Interview with Mary Ellen Mark

Sam Kanga said:
...I agree with her statement:
"I don’t think people know what good photography is anymore, not just the public but those working on magazines also."...
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I don't agree at all. Here is the full quote on this:

It isn’t nostalgia colouring her view when she speaks of the constant bombardment of imagery from cyberspace. Mark says the current level of activity in photography has “lowered the bar. I don’t think people know what good photography is anymore, not just the public but those working on magazines also. There is no discrimination, everything is uploaded, downloaded, and we are inundated with images. People are not dazzled anymore by how difficult it is to take great pictures”...Continuing she says, “We used to look at magazines and see the pictures of great photographers who took incredible images that stuck in our minds forever. Now we are seeing average nothingness. I mean it is true that anyone can take a picture, and some make good pictures, but it is very hard to make great pictures, very hard and I don’t think people know the difference anymore. I think people are becoming numb”.

Publishers, magazine editors and art directors that I've met certainly have not lowered the bar and do know what good photography is. The argument that Mark is making is simply the rant one often hears about flickr by people who forget the billions of 4x6 prints from color negative film made of friends and family and vacation travel — the difference is that now a large portion of these can be seen publicly on the web. But who's looking? Actually, what I see of Instagram and iPhone picture strikes me that the average of these types of photography — look at some of the stuff done by teenagers — is better than that of the 4x6 print days.

No, it's still just as hard to make great pictures and people still know the difference.

MITCH ALLAND/Potomac, MD
Nightshots from Tristes Tropiques
Download link for PDF file of 16-shot portfolio
 
Nice interview, thanks for the link.

I went to see the Mary Ellen Mark exhibition at Stills last Saturday, the last day it was open. It was great to see her prints, at leisure and up close. I've always liked her work, ever since first seeing it in the 1970s.

Recently I bought her book Seen Behind the Scene/Forty years of photographing on set, which I can recommend (published by Phaidon). I don't have any of her other books, although like most people I've seen hew work in photo books and online. But nothing beats seeing large prints on a wall.

Cheers,
 
Mary has done some great work, but I also agree with what Mitch has just written.

I suspect Mary's is just another in a long series of discussions by former photography greats who see their rates shrinking as the industry is further democratized by access to cheap imagery.

I think the real problem now is for someone who actually does shoot good pictures, great pictures, to rise above the noise and be seen.
 
I certainly didn't mean any disrespect to Mary, John, but I feel like her heyday...when she was working in a more pedestrian method...was earlier, maybe the '70s. It's only my own perception though...I know she's consistently worked.
 
Mark has generally been a very good photographer. And I suppose there is a degree a showmanship to become so well known. I heard her lecture once at the Maine Photographic Workshops around 1991 or so. One thing set me off: she was talking about the work she was doing on the banks of the Ganges — around Benares I believe — and she kept on telling the audience how the dirt-poor men working there, whom she was photographing, were "her friends." I must confess that this set me off for the simple reason that it could not be true — not only because of the fact that these men did not speak any English, but also because of the social and cultural chasm. She could have said that she felt a rapport with them and that they accepted her presence, or many other things, but to repeatedly refer to them as her friends was, to say the least, bad judgment. The pictures she showed of them were good, however.

MITCH ALLAND/Potomac, MD
Nightshots from Tristes Tropiques
Download link for PDF file of 16-shot portfolio
 
David_Manning said:
I certainly didn't mean any disrespect to Mary, John, but I feel like her heyday...when she was working in a more pedestrian method...was earlier, maybe the '70s. It's only my own perception though...I know she's consistently worked.
Click to expand...

I think its fair to say her heyday may be in the past, but I think she's still got wisdom to offer. She most likely knows more about Photography than most of us here...
 
She could have said that she felt a rapport with them and that they accepted her presence, or many other things, but to repeatedly refer to them as her friends was, to say the least, bad judgment.
Click to expand...

That is, unfortunately, the way people are. I personally like some of her work and dislike the rest. She's not what I would call consistent, in the way photojournalists such as Bert Hardy or Don McCullin were.
 
They are certain "famous" photographers who are notoriously horrible to the people who work for them. Treating your subjects with respect is commendable. Treating those around you with anything less is not.

This is from an interview with Mark circa 2010 -

You do a lot of documentary work or photojournalistic work. ...

Well there's no such thing as photojournalism anymore. That's over, except in newspapers. I respect newspapers but the reality is that magazine "photojournalism" is finished. They want illustrations, Photoshopped pictures of movie stars.

Why do you think photojournalism is a dead practice?

