Pheeling philosophical: Art or Accident

[Sparrow]

How? I frame when I take the picture. Your conclusion is not logical.

“Then to see that special image, that is the iceing on the cake. I rarely feel those images are mine. They are more of a gift. I am grateful for those moments.”

I read this sentence to mean you didn’t feel wholly responsible for the results

 

[colinh]

So that leads us to the conclusion, the answer to the OP, that the full frame un-cropped image is in fact accident whereas the considered cropped image is, by definition, art

How? I frame when I take the picture. Your conclusion is not logical.

I think he meant, when the un-cropped image turns out to be not only well framed and well composed but also "good" as well, then that is an accident.

You said, earlier

Careful composition does not mean the image is good, just framed well. It certainly does not guarantee a great image.

Because I had claimed (provocatively) that if the photographer knows exactly what the shot will look like (composition wise) at the time he took it, surely it must be a good shot. If it weren't he shouldn't waste the film.

Clearly this isn't the case. I think it is a question of time available. Do you decide whether a photo is good within a fraction of a second? Well, maybe yes. But deciding whether a differently framed shot might be better takes longer (for me).

I think there is something in criticising "I never crop. I only take properly framed shots." It gives the impression that one has a magic ability to instantaneously analyse the scene. Maybe some do have that ability. But why then publish only 1 % of your shots? What was wrong with the other 99 % ?

And we're back to the very first post: If only a tiny fraction of your work is great. Wouldn't you call these fortunate accidents? I think an artist (especially a great one) should have a significantly higher hit-rate than a button-pressing monkey. And maybe he does.

colin

 

[colinh]

“Then to see that special image, that is the iceing on the cake. I rarely feel those images are mine. They are more of a gift. I am grateful for those moments.”

I read this sentence to mean you didn’t feel wholly responsible for the results

Yup. I feel the same way as Finder (sort of). When I have a good shot, I also sometimes feel it wasn't mine - because I don't feel I could reliably, by my own ability, just go out and get another.

It is luck, in my case, that the situation occured and that I managed to get it on film. Requiring then that I also happened to be in precisely the right location is pushing luck a little far.

I was just hoping that I have some sort of photographic ability other than recognising something I like from the scans

All these Close up Candid Street shots, are taken in the centre of Munich, in summer. Munich has a lot of pretty girls and we have a lot of tourists here too. Ever more Arabs for some reason, loads of beautiful Italians (the border is around 2 hours away), Russians, Bulgarians, Japanese even Americans. Thousands and thousands of people walking around in the heat.

I predict a sharp drop in output come the winter


colin

 

[Finder]

“Then to see that special image, that is the iceing on the cake. I rarely feel those images are mine. They are more of a gift. I am grateful for those moments.”

I read this sentence to mean you didn’t feel wholly responsible for the results

Have you ever taken a picture of a person who does not like having their picture taken? You can frame, focus, and expose very well, but yet the image is just not captivating. I did nothing wrong. Yet with someone open, there is a much greater chance that it will work.

There are also moments that happen at a particular time and place. I did not make those moments. I was just there with a camera.

Naturally, I can mess up the photography part. Also, that photography is more intuitive than rational. I am always amazed when it comes together. There is no reason why a photograph should be simply a copy of reality without any other value. Somehow I cannot say it is all me when I get a strong image.

 

[Finder]

I think he meant, when the un-cropped image turns out to be not only well framed and well composed but also "good" as well, then that is an accident.

You said, earlier



Because I had claimed (provocatively) that if the photographer knows exactly what the shot will look like (composition wise) at the time he took it, surely it must be a good shot. If it weren't he shouldn't waste the film.

Clearly this isn't the case. I think it is a question of time available. Do you decide whether a photo is good within a fraction of a second? Well, maybe yes. But deciding whether a differently framed shot might be better takes longer (for me).

I think there is something in criticising "I never crop. I only take properly framed shots." It gives the impression that one has a magic ability to instantaneously analyse the scene. Maybe some do have that ability. But why then publish only 1 % of your shots? What was wrong with the other 99 % ?

And we're back to the very first post: If only a tiny fraction of your work is great. Wouldn't you call these fortunate accidents? I think an artist (especially a great one) should have a significantly higher hit-rate than a button-pressing monkey. And maybe he does.

colin

When you are shooting, you are doing that. The value judgement of the image of whether it is "good" is made later.

You could say great basketball players arejust luckier than the rest of us. Is their split second performance just acidents? They do miss the hoop.

I don't call my good work "accidents," I can them "gifts." But the shooting is not random. Like an athlete or dancer, the photographer also trains and develops his/her skill.

But now we are getting into just what I think I do. For any hypothosis to be valid, it must cover more than my opinion.

 

[Bike Tourist]

Art or accident?

Well, someone once said that if an infinite number of monkeys were given typewriters, one of them would write King Lear.

I would add that that's what actually happened.

 

[Sparrow]

Have you ever taken a picture of a person who does not like having their picture taken? You can frame, focus, and expose very well, but yet the image is just not captivating. I did nothing wrong. Yet with someone open, there is a much greater chance that it will work.

There are also moments that happen at a particular time and place. I did not make those moments. I was just there with a camera.

