"What you've got are not photographers....

[hxpham]

Great subject.

In my OPINION, Adams exemplifies a misguided approach to photography as a medium- emphasis ontechnical merit at the expense of the communication of ideas. You can trace his lineage directly to the pap that passes for photography on the internet these days - sterile overworked digital images, HDR, endless discussion of technical aspects of the craft. Its akin to judging a novel by its layout design.

Give me Dorthea Lange's MIGRANT MOTHER or any one of Walker Evan's Cuban stevedore portraits to Adam's entire oevre.

Of course, I respect conflicting opinions, as they are just that, opinions and not facts. There are no facts in aesthetic judgments.

Photography is just creating photographs... who says it has to be social commentary? What's wrong with creating pretty photographs?
And comparing AA to poorly tonemapped HDR?? I could understand comparing AA to clean, well-done HDR images that you cannot tell are HDR, but to "sterile overworked digital images"?

 

[semilog]

For some of us "photography" is done while shooting, and that's what's hard to do. AA found his way of making people consider his images interesting, was creating lots of internal contrast on his images while printing. His captures were not enough.

Juan:

1. You are misrepresenting what Adams actually did in his photography. I increasingly suspect that it's because you don't actually know very much about Adams's photographs – you don't know much about how he viewed the process of exposure, development, or – for that matter – printing. Because your descriptions of his work are both oversimplified and inaccurate, your criticisms of that work are shallow and misplaced. I genuinely don't think you have a clue as to what went on in Adam's photos up to the moment of exposure. Hint: his series of books on photography technique does not begin with The Print.

2. You are also making an argument about the validity of pre- versus post-capture manipulation (transformation) of images.

a. Every lens alters a scene through distortion, selective focus, and a variety of lens aberrations. Consequently, the image hitting the film is already, always, profoundly compromised.

b. Every film-developer combination compresses and distorts the tonal and color range in the original scene. Most films and sensors also clip the dynamic range of the scene. Some films and developers add additional artifacts, such as edge effects. Even in B&W, not every film is equally sensitive to different colors of light.

c. In digital, every RAW developer adds additional artifacts, and further distorts, curves, and compresses the tonal range and color gamut. Nether prints nor monitors can display anything like the dynamic range of a real scene. If you've looked at a typical HCB print, a scene dynamic range of 1:100,000 is being compressed into a print dynamic range of 1:50, sometimes worse, very rarely better.

d. The situation is the same in analog printing. Every paper has a tonal response to exposure. Even the straightest of straight prints depends for its dynamics on the properties of the paper (shoulder, toe, etc.), the contrast grade, the development time etc.

EVERY photograph ever made involves a complex series of transformations, both before AND AFTER capture. A series of decisions.

So: what is acceptable, and what is not? Where are the lines drawn?

And, more importantly, if you think that drawing these lines is important, why do you draw them where you do?

Very, very, very few great photographers have taken the HCB line of extremely minimal darkroom manipulation. So, Juan: which photographers do YOU admire, and do they actually meet your claimed standards?

 

[Enoyarnam]

In their wonderful monograph of 15 FSA photographers, Gilles Mora and Beverley W Brannan, make the following observation of Marion Post Wolcott. Her, 'style was to be a sociologist with a camera' (paraphrasing A. Adams). Moreover, no negativity is attached to Adams use of this statement. For they go on to say 'something about Marion Post Wolcott drew people to her and they remembered experiences with her as high points of their lives'.

Praise indeed. I am really fascinated at how Wolcott became so 'adept at teasing out the nuances of social interaction in her photographic choices', The case study given is of a tobacco auction,' as seen in her depiction of Titus Oakley's entire family - helping prepare tobacco for market ...and the social and service industries that swirl around the auction, giving it the semblance of a medieval fair'.

Maybe, this is food for thought. We are currently in the midst of a world wide recession. The agenda and the example that Wolcott set in the ''middle period of the FSA, from 1937-1942' sounds incredibly relevant to events of today. Who amongst us would not want to be remembered in such glowing terms?

