What do you see when you look at a photograph?
Simple question.
How you answer it may reveal what you find important in imagery.
I was once in a gallery at a large Arizona University. We were looking at a show of a photographer who had just completed his Master’s Degree and this was the work that was the culmination of his study there.
I looked at 8”x8” prints of lawns and sidewalks with pieces of string strewn about on the ground. There was a photograph of a piece of string on a sidewalk. It was entitled; “Piece of String on Sidewalk: facing North.” I remember that title to this day. I remember that image to this day. I am guessing you know why…
I was supposed to be seeing some sort of transformational images dealing with self-discovery and the impact of the fracturing of our social system has had on the malnourished children of teen age parenting or some such bullshit. There was a huge three sheet “artist statement” that I briefly skimmed over before going to look at the images. I was supposed to read the whole thing, I guess. My bad.
I saw a piece of string. On the ground.
A few prints down, that same piece of string was on a well manicured lawn. I am sure it was the same piece of string and I wondered how it had migrated from the sidewalk to the lawn and if that social injustice had somehow pushed it there. I was shocked to find that the title of this piece was “Twine on Lawn: facing South”. I was reasonably certain that it was the same piece of string from the first image, but here it was called ‘twine’.
I wondered about the importance of the name change. Was it the destruction of the nuclear family or the inherent racism of large industrial complexes that had forced the string to change to twine… I will never know, I didn’t read the damn artist statement that would have clarified it all.
In front of me, there were two obvious photography students. They were intently going from one print to the next and chatting in hushed tones. As I drew closer I heard their comments: “Yeah, this is definitely his Rollei, you can see how the grain looks in the highlights.”
Well, hell… who knew. I was supposed to be looking at grain structure in the highlights for a clue as to what kind of camera was used to make the totally insipid crap photos that had earned some kid his masters degree.
Sure as hell made more sense than trying to find anything of value in square prints of string on the ground.
As I was leaving there was a very dapper older woman with a over-sized purse and lots of piled up hair (hey, it was the 80’s, so cut her some slack). She was gushing to another woman over the images that were on display. “I am so glad he is out of school. This is the final part of his masters… I know he will be coming back to …”
I was out the door and heading for the motorcycle by that time. I had come all the way across town to see this show, and what I saw was not what others saw. Not by a long shot. Mom saw an end to the master’s degree. Other photography students saw grain structure and camera choice, and I saw a huge effort to present a pile of excrement as art. I can only imagine how anyone willing to hire him would have received shots of string on the ground. Still life? Nawwww.
I do not know what you would have seen. I don’t even know what the other people saw who were in attendance… it was kind of a hushed audience moving respectfully through the thirty or so pieces of string on the ground with directional titles hanging with authority in over-sized mounts on white walls in a place of ‘higher learning’.
I had to get back to the studio to shoot photographs of some Phoenix Suns.
Now think of a photograph. It is a photograph of two people embracing. One is smiling and the other obviously laughing. It is in color and the two people are dressed up. What does that picture represent to those who view it?
Most will see nothing more than a snapshot. Two older people caught in a split second of time and really of no importance. It is neither compositionally exciting, nor does it have any cool post processing effects. The people aren’t famous, and it wasn’t shot by anyone famous either.
It is, in short, a snapshot. Not unlike the millions of snapshots taken each and every day by people wanting to capture a moment. It will never hang in a gallery or be included in a show.
But I love it. It is my mom and dad, and they are smiling together. Rare, and rarer still that they are hugging and laughing. And I caught it. Snap. Mine. Forever.
What was intrinsic in the photograph was unknown to any other viewers, and so they bring their parameters and expectations to the image. Some may want to actually check the grain structure for any hint of Leica…
So we get into a discussion of art in photography and we start to run smack dab into what the viewer is bringing to the experience. Because what the viewer brings to the experience is so much more than the image itself in so many cases.
