mgd711
Medium Format Baby!!
I just saw my note copied for reply / remarks and -- horror -- I wrote (typed!) "affect" instead of "effect."
Anyway this notion I put forward -- that the morality of art lies entirely in the qualities of 'the thing made' and not with the motives or moral standing or behavior of the artist -- comes from St. Thomas Aquinas. He defined art thus: "Ars recta ratio factibilium est." Art is the undeviating determination of work to be done.
In the US, where art is largely used decoratively or as a mild social stimulant, it is almost universally believed that art is good for people, that its aim is to make us better and our society better. Nothing could be further from the truth. It's often quite hostile and disturbing and destructive at heart, and often the most committed artists are monsters personally. All we know in the end is that we need it. The photograph has given us a way to stop time, and the best photographers have taught us, through this miraculous framed event, how really to see. This might not be helpful to us; it might frighten us and give us bad dreams. But we need it. And we seek it out. So the question isn't how we feel about taking pictures of the poor -- the writer Flannery O'Connor when asked why she always wrote about the poor replied simply, "As far as I am concerned, we are all The Poor" -- the question is how we feel looking at the pictures. Manipulated? Then it's a bad picture. Stricken? Or elated? Or confused? Then, possibly, it's a good one.
Fantastic! very well quoted and exactly to the point 🙂