Does an extreme focus on craft lead to a loss of artistic value ?

[Bertram2]

I realized that beauty is perfect, however if something is perfect it doesn´t mean is beauty.

Perfectly compressed 😀 !


Besides, I think that A. Adams was an artist with the skill of an artisan.

Exactly my POV too.

Regards,
bertram

 

[Bertram2]

A must read article:
http://www.prime-junta.net/pont/Pontification/o_Boring_Photographs/a_Boring_Photographs.html

Did not read it completely but it seems to be quite an intelligent essay. 🙂

That was what I meant,

"photography whose primary reason for being is existence as an object in itself."

losing contact to the origin, which was to use the camera as a recorder, for freezing slices of my personal lifetime, my personal realty.

Thanks for the link, I'll read it all soon,

bertram

 

[Bertram2]

If technique is too far in the front of your mind the camera becomes more of a scientific recording device and less an expressive artistic tool. There is a balance to be struck.

Yes, and the recorded issue more an object for exercises than a piece of reality, from what reasons ever relevant enuff for you to freeze it on a neg.

Shooting on a cloudy day where the sun is forever moving in and out is one such example - I find I start looking at the light more than the shot- the craft takes over from the art[

Perfect example ! That is what I meant as "aberration" during the learning process.
Suddenly you notice you lost the plot !! 🙁

Regards,
bertram

 

[Bertram2]

Then I bought a SLR and a 35-70 zoom and started to think about composition, framing, DoF and my pictures are more and more boring and I lost interest in photography except when traveling.
When I started working on a party magazin with some friends in 2000 my interest was born again and I burnt through some three rolls a weekend. I mostly thought about fill flash ratios, framing, abient light and so on but not about the people. So I got lots of flack from my more experienced and talented friends. The more I tried the worse where my results.

Some parallelisms in my own life, made me give up photography at the end of the 70 in blind anger, angry more about my own inability to find a way outta this dilemma ! Today Is suppose this something happening to many amateurs sooner or later.

Regards,
bertram

 

[Frank Granovski]

Making the effort while not screwing up can lead to a good photo or two from a batch of averages. I always experiment which results in cr_p along with a few surprises. 😎

 

[Pherdinand]

As gabrielma said...since you used the word 'extreme' i say YES.
Otherwise, simply mastering the craft on a good level does not work against interesting images. It also depends on the style/subject; e.g. some photographers work with large coloured spots or bright/dark areas, where sharpness e.g. is completely unimportant, as well as 'perfect exposure', one quick example would be sbody called s.liu that regularly posted on photo.net classic cameras forum... he had shots with everything, from holga to rolleiflex, and i can tell you it did not matter at all what he used, some shots of him were simply amazing because he had a feeling for using bright colour spots (used velvia most of the time, and in a holga, that's quite a challenge if you want to focus on the craft, lol)

Some other people work with a collection of fine lines to express something; there the sharpness and correct exposure is crucial, otherwise the point gets lost in the blur.

 

[Pherdinand]

Some years ago, a friend of mine and me were listening to the J. Rodrigo´s Aranjuez Concerto played by Narciso Yepes. The recording was excellent (vinyl) and we found that sometimes the guitar strings (and player´s fingers) made a short but a bit annoying buzzing sound. This wouldn´t surprise as this (fretting) is one of the usual "mistakes" a guitar player could face. I said at the end of the recording that it was perfect. Mi friend was a bit critic saying that Yepes made two mistakes during the play. I replied "It was perfect because of this immperfections ... those make it perfect, those show there was a man playing the best he can, not perfect, but the best".

Ernesto, that' interesting... I've heard many guitarists playing that Rodrigo piece, but the most i've liked is the one recorded by Narciso Yepes, well ahead of Paco de Lucia e.g.. I did not notice any of these "imperfections" (i am no connaisseur of classic guitar playing, btw) but it just sounds perfect to me.

 

[StuartR]

Well, I think there is another important aspect that we are neglecting. Some of the photographers who put less stress on the craft during capture will be incredibly proficient in post exposure work. If you look at the Cartier-Bressons and Capas, you will find brilliant printers behind them. There are many photographers who concentrate more on getting an artistic rather than technical image onto the film/sensor, and then address the post exposure with the most skillful craft that they can muster. I think this is probably a good way to work...

 

[varjag]

Stuart, they undobteldy had great printers behind them, but both Capa and HCB had quite some finesse with cameras. If most of us was given the grainy, unsharp 10-50 ASA films used back then, we'd probably abandon the idea of small-format photography for good 🙂

 

[Bertram2]

W There are many photographers who concentrate more on getting an artistic rather than technical image onto the film/sensor, and then address the post exposure with the most skillful craft that they can muster. work...

Well that is what I am talking about: If yet the picture taking process is influenced badly by the primary intention to make everything as good as it is possible you easily get outta touch with what once had made you take a camera.

To HCB this never could happen, a draftsman and painter first and later again and exclusively at the end of his lifeany technical perfection could not get something obsessive for him, making him lose the plot.
IMHO his quote "Sharpness is a bourgeois concept" is only half a joke. The other half is HCB himself !

Regards,
Bertram

 

[StuartR]

Eugene -- my intention was not to say that they weren't technically brilliant, but just to say that they were not techical to a fault. That is to say they weren't shooting street photography on a tripod with a cable release! But seriously, I know that they were great photographic technicians as well as photographic artists, I just think they stressed the art.

