the tao of photography

[kenya]

quote from Henri Carier Bresson:

I'm not responsible for my photographs. Photography is not documentary, but intuition, a poetic experience. It's drowning yourself, dissolving yourself and then sniff, sniff, sniff-being sensitive to coincidence. You can't go looking for it; you can't want it, or you won't get it. First you must lose yourself. Then it happens.

Quoted from "The Tao of Photography; Seeing Beyond Seeing" by P.L. Gross and S.I. Shipiro

Also, from pages 11-13: ...to develop one's artistic ability demands first fully knowing and then transcending techniques-seeing, feeling and responding holistically to a photographic scene. ... For some photographers, the merging of self with the photographic subject matter is a prerequisite if one's vision is to be effectively expressed in the language of photography.

[sun of sand]

50/50 BS and absolutely

This stuff is not what a person thinks when they're doing
this is what a person thinks up trying to help others understand them

The quotes themselves are bullshit and meaningless ..words
It's what you make of the quotes that is absolute

I gain nothing by reading these
I gain by thinking ..whether about these specific sayings or not

to develop ones artistic ability demands...

Practice. Work ethic.
You cannot "be the ball" before you learn it

You're an artist ONCE you get to where you feel comfortable transcending techniques-seeing, feeling and responding

Becoming a better artist is just development of approach


This is why practicing hard as f*** tricks all day is pointless unless all you care about is being good at tricks
can't skip rudimentary practice and expect to end up anywhere great

[Steven Barall]

Well the problem is that the statement is contradictory. How can you say that you're not responsible but your intuition is?

He is saying that you have to be tuned in to your surroundings and then just react and that you can not possibly make any conscious decisions regarding the photo in that flash of a second leaving the photographer as merely a conduit for happenstance.

Well, as the guy is jumping over the puddle you aren't going to start to decide which lens to use or even which shutter speed and f-stop to use but you did make those decisions at some point. (Actually, Bresson's negatives are horrendous.) In fact when he talks about learning enough tech stuff so that you can forget it, that is exactly what he is talking about. The point is to make those sorts of decisions so integral to your process that they seemingly disappear and actually become that special "look" of your photos. Using one camera and one lens and exposing the film one way each and every time is still the result of a decision making process.

Nothing is really being left to chance. Bresson is exercising quite a bit of control but hiding it in the consistency of his "look". Cheers all.

[bvstaples]

I gain nothing by reading these
I gain by thinking ..whether about these specific sayings or not



S of S:

This seems contradictory to me. You say you gain by thinking, and I agree, but you go on to say "...whether about these specific sayings..."

It sounds to me as if reading these may cause you to think: and if you gain something because you think, and if you think because you read these, then you gain something because you read these.

I take a lot of this stuff with many grains of salt. People can spew on about what makes them do this or that, what made them make this photo or that photo. For me, I want my viewers to see my photos as just that, my photos. I don't really try to lay on a lot of philosophical bull to convey the point of the image. When someone pushes me, then I'll lay on my fartist's statement (which I've pasted below for your amusement). But I do read what others say; I listen to podcasts; watch shows and documentaries on artists (not just photographers), because if any of it raises an issue in my mind, and causes me to start the thinking process, then it has value to me.

Brian

------------------

bvstaples Fartist's Statement

It is unmistakably apparent in Mister Staples’ photographs that the relationships with his subject matter brings up intense issues of content, the transcendent beauty and the distinctive formal juxtapositions of the purity of line, and the spatial relationships that resonant within the realm of discourse and threatens over-specificity by penetrating an essentially transitional quality. Inherent in his nature, he is not astonished that few have yet mentioned that the disjunctive perturbation of the purity of line visually and conceptually activates participation on a critical dialogue, and as an advocate of the Embiggened Mac Aesthetic, feels that the sublime beauty of the subconsciously rooted quasi egyptian and occidental motifs punctuates the eloquence of his pieces. In Mr. Staples’ quest to capture the quintessential slice of the space-time continuum, his work becomes menacingly playful because of the way the iconicity of the vernacular signifier endangers the devious simplicity of participation in the critical dialogue of monochromatic existentialism. This iconicity threatens to penetrate the exploration of the montage elements, and it takes every iota of his efforts to enter into this work because of how the mechanical mark-making of the figurative-narrative line-space matrix spatially undermines the substructure of critical thinking, how the difficult photon capturing venture is marred by a disruptive perturbation in that space-time continuum, and eventually notates his extraordinary handling of light.