 

[semilog]

Photography is just creating photographs... who says it has to be social commentary? What's wrong with creating pretty photographs?
And comparing AA to poorly tonemapped HDR?? I could understand comparing AA to clean, well-done HDR images that you cannot tell are HDR, but to "sterile overworked digital images"?

It's just like saying that the only real literature is by Chaucer because he understood the grit of the street, and dismissing Proust, Austen, Garcia-Marquez, Melville, Dostoyevsky et al. because they look at different parts of the world, through different eyes, than Chaucer did.

It's a – literally – blinkered approach to the art of photography.

 

[semilog]

Terrific post, Enoyarnam.

 

[semilog]

Ironically, you are condemning exactly theposition AA took when he called FSA photographers sociologists with cameras. which just goes to show that intellectual consistency can be ellusive in discussing aesthetics.

You're assuming that AA's comment was intended to be pejorative rather than merely descriptive. I've seen no evidence whatsoever in this thread that his comment was so intended. None.

 

[semilog]

Just to stir the pot a bit more, here's another view:

He traveled all over the goddamned world, and you never felt that he was moved by something that was happening other than the beauty of it, or just the composition.

– Robert Frank on Henri Cartier-Bresson

Agreed or no, the whole article is very much worth reading.

 

[x-ray]

Those words are just yours: I never said that.

I'll repeat: Adams created images after photographing. HCB didn't. Both in general and for most of their works, of course...

And I'll repeat for the third time: any forum member can consider any of both options more valid than the other one, or not... I don't care. I just see they're totally different.

Cheers,

Juan

I went to a show recently at the High in Atlanta containing well over 100 HCB images. If you think his images were un manipulated your sadly mistaken. There were prints that he printed and also prints from his hired printer. HCB must have produced some of the worst negatives in photographic history. His negs were often drastically under or over exposed and either terribly flat or terribly contrasty. I got the impression if he had a normal neg it was by accident. In viewing the show it was obvious they were highly manipulated just to get an acceptable print.

Adams didn't try and hide the fact that he manipulated his images. Adams was simply a master technician and figured out how to put his vision on paper through a more predictable workflow.

I would also suspect Moonrise is much more widely known and who took it vs Dorothia Langs Migrant Mother image.

 

[Sparrow]

You're assuming that AA's comment was intended to be pejorative rather than merely descriptive. I've seen no evidence whatsoever in this thread that his comment was so intended. None.

I believe the antonym of perforative is complimentary rather than descriptive, and I cannot recall Adams ever paying anyone a compliment ... well except himself that is.

What always surprises me is that anyone still sees Adams as relevant today, given the historic perspective it seems clear it was the newcomers, the photojournalists, who were the way forwards for photography. Adams was simply at the pinnacle of an irrelevant genre.

 

[robklurfield]

I think someone studying photography (and who among us on RFF -- even you career pros with many years of paying work under your belts -- isn't always and still learning our art & craft?) can take away lessons from either/both schools. It doesn't have to be an either/or experience/choice (LFP.com notwithstanding...). Not just on the technique side of things, but also on the aesthetic channel.

Not only can I be captivated by BOTH Moonrise and by something from Walker Evans ... Dorthea Lange ... Ben Shahn ... etc., but I can glean something that informs my own work, too. (Of course, AA would be horrified to see how I work. I'm a terrible slob and it shows in all the dust on my negs and my lousy technique; but I wouldn't be me if did it any other way.) Anyway, given a choice, I split the difference and have nice cabin overlooking Hernandez where I could watch the moon come up myself AND I'd hang a nice Walker Evans print on one of the walls (with some Winograd, Weegee, Duane Michaels, Erwitt, etc. on the other walls ... a Frank Petronio thrown in just 'cuz I like Frank's work). Best of both worlds for me.

 

[semilog]

I believe the antonym of perforative is complimentary rather than descriptive, and I cannot recall Adams ever paying anyone a compliment ... well except himself that is.

My point was that Adams's comment may have been neutral rather than pejorative or complimentary.

What always surprises me is that anyone still sees Adams as relevant today, given the historic perspective it seems clear it was the newcomers, the photojournalists, who were the way forwards for photography. Adams was simply at the pinnacle of an irrelevant genre.

