Why William Eggleston is...

[jsrockit]

I'm a fan of Eggleston's photography, but this article was nothing new and the interview was silly. I don't think Stephen Shore or Fred Herzog get enough credit for early color as well.

 

[jsrockit]

Newsflash: There were, and probably still are, many detractors to the work of some of those people.

Detractors don't really matter when your work is in galleries, museums, and books and has been for a few decades. Every photographer has detractors.

 

[Dave Jenkins]

Only in a degraded culture could Eggleston's "photography" be regarded as significant. Has no one heard of people such as Ernst Haas or Jay Maisel, whose work actually makes sense?

 

[jsrockit]

Only in a degraded culture could Eggleston's "photography" be regarded as significant.

We should all be so lucky to be as significant as Eggleston.

Has no one heard of people such as Ernst Haas or Jay Maisel, whose work actually makes sense?

They can't all exist together? How does Eggleston's work not make sense?

 

[leicapixie]

http://www.rangefinderforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=132002

http://www.rangefinderforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=132002

How many color photos does anyone remember?
A few, one or none. With Eggleston, one instantly remembers "The Kids Tricycle", "Red Room", Young man at supermarket" many others! That is one feat.
Is Eggleston ONLY about color for color sake?
I thought that till i saw his set of "new" Three Books/Trilogy.
I was thunderstruck. Watch the word "democratic".
It is a poem, an essay, a personal letter and a manifesto about the South. Dixie flag, poverty, of a defeated land rising and falling like an ocean, and oh so personal. Yes! Hidden in the color.
Of course he's reluctant to answer, what with Lynch mobs, the KKK, all the levels of a lower society to his aristocracy..
Go again and really look. No wonder he is bored.

 

[TXForester]

Better than saying noting with lots of words.

So you read Mr. Glover's article. 😀 This is why I often avoid reading about the arts. Over analyzed with lots of flowery language that is supposed to sound deep.

 

[furcafe]

For photography? Yes.

Do people think their work actually has more meaning when they have less to say about it?

 

[dabick42]

Eggleston does a nice line in snappy, sardonic one-worders, his armour-plated ego well used to stiff-arming inane questions from assinine inquisitors.

I'm lukewarm about his art but concede that he deserves better than to be subjected to the purple prose of Michael Glover, whose saccharin eulogising of Eggleston's talent is sick-making in the extreme...

 

[Jamie123]

Detractors don't really matter when your work is in galleries, museums, and books and has been for a few decades. Every photographer has detractors.

My point exactly. Eggleston did not pave the way for other photographers to "be themselves". His show was badly reviewed. So what. Happens all the time.

 

[gns]

"I have never understood the obsession about discussing color as though it is something unusual."

Now, sure. But at the time, in the art world, it was pretty unusual. Obviously, he was preceded by a handful of others, like Levitt. But did they have the influence or impact of Eggleston? Was it he, or just the times that brought on the nearly complete transition to color photography. (There is a current show at the Milwaukee Art Museum that attempts to deal with the emergence of color in art photography).


Of course, to say, "The Greatest" is never wholly serious. But if you don't see his work as even among the greatest, how do you explain his immense influence? The MOMA/Szarkowski machine? His persona?

 

[Jamie123]

Was it he, or just the times that brought on the nearly complete transition to color photography.

It was the times that made him and many others (not only in the US) turn to color and the work of all of those artists influenced each other and the artists that followed.

 

[anjoca76]

I don't care whether he pioneered the use of color film (he of course didn't), I don't care if people think he took images of boring subjects (he often did), and I don't care if he's not the world's greatest photographer (no one is; this is art). But I do, personally, very much like his work and he has had a positive influence on me, and for that I am grateful that many decades ago he decided to pick up a camera and make pictures. As for his interview, this is not shocking. Anyone who has seen or read others with Eggleston knows he is a man of few words.

 

[Exdsc]

Szarkowski hand picked all the photos which went into The Guide and MOMA show. Eggleston himself had no clue about the merit of his work before that. This was discussed in a BBC documantay about him: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gGR6_H-G17c

 

[gns]

Maybe in the "photography world" but not in the art world, artists have been using color since they were painting in caves.

I personally feel that the "the MOMA/Szarkowski machine" perpetuated the myth that color was something new, when in fact young photographers simply began using color because they were more confident in their own vision, and did not need the approval of MOMA.

When I began shooting seriously in the 70s, it would never have occurred to me to shoot black and white because it was artistic.

I don't disagree with any part of that statement.

But, If you had taken up in the sixties,??
New generations never need (or want) the approval of the elders...Then they become them.

 

[Sejanus.Aelianus]

But I do, personally, very much like his work and he has had a positive influence on me,

That is probably the best reason to express liking for anyone.

 

[Jamie123]

The whole bw vs color thing in photography was a simple case of an art vs. commerce dialectic that plays out over and over again in art and lends itself to a new school/old school narrative. Art historians love to describe these developments as a sort of paradigm shift but they're not.

 

[jsrockit]

My point exactly. Eggleston did not pave the way for other photographers to "be themselves". His show was badly reviewed.

Isn't that why he paved the way for others to be themselves? Going against the styles of the time even if it meant bad reviews and harsh criticism...and then continuing to do the work anyway.

 

[gns]

I agree that the controlling/doing it myself was probably a factor for many choosing b&w (then and now). Cost is/was also an issue for many.

Could the 70's transition to color not also be a result of better color materials becoming available at that time?

Garry Winogrand probably would have rather worked with color but the reasons he gave for not doing so were cost and the inherent contrasty nature of the color materials.

 

[Jamie123]

Well, yeah but that really is just in line with the whole new color photography narrative. It being that at the time color photography was the realm of amateurs and advertising and that all commercial labs mostly only processed color films. So you being a 12 year old amateur it was only natural for you to use color. The supposedly revolutionary aspect of the photography of people such as Eggleston, Shore et al. was that they took color out of the from the area of amateur photography into art photography.

 

[jsrockit]

Eggleston himself had no clue about the merit of his work before that.

Why would he go visit Szarkowski if he had no clue about his own work?