If I described for you a wall with 300 snapshots taped to it. Smiling people caught in all kinds of normal activity… washing the car, doing their daughters hair, school snapshots, business portraits, holding their dog or cat… simple pictures from real life stuck to the wall. Absolutely nothing about the wall or the images themselves is more than mundane.
Now I tell you that that photograph made me cry. It still does.
It is a wall of the ‘missing’ after September 11, 2001.
Can you look at the image again in the same way? Ever?
We bring context to the images… the context of loss and terror and the realization that all those smiling people doing ordinary things are no longer with us.
One more – imagine this image with me…
A woman in a swimsuit, obviously back in time: maybe the sixties. She is smiling on the edge of the pool and looking straight at the camera. Now hold that image for a few seconds before moving on to the next paragraph.
Viewer A sees a hot chick in a swimsuit.
Viewer B sees a photograph of a famous actress in her youth.
Viewer C sees a photograph of a woman that was his wife taken right after she was told she had a part in a major picture
Viewer D remembers when dad took that picture of his mom, the famous actress
Viewer E sees a historical shot of a young up and coming actress before she won the Academy Award
Viewer F sees a mean and arrogant woman who treated her badly when she was a script girl
Viewer G sees a very cool retro look that she may try on a model she is doing makeup on later this week
Viewer H sees a decadence that is forbidden in his country and hates what it stands for
Same picture… so many ways to see it.
What did you see before I gave the examples.
The context of the viewer over-rides the image itself, which is a lovely portrait of a woman just before she became a world famous star.
Is that important to the worth, or value we place on the image.
After all, there are about a gazillion shots of girls in swimsuits. About a half a gazillion are uploaded to Flickr every day.
Many of those are technically better, and many have ‘better’ lighting and maybe even cuter girls…
But this picture is of someone we all knew. We have a history with the subject, not the photographer. Does that matter? Shouldn’t a photograph live on its own merits, without a ‘backstory’? You will have to answer that for yourself.
I can tell you that an image is an image. Photographers can work their magic with the composition, and processing and all the aesthetic stylistic affect possible, and the viewer still has to bring something to the table.
But we continue to try. We do. We want that experience we felt to be transferred over somehow. We hope and long for images that tell our story and invite the viewer in to present a little of theirs. We strive for context. Elusive, adaptive, hidden in plain site context.
So tell me – what do YOU see in these five photos?
Photo by Bruce Barnbaum
Photo by Garry Winogrand
Photo by Helmut Newton
Photo by Ansel Adams
Photo by Stephen Shore
There are no right or wrong answers. These are all famous and well respected photographers and these are some of my favorite images. Take some time to really see them and then think about what you expected from the image.
Was it what the image promised or did you bring that expectation with you?
I think it is fun and enlightening to look at and see photographs. Take every opportunity you can to look at photography, ask yourself what you see. And look for the context for the image. You may be surprised what you see and take away.
As always, I am available on Twitter, at my Facebook Page, and I do lighting workshops all over the country. Find out more at Learn to Light. I am off to Florida… watch for a live broadcast from somewhere in Florida Monday. See the LE Live page for more info.
Every photo has different ambition and destination. Creative post!
I take it you’ve bought the book Photo:Wisdom ? If not its a very worthy purchase, amazing imagery and words from the photographers. I just read the text by Stephen Shore and also a bit further on the text by Tim Flach and couldn’t agree more, so it was great to find your thoughts here today.
Nope: Have not seen that book.
Will check it out.
Thanks for the recommend.
I work for a moving company, and as such I get the job of entering peoples homes to pack them to move. Its often during these packing hours I run across the bounty of family photos, and I have become quite the master of skimming through them rather quickly, admiring and shuddering the entire time. I don’t open albums, mind you, only the framed ones set out for display. Sometimes if the customer is in the room, I’ll mention a particular nice photo and often will get the back-story on it. More times than not, the story is 180° from what I thought it was. -Will
Re the string-on-the-ground exhibit: I never get much of anywhere defending contemporary fine-art photography to other “flavors” of photographers, but I feel I need to make at least a faint effort to show the flag.