Yes, it's important to understand that there can be only one valid genre of photography, just as there can be only one valid genre of literature. This is because there is only a single variety of human experience. Right?

 

[robklurfield]

Well put.

A photograph, any photograph, is merely a representation -- highly filtered by the technology and the user/artist and then refiltered (read: interpreted) by the viewer. Therefore, it's all artifice and, well, almost a lie. We accept it and we often love it. But there's no photographer that has ever been or ever will be quite "true."

Obviously some folks attempt a lot more or less alteration/filtration than others. But, think for a moment: when you view the world normally, that is without thinking about making a photograph, does your brain register in B&W or color? So, just the thought of registering on image on gray scale rather than in color is automatically a rather dramatic alteration, isn't it? But, we've taught ourselves to accept it. Now, some folks like me are rather lazy with our processing and simply reproduce what we recorded more less the way we recorded it (I don't spend much time diddling around with the various controls at my disposal with film or digital AFTER I have snapped the shutter; most of all my diddling is on the camera), but even our images are flat out lies (representations of the light falling or not falling on objects out there in the world).

Anyway, some folks like a well-ordered world and try to explain rules for things (an image should look thus and such to be acceptable) while others of act as if there were no rules at all (there are some "laws" of physics that none of can escape). And everyone is a critic, so the world permits a wide spectrum of results and tastes. To quote that famous philosopher, Rodney King, "Can't we just learn to get along?"

On the topic of HCB, I think he abdicated some of the opportunity to manipulate his images after shooting them by allowing most of his printing to be done by others. Of course, it's easy to forget all these years later, that this was his job and he simply did what he was supposed to get paid for doing what he liked to do. If you're in some dusty part of the world far from Magnum or your magazine clients, why would you put much worry into what came after you pulled the film from the camera, when there was always a next image possibly unfolding out there in the world.

I think the world would be a poorer place without both the FSA/HCB's and AA's having lived and contributed.

Juan:

1. You are misrepresenting what Adams actually did in his photography. I increasingly suspect that it's because you don't actually know very much about Adams's photographs – you don't know much about how he viewed the process of exposure, development, or – for that matter – printing. Because your descriptions of his work are both oversimplified and inaccurate, your criticisms of that work are shallow and misplaced. I genuinely don't think you have a clue as to what went on in Adam's photos up to the moment of exposure. Hint: his series of books on photography technique does not begin with The Print.

2. You are also making an argument about the validity of pre- versus post-capture manipulation (transformation) of images.

a. Every lens alters a scene through distortion, selective focus, and a variety of lens aberrations. Consequently, the image hitting the film is already, always, profoundly compromised.

b. Every film-developer combination compresses and distorts the tonal and color range in the original scene. Most films and sensors also clip the dynamic range of the scene. Some films and developers add additional artifacts, such as edge effects. Even in B&W, not every film is equally sensitive to different colors of light.

c. In digital, every RAW developer adds additional artifacts, and further distorts, curves, and compresses the tonal range and color gamut. Nether prints nor monitors can display anything like the dynamic range of a real scene. If you've looked at a typical HCB print, a scene dynamic range of 1:100,000 is being compressed into a print dynamic range of 1:50, sometimes worse, very rarely better.

d. The situation is the same in analog printing. Every paper has a tonal response to exposure. Even the straightest of straight prints depends for its dynamics on the properties of the paper (shoulder, toe, etc.), the contrast grade, the development time etc.

EVERY photograph ever made involves a complex series of transformations, both before AND AFTER capture. A series of decisions.

So: what is acceptable, and what is not? Where are the lines drawn?

And, more importantly, if you think that drawing these lines is important, why do you draw them where you do?

Very, very, very few great photographers have taken the HCB line of extremely minimal darkroom manipulation. So, Juan: which photographers do YOU admire, and do they actually meet your claimed standards?

 

[dave lackey]

Well done, Rob.

 

[Sparrow]

My point was that Adams's comment may have been neutral rather than pejorative or complimentary.



