BARBELITH underground
 

Subcultural engagement for the 21st Century...
Barbelith is a new kind of community (find out more)...
You can login or register.


Underground > Art, Fashion & Design >

Photography is dying?

  
 
Turk
06:00 / 14.03.04
Hockney hits out at photography:

Artist David Hockney, who created photo collage works in the 1980s, has said digital manipulation will kill off photography as an art form. Hockney told the Guardian newspaper that photographs can be so easily altered these days that they can no longer be seen as factual or true.

"You've no need to believe a photograph made after a certain date because it won't be made the way Cartier-Bresson made his. We know he didn't crop them - he was the master of truthful photography," Hockney told the Guardian. "But you can't have a photographer like that again because we know photographs can be made in different ways," he added.

Hockney hopes that painting will gain in standing as more people realise the camera can be made to lie. The artist said his sister's use of digital photography had brought home the effect manipulation was having.

"She's just gone mad with the digital camera and the computer - move anything about. She doesn't worry about whether it's authentic or not; she's just making pictures." [more...]

As a prospective, albeit currently ignorant, student of photography I'm both frustrated and puzzled. However much I wish to resist the gawdy charms of digital manipulation it's a discipline I'm already being instructed in, and perhaps it is unavoidable. Currently what I want to become is a technically skilled photographer rather than crafty user of PhotoShop, though no doubt it wouldn't hurt to become both. The problem is it seems competition would favour those with little regard for traditional skills, after all when it comes to this months picture on your calendar how many folks are concerned with the authenticity of the image? Perhaps, I should grow up and understand, an image is an image is an image, and how it's made really shouldn't matter, at least not necessarily anyway.

It's when I think beyond this doily comfort art that I depart from Hockney's concerns. In the right hands digital editing has helped even Hollywood, of all places, creative truly evocative images. So the possibilities for photo-artists, as opposed to photo-journalists, seems to practically explode with the growth of digital manipulation, and perhaps Hockney's concerns are merely that of traditionalist, never a group of people to listen to when you talk art - which, as it happens, is exactly why I don't say much myself around here.
 
 
Grey Area
11:43 / 14.03.04
There will always be a space for artistic photography using film, enlargers and all those wonderful chemicals. Simply because there is a lot more to be said about a picture that is made that way.

Example: I have on my living-room wall a 1m diagonal enlargement of a b&w picture I took years ago in Holland. It's taken looking straight up through a ragged basketball hoop against a backdrop of sand. Sand that's been rippled by waves like you see on beaches everywhere. But the point is that it's not sand...it's clouds. Now, I could have pasted this together in Photoshop quite easily. But the appreciation people gain for the picture comes from the realisation of the work that went into it, as much as the subject that it portrays.

Digital photography is nice, yes. I use a digital camera myself these days simply because I can't afford to run a darkroom. But once I have an income again I will revert to using 35mm b&w stock because it is a lot more satisfying. I feel there is a perception developing amongst people that exactly because digital photography is so easy to use and manipulate, film photography will slowly gain in respect and appreciation once more, simply because of the creative planning that goes into a successful shoot.

A piece of art is not just about what you see standing/hanging before you. There is a story behind it that is an integral part of the piece itself. I believe people expect this from art, and photography as an artform provides ample amounts of stories behind the pictures.
 
 
The Strobe
13:31 / 14.03.04
But the appreciation people gain for the picture comes from the realisation of the work that went into it, as much as the subject that it portrays.

I'm not sure this is true. With painting, yes. But with photography a lot of people don't know what work went into it. Most people don't realise that darkroom work isn't just developing the print; it's aprt of the artistic process too. I mean, people can tell a good picture, but they'd probably think Ansel Adams just had really great light or something - not that he had tons of dodges and burns all over the photograph to bring out exactly what he desired.

Digital photograph is easy to manipulate to some extent, but to really post-process a photograph properly, slickly, and realistically, I'd say it's almost as hard as film work. It's certainly less rough-and-ready than waving dodgers around under the enlarger lens.

The photographic process doesn't end with the taking. Many people are interested in the stories about how a photographer got a particular shot - where they had to be, what coincidences had to take place - but few will admit to caring about the darkroom process. Aside, obviously, from other photographers.

I'm not quite in agreement with Hockney; I mean, the camera can lie - but paintings lie all the time; they exploit perspective and representation of temporality regularly, far more so than a photographer who doctors the odd picture. The quest for "authenticity" is a difficult one, because some people would argue that paintings aren't exactly authentic. Also: should photography strive for authenticity? It's a "realisitc" art form, sure, but it's not solely limited to that. Dave McKean (to use an example many people here will be familiar with) uses photography throughout his work - both as an intermediate stage and as a final method - and his work wouldn't be the same without digital manipulation (these days).

Digital manipulation is great for photo-artists, as Turk calls them. But the digital revolution has been a lifesaver for photojournalists; they're all moving onto digital backs and Photoshop-as-darkroom because of the speed it can turn around images. The fact that it makes it easier to doctor images doesn't mean that digital photography encourages it. I've used B&W darkroom equipment before, but I've now started to learn to use Photoshop to enhance, rather than edit, photographs, and it's hugely satisfying that I can spend a similar amount of time processing pictures but in a non-destructive and light environment.

