If I'd taken that picture...

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Day

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Is a picture more worth if it comes from a famous photographer?
Let me explain what I mean:
http://www.magnumphotos.com/C.aspx?VP3=CMS3&VF=MAGO31_10_VForm&ERID=24KL53ZMYN

If I'd taken this picture yesterday, would you rate it as a masterpiece?
For sure you know that picture a long time now and every picture like this is
just a copy, but would you rate it as the same if I'd taken it?

I want you to read this one too:
In the early schooldays, I was a pretty bad painter. There was a little girl
which was teachers darling. Some day I tested him out: I gave my pretty bad painting to the girl and she showed it to the teacher. He said it was a nice painting. The next week I went to the teacher with the same painting. It was a bad painting.

Or is it the famous photographer himself? If I'd show this Henri picture to
someone who doesn't now it - would he consider it a masterpiece? Or would he consider it a masterpiece after he checked his whole biography?

If I watch Bruce Gilden's pictures, I can't see anything that interests me.
Just shocked people photographed by a.... ah its personal preference.

Or...is every picture just personal preference? Is there someone who don't like Henri's pictures? Is it all about the work or the person?
 
That is an excellent question of philosophy and anthropology.

If you had taken the HCB photo, I would indeed consider it a great photograph. There are a few members of RFF who regularly post photos that I would rank among those of 'famous' photographers. Whether they will ever achieve that level of recognition means nothing as to the quality of their work.

But that said, I am someone who can recognize good photographs. Someone who has no sensitivity goes by public opinion. I suspect your school teacher falls into that category, and responded to student art on the basis of personality.

Or, perhaps the teacher thought your little friend was just having a bad day and didn't want to hurt her feelings. ;-)

Randy
 
Day said:
. . . Is it all about the work or the person?
Click to expand...
Both, obviously. But there's also the question of a "body of work": see http://www.rogerandfrances.com/bodyofwork.html for further explication of the term, if you like . A "great photographer" doesn't rely on a few lucky snapshots. He or she makes his/her name from a coherent "body of work"; plus, possibly but not necessarily, a degree of self promotion.

Cheers,

R.
 
Thanks Randy, I think right.

A great photographer doesn't rely on a few lucky shots, you're right Roger. That explains
why they don't won't to show their contact sheets. So every "big" picture looks like a lucky shot.

Perhaps its about the "first" thing. Henri, Capa and a few others were the first real
photojournalists. They took so much photos, that everyone thinks every picture was already made in the past.
 
The basic difference between the original and a copy, talking of art, is split in two:
- if you make something NEW, then it has intrinsic "discovery" value, this is why normally copycat artists are not considered as good as the precursors
- if John Brown takes picture and Elliot Erwitt takes a picture, the picture by Elliot Erwitt will be worth more, because of the value attribution mechanism present among humans.
There is no need to go back to HCB, you could make a painting in the style of Leonardo da Vinci or Van Gogh, and yet today, it would fetch at most a few dollars.
 
But where does "copycat" become "inspiration"? Clearly, oil painting still goes on today, and so does Leica photography of the "decisive moment". It's seeing things your own way that makes the difference. And treating new things in old ways. I don't think there are any universal rules.

Cheers,

R.
 
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As Roger said, there is the matter of a body of work. And then there are (temporal and cultural) context and intention...

If you had taken it in 1932, as a portrait of a stranger, it would be a masterpiece. But it is not that striking as a current photograph (and would not have been striking either if it had been your failed 1932 attempt at a group shot of your family).

For what it is worth, it is not one of HCB's best, and mostly relevant because it is very early, one of the earliest that fully display his style. As such, it must have been quite remarkable in its time, and still has significant historic value.
 
In my beginning of photography as something more than just pictures taking, I would often think the same. "Oh, I could take same picture with my DSLR..."

It is taken at 1932. Obviously you can't get picture like this. You could dress the model, you could get it with same camera and lens, but it is going to be fake.
I have no idea when they decided to put it on this page, but it is good picture which represents this time and this photographer and person who did the print.

It is true 1932 picture. Trying to judge it in modern times and terms is pointless exercise.
 
If you would have taken that photo, it would still be a stunning work of art (imho). A perfect composition, perhaps posed, but if it was a so called 'decisive moment' shot, it's still better.