Naturally, I can mess up the photography part. Also, that photography is more intuitive than rational. I am always amazed when it comes together. There is no reason why a photograph should be simply a copy of reality without any other value. Somehow I cannot say it is all me when I get a strong image.

Then we have a consensus of three, as that’s how I feel, I take pride in the technique and in being in the best position to make the shot, but I find the picture in the back of the camera, is that an accident?
As for people who don’t like their photo taken; my daughter is an expert in spoiling the shot, I get extra lucky sometimes

 

[antiquark]

If only a tiny fraction of your work is great. Wouldn't you call these fortunate accidents? I think an artist (especially a great one) should have a significantly higher hit-rate than a button-pressing monkey. And maybe he does.

colin

That's like saying a painter should have no need for a sketchpad.

Anyways, look up Garry Winogrand. He was one of those guys who took dozens of pictures of a single scene.

This just shows that editing is a crucial part of photography.

 

[Finder]

Just for fun I went through a catalog of a body of work Cartier Bresson that was sold to a collection in Japan. 15 of the images do not show a full-frame border. One of those I know not to be full frame - Gare St.-Lazare, Paris 1932. Whether all of them are not, I have no idea. But it is stll not a bad number considering it is out of 411 photographs.

 

[Finder]

One of those I know not to be full frame - Gare St.-Lazare, Paris 1932.

BTW, that is the one Magnum Photos starting placing a fake full-frame border around after Henri's death.

 

[colinh]

BTW, that is the one Magnum Photos starting placing a fake full-frame border around after Henri's death.

I'll try that. I wonder if anyone will notice if my pics are not in 2:3 format


colin

 

[Sparrow]

I'll try that. I wonder if anyone will notice if my pics are not in 2:3 format


colin

Now, when we’ve sorted out the art/accident thing, you have to go and bring up integrity

 

[peter_n]

The problem with HCB is is that he shot loads and that we are seeing minuscule amounts of it. HCB also didn't do much of his own printing, so how much of his work was actually cropped and/or staged, if not a total crap shoot? .... What I'd want is to see all of his contacts. Only then we can see for ourselves how great he was, or whether he was little more than a monkey with a typewriter.

There was an HCB exhibit in NYC in April called Scrapbook and in it you could see how really, really good his developer/printer (Pierre Gassmann?) was. Also there were contacts in the scrapbook and some of them were quite mundane, there is a thread here at RFF about the exhibit in which someone comments that it was a relief to se that HCB was "human" after all. Josef Koudelka felt that HCB would never have allowed that exhibit if he had been alive. The catalog of the exhibition is called simply Scrapbook and is published by Thames & Hudson.

 

[RML]

Why is this a problem?? This is true for most photographers.

True. However, HCB's fame to a great extent exist of the idea that he only needed a single shot to create a "masterpiece". And that simply isn't true.

Except for a few examples falsified by Magnium Photos AFTER his death, his uncropped work is easy to spot - they are printed with a full-frame border.

What does that make of all those prints without the full frame border?

Certainly you passionately dislike Cartier Bresson. Did you know him personally? Most artist's statements are inadequate. Why not just enjoy his work for what it is rather than what Cartier Bresson says it is.

I didn't know him personally. I did see his work up close and personal in an exhibition with photos selected by HCB personally as his best work. Most of it was boring at best. There's so much more better work out there by people before and after him (Lartigue for one, Winogrand for two, and so on). IMO HCB is heavily overrated and I think there are others who deserve much more attention and recognition than HCB.

Also, HCB didn't do just "artist statements". He wrote and talked extensively of his views. These thoughts and views are now by many considered similar to the revelations of a prophet. For me they're a load of hogwash, mostly because they don't make any sense, still don't come close to explaining anything, and (because of their influence) are limiting our views of what is acceptable or not (like cropping).

 

[RML]

There was an HCB exhibit in NYC in April called Scrapbook and in it you could see how really, really good his developer/printer (Pierre Gassmann?) was. Also there were contacts in the scrapbook and some of them were quite mundane, there is a thread here at RFF about the exhibit in which someone comments that it was a relief to se that HCB was "human" after all. Josef Koudelka felt that HCB would never have allowed that exhibit if he had been alive. The catalog of the exhibition is called simply Scrapbook and is published by Thames & Hudson.

I'm waiting for that exhibition to come to Holland one day.

 

[peter_n]

To be honest Remy, you don't have to wait for the exhibit. The exhibition in New York was quite poorly presented and all you really need is the book. Although I like HCB I have to say that the Scrapbook exhibit was completely upstaged by a Martin Munkacsi exhibit in the same building. The Munkacsi pictures were stunning.

 

[andrealed]

Just for keeping the thread alive:
I love cropping, and I love shooting with 120 film, because I know it will allow me to get far more keeper from 12 shot than from a 35mm roll (with a good quality). And, sometimes, to get 2/3 different pictures from the same shot.
I really feel to be more "artsy" when I try different crops than when I shoot.
Shooting is the ordinary, mundane part of the job (I just have to be sure to get focus, time DOF and aperture right..and to find good subject, not easy..I admit...). The artsy part of the job, the most amusing, comes later, when I see the scans and when I switch my enlarger and my radio on.
Everyone is different.
ciao