The thing about current art photography that’s probably the hardest for mainstream photographers to get their (our) heads around is the fact that within fine-art photography, it’s permissible (although not required) for the photographs themselves to be of no intrinsic interest. That’s a foreign idea because for almost every other kind of photographer, making interesting photographs is the whole point.
In fine-art photography, the point is to explore certain kinds of ideas, and the photographs might be merely tools for carrying on that exploration. The ideas might be ones such as: What is a document? What is an image? Can a photographic image not be a document? If a photograph documents a fictitious scene, is it still a true document? And so forth.
(The string photographs might be examining such concepts as: What is a place? What is a direction? Is the idea of “north” still meaningful when translated into an image hanging on a wall? It’s not a stupid subject and it’s not confined to photography. Have you ever read Wallace Stevens’ poem, “Anecdote of the Jar,” the one that begins, “I placed a jar in Tennessee…”? It’s not a long poem, just 12 lines, and it isn’t exactly catchy, but it has attracted a long history of serious scholarly analysis.)
Of course the ideas being explored in contemporary art photography are not of interest to most people, and that’s okay. Things have changed in the art world; you’ll seldom find anybody legitimate nowadays who will call you a boor and a Philistine if you’re not fascinated by art-concept esoterica. However, the fact that it IS esoteric does not mean that they’re just B.S.ing you.
It reminds me a bit of higher mathematics: most of us have no need to know anything about, say, Cauchy functions and have no reason to be interested in them. However, there are specialists who ARE interested in them, and who investigate them in a rigorous, highly disciplined way. It’s opaque to most of us, but I’m willing to give them the benefit of the doubt that they’re not just yanking my chain.
I got out of fine-art photography because I discovered that I wasn’t very engaged by its kinds of ideas and that I preferred to try to make photographs that WERE of some intrinsic interest. And even though there are undoubtedly some chain-yankers in the field (just as there are in other kinds of photography) I’m still willing to be respectful of people who are taking it seriously.
“Re the string-on-the-ground exhibit: I never get much of anywhere defending contemporary fine-art photography to other “flavors” of photographers, but I feel I need to make at least a faint effort to show the flag.”
Be careful here. You didn’t see the work. Because it was labeled ‘fine art’ doesn’t make it so. That is the problem. A lack of critical discernment. To defend something that was outrageous because it was outrageous is not really a defense, but an indictment.
And I am well versed in contemporary fine art photography as well. I do not have any issues with those producing fine art, and have collected several images that would be considered pretty edgy. I just know that not ALL edgy stuff is real.
An exposure does not art make.
“The thing about current art photography that’s probably the hardest for mainstream photographers to get their (our) heads around is the fact that within fine-art photography, it’s permissible (although not required) for the photographs themselves to be of no intrinsic interest. “
No. I do not believe that. Just as i do not believe the ‘artiste’ who states loudly and whenever he can that “I don’t care if anyone understands or even likes my work, they just don’t get it.” Yeah. I have met too many of those to believe it for a moment. Hiding in the shadow of blaming others for one’s inability to connect is not gonna fly with me. it seems too weak and ineffectual.
If it indeed has no intrinsic interest, then the value would be nil. There really is no value in art that says it is not interesting by design. I mean, it sounds all artyspeaky and such, but that artyspeaky stuff isn’t working anymore.
As to the Wallace Stevens poem.
Yep.
However, I was also in the audience when a University of Arizona lit professor was introducing Richard Brautigan and gushing over all the nuances of his book, “In Watermelon Sugar”. I was a big fan of Brautigan and had made the trip to hear him.
He took the microphone and stared at the lady in sensible shoes and said “What a pile of fuckin’ horseshit that is. I was pretty messed up when I wrote that and it isn’t about ay goddam thing at all.”
That has stayed with me… the ‘scholarly’ tomes about what other artists are actually doing.