[Wallace_Billingham]

I got that book a few years back for Christmas, I found it to be a total waste aside from some nice pictures the text really spent the entire book saying nothing of any importance.

Interestingly enough there are two books with the same title "The Tao of Photography" and they are both BS

[Robert Hughes]

It is so difficult to say something original, important, and comprehensible about photography. People have been puzzling over its role for 160+ years, and still haven't decided if it is truly a fine art. Yet, we keep taking pictures, we have a passion for the process, so there must be some life left in its pursuit.

[Ken Lee]

Go ahead and try to pin-down a butterfly.

If you do, you just kill it, and what you have is just something dead - certainly not the true butterfly.

The true butterfly can't be grasped.

[Mike1234]

Yech... puke... his rhetoric to "poetically" sell his own stuff... or just masked arrogance. Gives me the willies!!!

[The Lazy Painter]

I agree with the general sentiment expressed, a photographer should understand his equipment/technique well enough so that it doesn't get in the way of effective visual communication. Freeman Patterson has been one of the biggest influences on my work and he says more or less the same thing, camera's and technique are a means to an end but not the end themselves. Which isn't necessarily why everyone likes photography, obviously some prefer the more technical aspects.

As far as the language that it's presented in goes (I should preface this by saying that I haven't actually read "the tao of photography") I've read a lot of Taoism so I'm use to the less literal, more poetic structure that's commonly used. The easiest example I can think of is the the I Ching, read 10 different copies and you'll have 10 different versions due to the variation between how the translators interpret the charecters. It's useless for expressing technical ideas (like how to use a camera) but I find it's great for talking about highly subjective concepts (like why to use a camera).

[sun of sand]

Seems everyone is on the same page for the most part here
I'd bet these quote sayers would believe the same


I meant that its your own interpretation of the quotes that matters
Not the quote itself
You may end up with something quite different than was intended
It's just that time spent working/thinking/practicing that counts

It is a bit contradictory
maybe you'd say completely
I wouldn't
What I want to say I cannot without lingering over it for years and even then it's still bound to be not much more than mush
I'm not about doing what these people have done -artistry through writing
I don't care to even try making people understand me through words
I see that as an exercise in "poetically selling ones own stuff"

I'm writing here but frankly I don't give a sh*t about what I write. I don't care if people appreciate what I write because I have no idea if they actually appreciate what it is i'm trying to communicate
I'm much more interested in what they have to say through their actions ..That's the only way you're ever going to know if you're truly on the same page with someone or not

So
You may begin your work by reading the quotes for inspiration but you'll never be sitting there with your camera thinking
how do I do as he did EXACTLY? ...let me read page 3 again
It's a jumping off point but nothing more than that. As soon as you begin thinking about the quote you're off the tracks.
If you don't think it would be blind faith/religion/stale/unartistic

You can't just work on "owning" their words and skip over practice
You'll be nothing more than a great party talker

[The Lazy Painter]

Well the problem is that the statement is contradictory. How can you say that you're not responsible but your intuition is?

I read it differently, to me he's saying he's not solely responsible for creating his photos. He see's a geometry in a scene and then waits for the action to complete the picture, i.e. his intuition guides him as to when to click the shutter. He talks a lot about that in the documentaries "the impassioned eye", "just plain love" and "the decisive moment", so I guess I looking at his comment in a different context. It also helps to keep in mind that the translation from french can also change the meaning conveyed.

[Mike1234]

Oh... give me a break. It's just about showing something... hopefully truth.

[Brian Ellis]

Well the problem is that the statement is contradictory. How can you say that you're not responsible but your intuition is?

