention.” He calls these color photos “black-and-white” because of the overall lack of power given to the colors in the piece. I felt that to be extremely powerful, a message that “even though you think yourself to be a classy, powerful photographer, using colorful, vibrant film, you have no soul, and are shooting black and white…”
I greatly enjoyed reading this article, in part because of Szarkowski’s manner of interpreting photography loosely, and also because of his encouragement to photographers to experiment extensively with the medium. Szarkowski seems to have great passion for photography as an art, and also for the interpretation of Eggleston’s work.
He writes, “The continuing, cumulative insights of these exceptional artists have formed and reformed photography’s tradition; a new pictorial vocabulary, based on the specific, the fragmentary, the elliptical, the ephemeral, and the provisional. This new tradition has revised our sense of what in the world is meaningful and our understanding of how the meaningful can be described.” Before this, he discussed the ability of gifted photographers to learn from the work done already, to learn to compose an effective photograph. Yet, these new photographers are also, in some ways, the most interesting photographers–because they are constantly contributing to a change in the face of contemporary art. The definition of “meaning” changes as time goes on, and these new artists encourage this redefinition. I liked the phrase, “a new pictorial vocabulary, based on the specific, the fragmentary, the elliptical, the ephemeral, and the provisional,” because it seemed to discuss the variety of methods and styles in emerging photography.
Though I was not familiar with Eggleston’s work, I enjoyed looking at the photographs present in the article, as well as Szarkowski’s interpretations of them. He discusses how Eggleston was perhaps never committed to being a “black-and-white photogrpaher,” but instead he fully embraced the color medium, “enabling him to make these pictures: real photographs, bits lifted from the visceral world with such tact and cunning that they seem true, seen in color from corner to corner.” I like the use of the phrase, “real photographs,” because Szarkowski seems to define them as something that lifts the viewer above the visceral in vivid color.
In thinking about the way that our class ahs ben developing it’s eye for color and evolving in the ways we capture and edit it, having an example like Eggleston in the back of our heads is a really helpful way of remembering why digital photography is so creative in it is ability to remake the palette of a color-scape. In paying attention to the layering of textures and textiles he brings forth vibrant images of moments that have come to be seen as trivial because they are ‘everyday’ occurrences (the regard of the woman wearing the checkered pink shirt posing in front of the rainbow tiled wall). With the critiques in class I’ve noticed that we have been playing with tonality and composition of our prints by paying close attention to the stories they are telling and the connections that they bring forth, often which are unexpected (the photographer didn’t have this particular story in mind.)
The article reminds us that we need to pay attention to the aspects of digital photography in the process of creating a context to which they were founded, and how to overcome the “clever originality of mindless, mechanized cameras.” Szarkowski’s article makes the photographer the conscious of the photograph; the photographer adds intelligence. Therefore, when presenting or printing we must consistently be aware of the development process that is going to take shape after the pictures have been developed and presented together. I think the stories that we have been creating on the board are really telling ofthe ways that we are willing to expose aspects of our lives that don’t always come out in our day to day interactions or personalities. Looking at Eggleston’s work, it was interesting to see the colors he was able to create, it is as if they are as vivid as they were the moment they were taken, there is no hint of reductionism in editing but an expansion of a greater history that we have been delivered to capture and present.
I found this piece interesting in the ways that color, perceptions of photography, and the progression of photography over the years were discussed. The movement from monochrome film to color film has created a shift between seemingly “fake” color added to a black and white photograph to photographs that can justly represent and document the surroundings.
“Form is perhaps the point of art.” We have had many discussions on what form is, but this topic is hard to define within photography. Form and subject are ultimately the same, but also quite different, making it very difficult to create a definition to define one but not the other. Svarkowski speaks of the subject as the “destination” of the photograph. This is to say that by reaching the “subject” of the photograph the viewer has followed along a path to find the true purpose of the image. This purpose must be reached after form and subject are fully defined in the realm of the photograph.
“It is not easy for the photographer to compete with the clever originality of mindless, mechanized cameras, but the photographer can add intelligence. By means of photography one can in a minute reject as unsatisfactory ninety-nine configurations of facts and elect as right the hundredth.” This quote was interesting to me as well as the idea that the photographer uses “tradition and intuition” to chose the best of his/her photographs. This idea sets apart the photographer from their mechanized counterpart, in a way that allows for human intuition to excel over modernized technology.
This piece struck me as something very close to what the goal of this class is, a redefinition, a reinterpretation of something that has already supposedly been established, an encouragement to get out there and reinterpret the art of photography and art in general, to reestablish that which catches our eye and to think outside of the box we sit in. He urges us to see photography as done for itself rather than for the sake of the image being photographed. Szarkowski holds many of the same ideas as Adams does, and even goes so far as to reference him in this essay. He idealizes the form and the beauty that is inherant to it, while simultaniously glorifying the moment captured rather than specifically the thing. But I suppose what this could be interpreted as is the beauty of the scene itself, the intrinsic power attributed to a moment captured on film. What matters most, he seems to say, is not the scene, but the message of the scene, what we see and feel from it, and what we carry away.