“I got out of fine-art photography because I discovered that I wasn’t very engaged by its kinds of ideas and that I preferred to try to make photographs that WERE of some intrinsic interest. And even though there are undoubtedly some chain-yankers in the field (just as there are in other kinds of photography) I’m still willing to be respectful of people who are taking it seriously.”
As am I. In fact I support those who do take it seriously. And I do understand that context may make it more difficult for abstract approaches. But there are serious and there are ‘artisticallyboundupinbullshit’ and that is something that only takes a bit of digging to find.
What bothers me is that the charlatans and fakes make it more difficult for the artists who are indeed struggling with a quiet or obscure voice.
it seems that there is a need to be outrageous simply to be outrageous. That i not going to work at all for me.
I will append this:
One of my favorite street shooters was Garry Winogrand.
His statement of what a photograph should be is very powerful. It may not be true for some, but it is a good jumping off point for discussion.
“A photograph must be more interesting than the thing photographed” – Garry Winogrand
This may have indeed been the basis for the string on the ground series, but in attempting such a feat one must be sure to be able to successfully complete it.
There in lies the true challenge. It may have been an idea to make images of string on the ground, attaching contextual labels to them, and then to have something more than actual string on the ground in a photograph. But merely attempting does not make it art.
definately do beautifully produced book, here’s a quote from the book by Tim Flach –
“How you see the observer of the image is so important. Where this person is, where the image is: its almost everything. I consider who is seeing the picture and if it is being delivered on a website, in an exhibition, in a book or other print. I have to think: “Will there be the means to support the image with other information? Will the viewer be affected by other things? It is important to consider what is possible, within the image and around the image. Understanding how it will be perceived is important. I am not a photographer who just does an image and thinks, “That is it. Now the viewer can make of it what they will.” You can take a lucky picture – it can work – but it is better if you take a true interest in how the communication works, how the photograph will transform somebody’s experience, how meaning will be achieved.”
It’s a great read on further and also the text by Stephen Shore is similar in meaning, cheers and enjoy ya weekend.
I read your blog everytime and I have learnt a lot on these pages but I am little surprised at how harsh your words are toward the master student.
I get that the photographs were not to your taste and the general arguement that everyone will their own discourse when relating to any photograph. If he was awarded his masters he must have made a compelling arguement for his work to the relevant tutors and examiners overseeing the course.
Anyway apart from that I tend to agree that an inherent problem with photography (and art) is that any intended statement opens itself up to the mechanics of production and circulation of meaning in society. But what are you going to do – you have to keep putting your work out there and keep making statements
Thanks for the comment.
“If he was awarded his masters he must have made a compelling arguement for his work to the relevant tutors and examiners overseeing the course.”
And I think that is part of the problem. As a graduate and student of the art school, I had seen equally appalling work that had garnered praise and admiration from a few in charge folks. It seems that the only way anyone could really make an impression was to be totally outside any rational basis for critique. “You just don’t understand, so it must be good’ sorta thing.
I need to also state that when a University takes the kind of money that they do, and do not prepare a student for the realistic world of what is, it is a terrible thing. I can say with some certainty that the work on the walls certainly would not have gotten the young man any work. Or even a show.
One can feel when one’s leg is being pulled.
In addition, these young people flood out of the schools and cannot even get jobs as assistants. I know, because as a commercial photographer in Phoenix I would get 4-6 of them at my door looking to assist. Their general knowledge of photography (as a business) was extremely poor. Their expectations high.
I only hired one, and he quit after two weeks because he didn’t like getting up early.
Not an indictment on the whole system, but the stories and examples are certainly out there.
Don,
You bring up and interesting point. Let me restate it…. What we see and value in a photograph is a reflection of the context of our own experience. Do you think this true for all art? or just more so with photography?
Can we go so far to say that a photograph becomes art because of the context we put on it?
Thanks for the post. Something to put in the background and mull over.
“Can we go so far to say that a photograph becomes art because of the context we put on it? ”
Maybe not “art” but certainly value. I wasn’t attacking ‘fine art’ with the post. It was for consideration of context.