Economics. You still see documentary work, but it's about war. War stories. I have great respect for war photographers. They're incredibly brave. I would never have the guts to do that, and I'm too old and can't run fast. It's for young people who can think and act quickly. So, you still have stories about war but what you don't see is more socially based documents, like the "Ward 81" project (Mark's book on the women inside the Oregon mental ward).

It's not just about Flickr.....
 
David_Manning said:
Mary has done some great work, but I also agree with what Mitch has just written.

I suspect Mary's is just another in a long series of discussions by former photography greats who see their rates shrinking as the industry is further democratized by access to cheap imagery.

I think the real problem now is for someone who actually does shoot good pictures, great pictures, to rise above the noise and be seen.
Click to expand...

Mmmm...not exactly, I know this is what amateur camera owners like to think but it is not entirely the case. Good shooters who are both super talented in terms of eye and market well are still pulling in a great income, mine has been steadily increasing for 3 years now.

I know Mary and I know what she is talking about and that is the self indulgent noise of garbage photos like HDR photoshop fantasy, the near constant flow of selfies changing what has happened to the notion of what makes a good photograph.

Take for example the average photo enthusiast forum, there is a big problem in the lack of actual critique of one's work. Instead, it is one big circle of back patting or mutual praise, no one gives actual critique. On Facebook someone will post a very average snapshot and a bucket of gooey praise will flow from it's boughs. Now, under ordinary "4x6 in a shoebox" kinds of family circles, this is rather normal and ok. But now we have this grotesque perception of what actually does make a genuinely good photograph being skewed by living in a bubble enthusiast websites and even media giants like Apple, Google and Yahoo making people think they are doing amazing work when they are not. Because in the case of the latter, they want you to think that so you will upload more freetography in order for their enormous deals of brokered content to look more appealing to other players who move it around.

At least this forum has a rather cultured and photo-educated user base, for the most part, so people do get out and see and take in work that is truly great whether it was created 50 years ago or 5 minutes ago. Most photo enthusiast forums do not however, and it's users bask in the never ending praise and the comfort that brings them...these folks will never get a critique and will always believe that they are the next great thing as they launch gaudy websites and give mediocre images away for free thinking that is how one "Breaks in" while they lament their day jobs.

Mary is spot on but I get that photo enthusiasts just don't want to hear that...It's easier to just live a lie and think the photo world is your oyster...
 
Tell me it ain't so! Tell me that Mr. KM-25 has just written a spoof on the superciliousness of pros posting on photo forums. I'd be hard pressed to write anything nearly as good as this if I were writing sarcasm to make fun of pro views — actually I should write "Pro" with a capital P, which is usually par for the course.

The whole idea that a professional photographer has a more valid opinion on the matter under discussion by virtue of being a pro is simply nonsensical. The idea that some people on photo forums admire schlock work with HDR and photoshpping is not relevant to the argument being made. I'll leave it at that cuz life is just too short...

MITCH ALLAND/Potomac, MD
Nightshots from Tristes Tropiques
Download link for PDF file of 16-shot portfolio
 
Oh wee-wowee Mitch, I never been worked over like that before, I think I need a cigarette, LoL!!


......carry on folks, nothing to see here....
 
Dan (KM-25),

It's good to hear that you've made the cut and that you are "super talented in terms of eye and market." (your self-description)

But my comment was mostly about the generalized market for editorial photography. One only need to pick up a copy of PDN to see what the industry is going through, in terms of a flood of cheap imagery and availability. Nobody seems to be immune, unless you've carved out a very specialized niche or rely upon your name or reputation. Hell, even Magnum is having problems...they've sold a great part of their archives for working capital...and that collective is full of photographers "super talented in terms of eye and market."

Mary Ellen Mark makes a specific point out of the fact that "nobody is dazzled anymore with how hard it is to take great pictures." She also says that people working for magazines don't know what a good picture is anymore. Sounds like a problem for working photographers, not the photography market itself.

The industry was different in the Life magazine days of the '60s and '70s...there is still good photography out there, but the trouble is when every outlet is bombarded by one hundred times the amount of both photography and photographers, someone worthy of being seen will be left out.

It appears to be a hard life for both emerging photographers and working pros out there right now in most markets, and I suspect it affects everyone.

But then, as an "amateur camera owner," I could certainly be wrong. I'm glad I have a backup...I'd hate to make my living shooting photo ops and events.
 
She has made some great pictures (mainly Tiny, because of Tiny), but there was one in her book that set me against her. Some poor starving sick person laying in a cot with a horrified look on their face, lit by on camera flash from about 5 feet. She obviously burst in and blasted them, and then thought it good enough to show around. I don't pay attention to what she has to say.
 
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