 

[yossarian]

No revelations, just commentary

No revelations, just commentary

My own work is least satisfying when I'm on a "quest", primed for that next worthy addition to my portfolio. The technical stuff is second-nature and I no longer let it get in the way (except with, um, digital). My real successes are those little slices of life I happen to glimpse when I'm out driving. Frequently such shots will include dogs--just a proclivity I picked up over the years (they never request that shots be "deleted").
I think it's the large-scale subjects which stymie me. Have any of you ever tried to personalize a shot of the Grand Canyon? I have one--it's purely mine, and I know even I could never duplicate it. Skill? Not a chance--dumb luck.
So I try to keep to the little stuff--the details you catch out of the corner of your eye.
I don't have any illusions of being an artist, and I think self-proclaimed artists are rather tiresome.
I watch, I see, I shoot--kinda like 30 years ago, only now I do it intuitively, without sweating the technical stuff.

yossarian

 

[bmattock]

You're all familiar with the Japanese term 'bokeh' or roughly, the pleasing way that out-of-focus areas are rendered - more bokeh meaning more pleasing in the rendering.

Let me introduce you to another Japanese (Zen) term. Like bokeh, it defies strict interpretation, but I believe it applies to both photography and other art forms, such as the music (and fretting mistakes) that we're discussing here.

The term is 'wabi-sabi'.

http://www.imperfectmusic.com/l_ess5.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wabi-sabi

To my way of thinking, the blurry and technically imprecise photographs I took as a teenager are wabi-sabi, as they exhibit the perfection of imperfection. But I did not intend this, and that is what makes it wabi-sabi.

The blurry and imprecise phtographs I take as a semi-trained adult photographer are also wabi-sabi, and they also exhibit the perfection of imperfection. But I do intend this (I claim), and that also makes it wabi-sabi.

But if I intend to produce photographs that exhibit wabi-sabi, that is not wabi-sabi. Unless it is.

Best Regards,

Bill Mattocks

"Zen flows like a bullet down the rivers of my mind."

 

[bmattock]

Since I seem to have shocked everyone into silence, here's another interesting read on the subject:

http://www.cerritos.edu/eheckerman/impermanence.html

Best Regards,

Bill Mattocks

 

[Bertram2]

The term is 'wabi-sabi'.
Best Regards,
Bill Mattocks

Quote from the link:
According to Leonard Koren, wabi-sabi is the most conspicuous and characteristic feature of what we think of as traditional Japanese beauty and it "occupies roughly the same position in the Japanese pantheon of aesthetic values as do the Greek ideals of beauty and perfection in the West." Andrew Juniper claims, "if an object or expression can bring about, within us, a sense of serene melancholy and a spiritual longing, then that object could be said to be wabi sabi."


If this is what wabi-sabi means , it does not have any relevance for my work and I do not see the relevance to the prob that too much fokus on quality lets the emotions get outta sight.

In general l I personally avoid to adopt such asian terms speaking about a completely different universe of emotions and esthetic understanding, so different that all effort on translation is always a bit incomplete at the end.

I hate operating with blurry terms and anyway I believe that as an European I cannot really understand such terms without a certain kind of assimilation to the culture, maybe living there for many years could get me into it.

Regards,
bertram

 

[djon]

Miles Davis, Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, Bireli Lagrene, Joe Pass...

 

[bmattock]

If this is what wabi-sabi means , it does not have any relevance for my work and I do not see the relevance to the prob that too much fokus on quality lets the emotions get outta sight.

It says that there is perfection in imperfection, in impermanence, in flaws.

The relevance to me is that the are limits to what can be gained in an attempt for technical perfection, since much is thereby lost and perfection cannot be achieved anyway.

The relevance you see is something I cannot address - your blinders are your own. Tommy said it best - "Put on your eye shades, put in your ear plugs, you know where to put the cork."

There was a man who spent his life planning how his life should be. By the time he finished the plan, he was an old man, and could not implement it before he died of extreme old age. Live your life - the plans don't matter much anyway.

Take your photos, and to the devil with the details. Spend as much time as necessary to make them as precise as you wish them to be.

In general l I personally avoid to adopt such asian terms speaking about a completely different universe of emotions and esthetic understanding, so different that all effort on translation is always a bit incomplete at the end.

Asian terms, european terms - it is all human terms.

I hate operating with blurry terms and anyway I believe that as an European I cannot really understand such terms without a certain kind of assimilation to the culture, maybe living there for many years could get me into it.

The world is a blurry place. Parts don't fit, screws fall out. Entropy everywhere tending towards maximum. That's why there is beer.

Best Regards,

Bill Mattocks

 

[Bertram2]

Asian terms, european terms - it is all human terms.

It's true. But this truth does not help to understand foreign cultures.

The world is a blurry place.

How very true ! No reason tho to use blurry terms in a conversation, at least as long as it shall be and stay an honest interchange of thoughts.
Blurry terms necessarily lead to projections and personal definitions. People must misunderstand each other necessarily then and at the end this leads to an interchange of monologues. Best case. 😀
Adding beer makes it dangerous btw ! 😉

Regards,
bertram

 

[Pherdinand]

The world is a blurry place. Parts don't fit, screws fall out. Entropy everywhere tending towards maximum. That's why there is beer.

Bill, can I borrow this from you?

 

[Pherdinand]

I kinda agree that the cultural difference between us (me, at least) and far eastern is so great that it is very difficult to 'get the point', often. I have a weakness towards modern far eastern cinematography; and have seen many great creations of Takeshi Kitano, Kim-Ki Duk and others, but i must confess there was NONE between them which i completely understood. I guess/hope that was also not the intention of the creators of those movies, otherwise i might feel plain stupid🙂
but i guess, my point is, that you don't really HAVE to fully understand something - an expression, a piece of art, a philosophy, a culture -, you just have to get a feeling of it, in order to enjoy it and/or use it.
Of course it is getting close to snobism when you abuse of some expressions only for the sake of looking highly educated and such. One certainly has to watch the thin line.