I like the spirit of the article, but really cannot agree with many of the things Tuck says.
[FONT=Times, Times New Roman, serif]We're constantly testing our cameras instead of testing ourselves.[/FONT]
Isn't this idea part of the "mirror image" phenomenon that he is criticizing? In the age of cybernetics and bionano-information technology, the difference between "testing ourselves" and "testing our equipment" just doesn't exist in the old conventional way that Tuck thinks it does.
And while I reserve great admiration for some photographers who create images, photographers of the "found image" should not be denigrated so much as recontextualized. The meaning of viewership and community has changed so much, I don't see why those things should not be valorized.
There is a massive democratization of the arts, in every sphere, and of course it is highly problematic, but does anybody really think that a reassertion of old hierarchies or nostalgia for the past will help us move forward? A certain not small percentage of these people have absolutely no hope or desire or even interest in gaining "recognition" for their "work". In fact, you could argue that they refuse the category of "work" itself, and that their photographs, which look like "embellished documentary", partake in a redefinition of social relations the key to which is the realization that
nobody is ever just an observer.
"Finding images" could also be an art, one that takes enormous skill and preparation. Perhaps the practitioners of this art are themselves a kind of equipment.
But yeah, there are ALSO real artists of the craft. I just don't see why the two types cannot coexist and be equally valorized.
