While getting my 'back home and catching up dose of blogging' this morning, I came across, a piece by Joerg Colberg about wish lists. While I'm no fan of Holiday/New Years lists, I was quite surprised to see that we agreed on several points.
Of course we disagreed on several as well, but that's for another discussion.
On the off chance Mr Colberg reads this entry, here's my response to "truly self-published photography books", [my free e-books have been available for some time and I hope to produce another this summer]. As for his thoughts on vernacular photography, I guess my approach, doesn't have enough portraits to count as vernacular? Some food for thought, there too though, I mean what exactly is vernacular photography, and exactly what is it in the 21st Century, is there even a difference?
But the point I want to discuss here is his wish for less typologies in 2009. How serendipitous! I have been thinking about this stuff for a while too.
Over the years I've watched with amusement and fascination several 'trends' come and go in the art/photography scene here in Melbourne, I'm sure there are others who can cite more trends as my professional creative photographic practice only began in the late 80's.
In the late 80's in Melbourne, Australia, it was all about sculpture & Photography, it seemed at the time to get a show, your work had to have some sculptural component to it. Then there was the Starn Twins. Everybody seemed to be using all sorts of materials and processes to get their point across. The early 90's saw the backlash against the beginnings of digital, which to a certain extent continues today, so work was 'obviously' analogue, not unlike, Joel Peter Witkin's work.
Lately there's been a challenge by the documentarians, and the artisans, over what is is a document and what is art. The current state of play now seems to me to be large scaled works, emphasis on large, that have an element of documentary and are usually some form of typology.
What has happened to the elements of surprise and surrealism that photography seems so good at?
Frederick Sommer, my favourite artist of the 20th and so far the 21st Centuries, understood this really well. He saw the connections between, art and life so well and vividly, he understood the camera's ability to lie and misrepresent, he understood, how to pose questions gracefully elegantly and deeply.
Perhaps, post-modernism's reach still manages to stifle notions of poetry and mysticism, amongst many other things? Or perhaps a down side to the democratisation of photography by digital is that the time required to examine and contemplate is discouraged, by the process itself, and hence less thought about the 'potential' meaning of a photograph?
Comments (6)
postmodernism is a contested term.
If I recall---and you would be much better placed to judge--- the postmodernism of the art schools/institution in the 1980s was informed by Jean Baudrillard's Simulations (1983), with its idea that the market forces of capitalism have so saturated our society that we now live in a world of simulacra. There is no distinction between an original and its copy or representation.
Hence the whole idea of the critical project of "appropriation" that made Sherrie Levine, Barbara Kruger etc famous; critical in that it aimed to undermine the old modernist myth of artistic originality.
Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson | January 1, 2009 12:22 PM
Posted on January 1, 2009 12:22
My understanding of Post-Modernism, was that idea ergo logic was paramount, all else was secondary. Poetry and Mysticism, often have no logic, but still resonate with most human beings.
My current idea of what art is one that where the object AND the idea equally are important a successful melding of the two makes for art that operates at any level.
As for the self-published work, I have no real idea, but the books I've published so far are all made by myself, using tools I've learnt to use, myself, and offered as a gift to the world.
Posted by s2art | December 31, 2008 5:15 PM
Posted on December 31, 2008 17:15
I don't see how postmodernism stifles notions of poetry and mysticism.
My understanding is that it was a critique of the assumptions, the art institution of the romantic idea of the artist in modernism, naive notions of realism in photography, and the stark duality of art v kitsch. It should have opened things up with its step into a visual culture.
Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson | December 31, 2008 12:44 PM
Posted on December 31, 2008 12:44
The positive aspect of Colberg's post was him saying that he would like to see more inter-blog discussions and truly self-published photography books.
I'm all in favour of the former---it doesn't really happen does it. Each blog is its own monad with a link rather than part of an on going conversation.
I puzzled about the latter---truly self-published photography books. What does truly self published mean? Is your work an example of that?
Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson | December 31, 2008 8:28 AM
Posted on December 31, 2008 08:28
Yes Gary, vernacular photography is murky territory. I think that maybe, Joerg, means, vernacular photography has no pretensions to anything else, I'm not sure, it's a term I've heard bandied about before, usually though in reference to the snapshot aesthetic.
As for the Digi V Analogue argument, well I ask my students, why does the question need to be so digital?
Posted by s2art | December 30, 2008 9:42 AM
Posted on December 30, 2008 09:42
S2art
I have no idea what Colby means by vernacular photography either. Reading his post I take it to mean developing the language of photography, and so that would include images taken by mobile phones whatever the content.
Even though I shoot a lot of film with old cameras I find the debate about digital v analogue (so strong in Melbourne) misplaced. A lot of the analogue work that we see has been "photo shopped", and we mostly view analogue photography digitally (online) these days--eg., on Flickr or websites. It's rarely that I see photography in a gallery situation----prints on the walls.
Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson | December 30, 2008 6:05 AM
Posted on December 30, 2008 06:05