One of my favorite lines from this goes thus…. “The more interesting of these might be described as black-and-white photographs made with color film, in which the problem of color is solved by inattention.” He calls these color photos “black-and-white” because of the overall lack of power given to the colors in the piece. I felt that to be extremely powerful, a message that “even though you think yourself to be a classy, powerful photographer, using colorful, vibrant film, you have no soul, and are shooting black and white…”
I greatly enjoyed reading this article, in part because of Szarkowski’s manner of interpreting photography loosely, and also because of his encouragement to photographers to experiment extensively with the medium. Szarkowski seems to have great passion for photography as an art, and also for the interpretation of Eggleston’s work.
He writes, “The continuing, cumulative insights of these exceptional artists have formed and reformed photography’s tradition; a new pictorial vocabulary, based on the specific, the fragmentary, the elliptical, the ephemeral, and the provisional. This new tradition has revised our sense of what in the world is meaningful and our understanding of how the meaningful can be described.” Before this, he discussed the ability of gifted photographers to learn from the work done already, to learn to compose an effective photograph. Yet, these new photographers are also, in some ways, the most interesting photographers–because they are constantly contributing to a change in the face of contemporary art. The definition of “meaning” changes as time goes on, and these new artists encourage this redefinition. I liked the phrase, “a new pictorial vocabulary, based on the specific, the fragmentary, the elliptical, the ephemeral, and the provisional,” because it seemed to discuss the variety of methods and styles in emerging photography.
Though I was not familiar with Eggleston’s work, I enjoyed looking at the photographs present in the article, as well as Szarkowski’s interpretations of them. He discusses how Eggleston was perhaps never committed to being a “black-and-white photogrpaher,” but instead he fully embraced the color medium, “enabling him to make these pictures: real photographs, bits lifted from the visceral world with such tact and cunning that they seem true, seen in color from corner to corner.” I like the use of the phrase, “real photographs,” because Szarkowski seems to define them as something that lifts the viewer above the visceral in vivid color.
In thinking about the way that our class ahs ben developing it’s eye for color and evolving in the ways we capture and edit it, having an example like Eggleston in the back of our heads is a really helpful way of remembering why digital photography is so creative in it is ability to remake the palette of a color-scape. In paying attention to the layering of textures and textiles he brings forth vibrant images of moments that have come to be seen as trivial because they are ‘everyday’ occurrences (the regard of the woman wearing the checkered pink shirt posing in front of the rainbow tiled wall). With the critiques in class I’ve noticed that we have been playing with tonality and composition of our prints by paying close attention to the stories they are telling and the connections that they bring forth, often which are unexpected (the photographer didn’t have this particular story in mind.)
The article reminds us that we need to pay attention to the aspects of digital photography in the process of creating a context to which they were founded, and how to overcome the “clever originality of mindless, mechanized cameras.” Szarkowski’s article makes the photographer the conscious of the photograph; the photographer adds intelligence. Therefore, when presenting or printing we must consistently be aware of the development process that is going to take shape after the pictures have been developed and presented together. I think the stories that we have been creating on the board are really telling ofthe ways that we are willing to expose aspects of our lives that don’t always come out in our day to day interactions or personalities. Looking at Eggleston’s work, it was interesting to see the colors he was able to create, it is as if they are as vivid as they were the moment they were taken, there is no hint of reductionism in editing but an expansion of a greater history that we have been delivered to capture and present.
I found this piece interesting in the ways that color, perceptions of photography, and the progression of photography over the years were discussed. The movement from monochrome film to color film has created a shift between seemingly “fake” color added to a black and white photograph to photographs that can justly represent and document the surroundings.
“Form is perhaps the point of art.” We have had many discussions on what form is, but this topic is hard to define within photography. Form and subject are ultimately the same, but also quite different, making it very difficult to create a definition to define one but not the other. Svarkowski speaks of the subject as the “destination” of the photograph. This is to say that by reaching the “subject” of the photograph the viewer has followed along a path to find the true purpose of the image. This purpose must be reached after form and subject are fully defined in the realm of the photograph.
“It is not easy for the photographer to compete with the clever originality of mindless, mechanized cameras, but the photographer can add intelligence. By means of photography one can in a minute reject as unsatisfactory ninety-nine configurations of facts and elect as right the hundredth.” This quote was interesting to me as well as the idea that the photographer uses “tradition and intuition” to chose the best of his/her photographs. This idea sets apart the photographer from their mechanized counterpart, in a way that allows for human intuition to excel over modernized technology.