He is saying that you have to be tuned in to your surroundings and then just react and that you can not possibly make any conscious decisions regarding the photo in that flash of a second leaving the photographer as merely a conduit for happenstance.

Well, as the guy is jumping over the puddle you aren't going to start to decide which lens to use or even which shutter speed and f-stop to use but you did make those decisions at some point. (Actually, Bresson's negatives are horrendous.) In fact when he talks about learning enough tech stuff so that you can forget it, that is exactly what he is talking about. The point is to make those sorts of decisions so integral to your process that they seemingly disappear and actually become that special "look" of your photos. Using one camera and one lens and exposing the film one way each and every time is still the result of a decision making process.

Nothing is really being left to chance. Bresson is exercising quite a bit of control but hiding it in the consistency of his "look". Cheers all.

I haven't seen a contact sheet of the puddle jumping picture but I've seen other of his contact sheets. If the puddle jumping contact sheet is like the others, he made a large number of photographs of the guy in various stages of running, jumping, walking, whatever exactly he was doing in that general time period, and then selected the puddle jumping one as the best of the bunch. When people do this with a digital camera they call it "spray and pray." When Cartier-Bresson does it it's called the decisive moment.

[ljsegil]

I think maybe Henri meant decisively Tao, for the moment. Strictly speaking, that is.
Larry

[Donald Miller]

What is the sound of one hand clapping? What is it that sees but cannot see itself? Show me your face before your mother's birth.

Donald Miller

[mandoman7]

Get out of your own way and take the picture.
:D

[paulr]

Some of you guys are being a little harsh on old Henri.

Are you really going to hold him to the standards of a philosophy PhD student in articulating his argument?

He's describing his experience; what the process feels like to him; what about it matters to him.

If some of the words seem to contradict, it's quite likely that he's using them in a different way than you're taking them.

For one thing, he probably said it in French ...

[William McEwen]

"Get the money up front." - William McEwen

[gevalia]

I'd only read it if there was a strong chance in having sex with Brooke Burke in it for me.

[Steve Gledhill]

bvstaples Fartist's Statement

It is unmistakably apparent in Mister Staples’ photographs that the relationships with his subject matter brings up intense issues of content, the transcendent beauty and the distinctive formal juxtapositions of the purity of line, and the spatial relationships that resonant within the realm of discourse and threatens over-specificity by penetrating an essentially transitional quality. Inherent in his nature, he is not astonished that few have yet mentioned that the disjunctive perturbation of the purity of line visually and conceptually activates participation on a critical dialogue, and as an advocate of the Embiggened Mac Aesthetic, feels that the sublime beauty of the subconsciously rooted quasi egyptian and occidental motifs punctuates the eloquence of his pieces. In Mr. Staples’ quest to capture the quintessential slice of the space-time continuum, his work becomes menacingly playful because of the way the iconicity of the vernacular signifier endangers the devious simplicity of participation in the critical dialogue of monochromatic existentialism. This iconicity threatens to penetrate the exploration of the montage elements, and it takes every iota of his efforts to enter into this work because of how the mechanical mark-making of the figurative-narrative line-space matrix spatially undermines the substructure of critical thinking, how the difficult photon capturing venture is marred by a disruptive perturbation in that space-time continuum, and eventually notates his extraordinary handling of light.

Your Fartist’s Statement reminds me (tangentially) of Arthur Dent’s response to the diabolical poetry of Prostetnic Vogon Jeltz of the Galactic Hyperspace Planning Council in ‘Hitchhikers’ Guide to the Galaxy’:

“Actually...I rather liked it. Um...some of the words I didn't understand, but I found the imagery quite effective. And, um, interesting rhythmic devices which seemed to counterpoint the surrealism of the underlying metaphor of the humanity ... Vogonity, sorry, Vogonity of the poet's soul, which contrives through the medium of the verse structure to sublimate, er ... whatever it was ... the poem was about.”

[William McEwen]

Can a bee be said to be or not to be an entire bee.. when half the bee is not a bee, due to some ancient injury...

[Preston]

The only way to say anything about a photographer and his photographs, is to allow the photographs to speak for themselves.

-Preston