@ Oscuro:
With all due respect to a well-stated response, I think you're wrong.
Thank you for taking the time to read my post and think about it. You raise some interesting and valid points and also, I believe (though I may be wrong), miss others.
It seems like you are suggesting that being a 'good photographer' is wholly about the vision and the decision. I would say that there is still more to the equation. If Photographer X produced beautiful work using a specific recipe of lens, film, developer, and printing for a number of years, and that formula, in combination with his 'eye' is what led to his success, it is not incumbent upon the viewer or 'fan' of his work to then also accept and revere his new work in an entirely different medium.
Yes, to a degree - a very large degree -it is about decision and vision. Look at d'Agata's work in Cambodia. But certainly not to the complete exclusion of form. That's not possible. How do we explain the American, Jay Maisel, in his transition? From my perspective, his shift from Kodachrome to Nikon digital, required only that he learn the new tool's requirements. His vision remained, by his own words, and the observation of others well acquainted with his work, intact.
I did not suggest that there should be a "momentum of acceptance", if you will. I'm saying that one should look very closely for the content, with the form not irrelevant but secondary. Secondary, but not irrelevant. This requires a separate context for each work rather than a generalization.
Let's take Ralph Gibson's Deus Ex Machina. If every one of those images had been made with a Leica Monochrom, and processed with the same tonality but without any grain (simulation), it seems as if you're saying that work should be as highly regarded as the grainy work. I disagree. All of the photographer's decisions and efforts would be the same at the moment of exposure, but the results would be different. I would suggest that the loss of that specific bit of 'character' would be the difference in how well the work is received.
Of course Mr. Gibson's work would be different if he shot it using an MM. That's my point, actually. He would be forced, or perhaps inclined (I must apologize, English is not my first language), to regard his subject, consciously or otherwise, differently, depending on the tools he was using. As a shooter of Tri-X (I believe), he is used to tonal breadth that is simply not available in digital, even with the Monochrome. The light, the shadow, and the transition - the variegation between the two - would need to be treated differently. This is an example of the inherent difference imposed by selection of specific media. With internalization of the media, this process, on the part of the artist, becomes intuitive.
It's not at all about 'understanding the idea described.' It is about seeing the whole of the work and not accepting that the 'greatness' of a piece of art (considered as a component) can be extricated and still maintain the greatness. Viewing a photograph of a painting is not the same experience as viewing the painting. That texture matters. The 'art' of the thing very well CAN be the sum of the napkin AND the diagram. We aren't talking about the napkin as being only the conveyance device for the 'information (diagram),' are we? A watercolor is a combination of how the pigment interacts with the paper. An oil painting is partially about the buildup of paint on canvas - those brush strokes matter. They aren't just the means.
Yes, and no. When I was very young, because of my social, geographic, and economic milieu, I was not able to see Vermeer's work in person, but only through books. Well-produced books, but books nonetheless. The effect was profound. Similarly, with Caravaggio, even as a child, I was riveted. I could not breathe the first time I saw a reproduction of the Conversion of St. Paul or the Crucifixion of St. Peter. (I will allow some long-dormant genetic memory as agency despite being raised an atheist.)
Regardless, the brush strokes are barely, if at all, visible. Indeed, when I saw the actual works many years later, the works were as moving but sufficiently distant that the brushstrokes were as invisible. Vision, decision, and yes, rendition. However the works functioned at a distance sufficient to render brush strokes irrelevant.
Not appreciating the nuance is to ignore a great bit of the artist's participation. No one is suggesting that the artist is any different when he shots with film or when he shoots with digital. But the results have to be assessed independently and the results can't factor in a reputation. And the concept or idea still requires execution. ALL of the execution has to be seen.
Perhaps it is my awkwardness with semantic subtleties that leads me to believe that, in fact, there was suggestion that the artist's work was different depending on media chosen.
I respectfully disagree with the last sentence, and request clarification of the penultimate.
With regard to the last: Much of the work of a photographer is reductive - for example, the removal of subject matter through the careful placement of the frame. What has been excluded may never be known by the viewer. Thus the result of a subset (?) of what we call execution, in this case, occurs without the awareness of the viewer.
I do not suggest that execution/rendition is to be totally disregarded. But do you listen to Eric Clapton? Or Robbie Robertson? Or Charlie Parker? Or Mick Jagger? Sinatra sang out of tune and retarded the phrasing so much that it became a "thing". He owed that to Billie Holliday and Louis Armstrong, neither of whom could sing bel canto yet could deliver a song more powerfully than perhaps the ears of someone with more rigid expectations of technique would be prepared to accept.
Amy Winehouse could barely stand up. Yet, her version of Body and Soul with Tony Bennett is nonpareil.
So I believe that execution/rendition is an important aspect, yes, but not necessarily in the way that the technicals would have us believe.