A picture can exist by itself.... Of course, and unfortunately, in our times, a name might help a lot to sell it....
 
Keep in mind that the image was made with significantly inferior equipment compared to modern cameras, and that being shot in 1932, when street photography as a method of expression was novel, it carries extra value.

Personally I don't think this photo is quite up to the standards of HCB's other work, not even as good as some of the other photos in the gallery, but it is a valuable piece nonetheless.
 
Great topic for discussion!

This is something I've often contemplated myself while perusing the books of the so-called masters of street photography. I also like that you chose a rather normal photo of HCB's to prove your point and not one of his most famous photographs.

A lot of this is a matter of taste, as you quickly realized when you brought up Bruce Gilden 😉, but there are many photographs by the so-called greats that I honestly don't find all that great. There seems to be a lot of fluff in The Modern Century for my tastes, for example, but I understand the historical significance, of course.

The photo you used as an example I don't find particularly noteworthy myself, as a street photograph or a fine art photograph. As a historical photograph, on the other hand, I do see it as noteworthy. That photo is probably an example of a "fluff" type photo as I alluded to previously. It's a photo that you could never perfectly replicate of course, but you could do the same type of composition with a more modern scene very easily. It's the type of photo I'd deem good enough for my blog, but not my book.

But, of course, it's Henri Cartier-Bresson. Henri Cartier-Bresson.
 
YYV_146 said:
Keep in mind that the image was made with significantly inferior equipment compared to modern cameras, and that being shot in 1932, when street photography as a method of expression was novel, it carries extra value.
Click to expand...
Well, you would really be impressed by pictures taken by George Hendrik Breitner, he used photography as a basis for his paintings. His paintings really are a form of "street photography" - his Bridge over the Singel near Paleisstraat in Amsterdam, painted in 1896 (Rijksmuseum) is street, 35 years before this picture by HCB. The cameras he used made it impossible to do street like HCB, a more compact camera was needed. But he did one thing HCB never did, he used color 😎

The picture by HCB is good, maybe not great. However, a lot of us are unable to see it before it was taken. Seeing is the beginning of photography. I learned composition by looking at paintings and reading 'bout painters. On most photography forums HCB would be told to use the rule of thirds as it is better then a central composition. They told me more then once. But it isn't 'bout the rule of thirds, it isn't 'bout the fact that any of us could make this picture - it is the fact that HCB saw this picture and took it that makes it special. And HCB is special 'cause he was (one of) the first to use this kind of photography.
 
Addy101 said:
Well, you would really be impressed by pictures taken by George Hendrik Breitner, he used photography as a basis for his paintings. His paintings really are a form of "street photography" - his Bridge over the Singel near Paleisstraat in Amsterdam, painted in 1896 (Rijksmuseum) is street, 35 years before this picture by HCB. The cameras he used made it impossible to do street like HCB, a more compact camera was needed. But he did one thing HCB never did, he used color 😎

The picture by HCB is good, maybe not great. However, a lot of us are unable to see it before it was taken. Seeing is the beginning of photography. I learned composition by looking at paintings and reading 'bout painters. On most photography forums HCB would be told to use the rule of thirds as it is better then a central composition. They told me more then once. But it isn't 'bout the rule of thirds, it isn't 'bout the fact that any of us could make this picture - it is the fact that HCB saw this picture and took it that makes it special. And HCB is special 'cause he was (one of) the first to use this kind of photography.
Click to expand...

Impressive, but then again while he is using the street in his artistic expression, it is not in photographic form. That is, Breitner's work, however interesting, is "street painting" and not street photography.

Without Leica and the 135 format the type of street work characteristic of the 30s and 40s would be almost impossible, and of course developments in film and darkroom techniques made shooting in complex light a real option.
 
Roger Hicks said:
But where does "copycat" become "inspiration"? Clearly, oil painting still goes on today, and so does Leica photography of the "decisive moment". It's seeing things your own way that makes the difference. And treating new things in old ways. I don't think there are any universal rules.

Cheers,

R.
Click to expand...

Inspiration is more than the original.