Yes, it's important to understand that there can be only one valid genre of photography, just as there can be only one valid genre of literature. This is because there is only a single variety of human experience. Right?

No, there are many valid genre in photography ... even Adams' was in the 19th century, but in the 1930's it's difficult to argue Arizona landscapes have the same importance as looming war in Europe. Right?

 

[semilog]

No, there are many valid genre in photography ... even Adams' was in the 19th century, but in the 1930's it's difficult to argue Arizona landscapes have the same importance as looming war in Europe. Right?

Which is why Cartier-Bresson's most important* work in the 1930s was... what? Right. A series of travelogues, travel photos in Mexico and pictures of fat french tourists at picnics.

Nice try.

*I really mean that. His work that was photographically most important is exactly those pictures. This does not diminish HCB's accomplishments, or those of Kertesz or Strand or any of his other contemporaries. But it does demolish the argument that (I think) you're trying to make.

 

[Sparrow]

Which is why' most important* work in the 1930s was... what? Right. A series of travelogues, travel photos in Mexico and pictures of fat french tourists at picnics.

Nice try.

*I really mean that. His work that was photographically most important is exactly those pictures. This does not diminish HCB's accomplishments, or those of Kertesz or Strand or any of his other contemporaries. But it does demolish the argument that (I think) you're trying to make.

I said nothing of Cartier-Bresson; you are simply attacking a straw man with that one.

Perhaps in the 1930's US, Adams really was the best you had, in Europe the new breed of photojournalists with their miniature cameras and roll-film were laying the foundations of most of modern photography, no amount of logical gymnastic or informal fallacies will alter that fact.

 

[goo0h]

Has anyone else seen Ansel Adams' documentary work he did of people in the Japanese-American interment camps during WWII? Very different from his landscapes. Available at the Library of Congress website. They appear to be not copyrighted and public domain, similar to the FSA photographs.

What I find interesting is to view his photographs of this project, then immediately view the photographs Dorothea Lange did of the exact same place, at about the same time. It's interesting to see the different perspectives of these photographers, and how it impacted the images they recorded.

(As I recall, the Defense Department liked the pictures Ansel took, but shortly after this project they dropped Lange, I believe because she didn't quite portray the image they wanted.)

 

[semilog]

Perhaps in the 1930's US, Adams really was the best you had. Tn Europe the new breed of photojournalists with their miniature cameras and roll-film were laying the foundations of most of modern photography, no amount of logical gymnastic or informal fallacies will alter that fact.

That's not writing. It's typing. You would also dismiss Kertesz, Strand, Alvarez Bravo, and many others with your over-simplified pablum. The history of photography has many threads and you appear to be aware of only one of them.

 

[ferider]

This just occurred to me:

There seems to be a fair amount of members/street photographers (Juan?) for whom depicting the emotion of the human subject seems to be most important.

How can this ever succeed ? We never know what somebody else feels.

Instead, for me, a successful photograph, street, portrait, landscape or otherwise, communicates the emotion, vision, etc., of the photographer. I interpret and "like" photographs based on this assumption. On top of my list of favorites are Adams and Franck, BTW.

As a side note: Moonrise over half dome was actually taken with two lenses 🙂 My favorite Adams is “Tetons and the Snake River”. Almost impossible to not see the photographers emotion, dedication, vision, and effort in preparation it took for the successful making of this print. In my opinion.

Roland.

 

[Juan Valdenebro]

I went to a show recently at the High in Atlanta containing well over 100 HCB images. If you think his images were un manipulated your sadly mistaken.

Hi x-ray,

I don't think HCB's images are unmanipulated always. I'll repeat: what viewers consider nice -and his particular style (although it isn't style from an aesthetic point of view)- on Adams' photographs is, first, how sharp and full of internal contrast from dodging and burning they are.

When HCB and most photographers use darkroom, they don't use it to make an image that's far from reality or from what their eyes saw, but to be able to show what was real.

The difference is enormous both from conceptual and visual points of view... One of them is closer to painting, and the other one closer to photography, as some critics and other forum members have said too...

Cheers,

Juan