Simply because there is a lot more to be said about a picture that is made that way.

In the end, I think this is a nostalgic comment. I love darkroom work, and I think anyone who enjoys taking photos ought to try it at least once simply because you ought to know how the magic of processing works, but I don't think it intriniscally makes a photo better. Most press photos of the last year were digital; some of them are stunning in their own right. Do you care that the photographers who took them didn't give their film to some galley slave to process?

film photography will slowly gain in respect and appreciation once more, simply because of the creative planning that goes into a successful shoot.

Any form of photography - 35mm film, 120 roll, glass-plate land camera stuff - requires good creative planning to produce a good photograph. Digital photography is easy to use and manipulate to mediocre levels. Sure, the photoshopped stuff at B3ta and SomethingAwful is funny, but it's very low-res; at print-quality (72dpi, so about 3000+ pixels wide) it'd look sloppy and dreadful. It's a misconception that because it's computerised it's easy. It's not at all; it might make it a more open market and allow more amateurs to get their hands dirty - especially with regards to the complexity of colour processing - but I don't think that's a bad thing.

I think I need to check what Sontag says about the authenticity of pictures.
 
 
retracdet
15:20 / 29.03.04
Digital versus "Pure" photography:

I think that photography should be judged no differently than any other art form. What is "art" to some is "garbage" to others; based soley on how effected one who experiences it is.

I, myself, am a budding digital photographer. I haven't the patience for the chemicals, processes, etc. that are involved in traditional photography, but am very comfortable with the digital manipulation of digital photos. And despite the multitude of manipulation options available to me, I usually work to keep the modification of the original to a minimum. I convert all color photos to black and white, crop, rotate slightly, and adjust the brightness, contrast, and sharpness. I would argue that all of these manipulations have their counterparts in traditional film processing and developing.

I think in the end, the product is what matters. All art is an attempt to communicate. So, I think digital photography should be judged exactly as all other art is; based on the effectiveness of the communication for each individual who views it.
 
 
Grey Area
17:33 / 29.03.04
Can I also throw into the discussion that there are now digital enlargers available (an example can be found here).

Setting aside the technicalities of taking the picture itself, does the fact that a traditional form of picture manipulation now exists for your digital negatives add a certain 'artsy' quality to digital photography? (Now that we can use the traditional tools of burning, dodging)

Or am I putting technology before the artist?
 
 
retracdet
18:03 / 29.03.04
I would still argue that the method is not the issue. That is not to say that the end result is all that matters; but instead to say that "art is in the eye of the beholder." There will always be "purists" that say the traditional method of taking and developing film is superior, long after the time when the abilities of digital photography actually surpass those of traditional photography (if that time ever comes). We will never come to a point where everyone agrees on the definition of "art" any more that we will be able to come to a concensus definition for "artistic photography."

I think it is more important that you decide what is art FOR YOU.
 
 
diz
19:53 / 29.03.04
Hockney told the Guardian newspaper that photographs can be so easily altered these days that they can no longer be seen as factual or true.

to me, this betrays a certain naive understanding of photography on Hockney's part. photography is just as much the product of a subjective process as any other art form. the photographer makes any number of choices (type of film, lighting, angles and composition, captioning and context of presentation, etc) and none of those choices are without weight in terms of meaning and such. honestly, so many people have done so much work (both in practice and in terms of theory) about the subjectivity of photo (and film and video) that i had kind of assumed that that particular horse had been flogged past the point where it was at all relevant to keep talking about, but apparently i was wrong.

i do have a great nostalgic love of chemicals-on-paper photography, and i know i'm not alone in that. analogues can also be found in music, where legions of aficionados swear by vinyl records. i expect that their will definitely still be an audience for all the old analog media for quite some time to come.
 
 
aluhks SMASH!
21:27 / 29.03.04
I find the suggestion that digital photography will somehow kill the whole medium absurd. As dizfactor pointed out, trusting any photograph to be "real" displays a certain level of naivete. By their nature all photographs are images of something, with the emphasis properly placed on their being images. Not literal representations.

Similarly, although digital seems likely to completely replace film in photojournalism, snapshots, and most professional trade photography, the ongoing popularity of "alternative processes" (such as platinum printing, homemade emulsions, and modern daguerrotypes) suggests that in the creative realm, film will always have a role.
 
 
diz
01:16 / 30.03.04
one of the interesting advantages of film over digital is the nature of the photo-as-artifact. there are differences and variations between different prints and reproductions of a film photograph, whereas digital copies are identical to each other. they also change over time whereas digital photos are essentially just lines of code which can theoretically be preserved forever. i think that in an era of essentially infinite reproduction and multiplications of images, film has an advantage in that film photographs are localized in time and space. i think that's going to become more valuable and important in art as time goes on.
 
  
Add Your Reply