To have the same effect as the picture referenced by the OP, you would have to do more and better now. The original has been done already, but it can provide inspiration to make something new. In other words (of Isaac Newton among others); "If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants". In this case, HCB is a giant close to the bottom of the heap, how far can you see?

So to answer the OPs question: No, you have to do better.

Cheers,
Michael
 
Day said:
Is a picture more worth if it comes from a famous photographer?...If I'd taken this picture yesterday, would you rate it as a masterpiece?...
Click to expand...
Get serious, my friend! This question has been answered some years ago in the two classic blog posts called Great Photographers on the Internet, Part I. and Part II.

—Mitch/Potomac, MD
Night Shots from Tristes Tropiques
[Download link for portfolio of 16 photographs]
 
I remember discussing a modern mid-twentieth century painting with someone. He laughingly stated that he could have painted that and did not understand why it was valued so highly. The answer to that question is simple: If you had painted it before him then you would be the master he would be standing her admiring your work.
Your can not go back in time and make that break through. One of the essences of art is that it is original. It states something that has not been said before.
 
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I once saw this on a shirt for sale at the Seattle Art Museum, and it pretty much sums it up for contemporary art. Jackson Pollock comes to mind.

For 'found' photography (as opposed to 'additive' photography--one that is set up, and thus hinges on the creation of the artist), the body of work is critical. It's incredibly rare to take an iconic, career-defining photograph. And when you do, it falls into that formula: it's completely original in every way. But that's hard to do, and thankfully, not the only rubric art is judged by.
There's two parts to art, to me: aesthetics, and intent or message (and the novelty of it). As we all say a lot on here, a good photo is a good photo, and that'll always be true, for HCB or Adams or whomever. What makes them more meaningful than the still-aesthetically-good photos that follow is the coherence of the editing and deliberate intent to create that body of work.

Plus, like someone said above, there's the luck of the draw of being found (which Meier won), and one's degree of self-promotion.
 
If I'd taken that picture... Well, that's one of my own points in my (shameless plug perhaps) new Blurb Book: http://www.blurb.com/b/5301658-come-see-come-saw

From my intro:

"My hope is that people -- and especially other photographers -- will say, “If I saw that, I’d shoot it too.” It's what I say to myself when I see photos I appreciate."

This is my litmus test of sorts.

I've made 9 books over the past few years at the rate of one every 3 months. And from the 900 photos I believe I have a handful of "contenders."

Of course what does one do then? From what I can figure out, one needs to be collectible to be of value to galleries -- and that requires being "knighted" and admitted to the realm -- or at least allowed a guest seat at King Arthur's Table. Without this, one labors on, and hopes there is purpose. In the end, perhaps the most realistic approach is to shoot for oneself -- if nothing else one will be consistent.

As for Bruce Gilden -- he has in my opinion a more obvious formula than most, but all have some formula, or at least a variety of approaches that work for them.

Okay, back to work.
 
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X

Do you know how much Picasso's early work-- even his discarded drafts-- fetch at auctions? They weren't good, but because they were done by Picasso, they're valuable. Because they're rare, and because they're authenticated.

Same for snapshots by great photographers.

Day said:
Is a picture more worth if it comes from a famous photographer?
Let me explain what I mean:
http://www.magnumphotos.com/C.aspx?VP3=CMS3&VF=MAGO31_10_VForm&ERID=24KL53ZMYN

If I'd taken this picture yesterday, would you rate it as a masterpiece?
For sure you know that picture a long time now and every picture like this is
just a copy, but would you rate it as the same if I'd taken it?

I want you to read this one too:
In the early schooldays, I was a pretty bad painter. There was a little girl
which was teachers darling. Some day I tested him out: I gave my pretty bad painting to the girl and she showed it to the teacher. He said it was a nice painting. The next week I went to the teacher with the same painting. It was a bad painting.

Or is it the famous photographer himself? If I'd show this Henri picture to
someone who doesn't now it - would he consider it a masterpiece? Or would he consider it a masterpiece after he checked his whole biography?

If I watch Bruce Gilden's pictures, I can't see anything that interests me.
Just shocked people photographed by a.... ah its personal preference.

Or...is every picture just personal preference? Is there someone who don't like Henri's pictures? Is it all about the work or the person?
Click to expand...
 
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