I do believe that what we bring to a photographic has a great deal to do with what we get out of it. Is that important for the artist to consider? I think so, but I wouldn’t say it was a vital part of what the artist does at the conception of the piece.
Indeed good stuff to ponder.
BTW – I don’t have any definitive ‘answer’ only the constant questioning.
Great article. So, it prompted me to click on other areas of your web site. I click on “Workshops”, I scroll down, and what do I see. “Tentative schedule for 2009”. Wasn’t that something like 2 years ago?
Damn.
i forgot that was even there.
I use the http://www.learntolight.com for all of that.
Thanks for the heads up… it is being replaced… NOW.
— don
Interesting article and now I guess I can come out of the closet and say that I see in much William Eggleston’s work, what you saw in the string exibit. Apparently a whole lot of people “get it” and obviously I ain’t one of ’em…
Re Brautigan: Funny story, but you can’t be sure that what an artist says is the final authority on his/her work. It IS possible to get inspired and create something “over your own head”… for example, a lot of literary heavy-hitters believe that when Melville wrote “Moby-Dick,” he honestly thought he was just cranking out a cracking sea story, like his earlier best-sellers “Typee” and “Omoo” (neither of which anybody except desperate academics bothers to read, let alone study, any more.)
And I wasn’t defending the string photos, just the proposition that in fine-art photography, the “interestingness” of the photos themselves may not be the bottom line.
Sometimes a blurry, closeup, out of focus picture of a spoon is just a blurry, closeup, out of focus picture of a spoon.
Several years ago, I ran across someone trying to hawk a 16×20 print of the above for upwards of $300, also attaching the phrase “limited edition.” The really comical thing that happened since then was that I have never forgotten that stupid photo – it made me really angry, then it became the butt of many jokes with a friend of mine, and now I just giggle when I think about it. The atrocity became something I’ll probably never forget, and has taught me that not all “art” is created equal. I guess I have a different definition of what “fine art” is than … well,.. people that take blurry, closeup, out of focus pictures of spoons. And that’s okay by me.
On a different note, as much as a fan as I have been of Ansel Adam’s photography, I never once had come across the idea that his photos were meant to be symbolic of other ideas until you said so the other day. My kid’s doctor has several reproductions hanging on the walls, and I’ve taken to trying to decipher them on my own while I wait. I’ve considered consulting the interwebs as to their meanings, but I think that would ruin the fun!
🙂
What do I see in those three photographs? I see five photographs. Must be the multiplier effect.
Joerg Colberg recently interviewed Nadav Kander.
(http://jmcolberg.com/weblog/extended/archives/a_conversation_with_nadav_kander/)
At one point, they talk about the popular idea that a beautiful picture is a picture of a beautiful thing. Colberg asks Kander, “If a lot of the Chinese people didn’t really understand why you were taking those photographs in some ways it’s similar to people complaining that a lot of contemporary photography is “boring”. A lot of people in the West also love photographs of sunsets and something that’s beautiful, the beautiful landscape photograph. For you, when you see a picture or a scene that you want to take a photograph of – what is the appeal of that which you see? If somebody came up to you and said “why is this photo not boring? Can you explain this?” what would you say?
And Kander replies, amongst other things, “…But I would say to people, if I was going to simplify it, that I photograph everyday situations that compositionally attract me in a very beautiful way…”
Isn’t that the point: that the photograph itself has to be visually engaging, interesting, pleasing as a visual experience? (It is not, after all, a treatise, poem, or a sonata, but something we appreciate by looking at it.) It has, first and foremost, to do engage us as a visual object per se, not because it has some other meaning outside itself. (The external meaning might be important for other reasons, but not to the photograph as experienced by seeing.)
“There are always two people in every picture: the photographer and the viewer.” – Ansel Adams
Excellent article, really enjoy how you make me think and realize no matter how much that one person thinks a photo is beautiful that necessarily others will.