When is it consider unwelcome to arrange things that you are photographing? If y ou are a journalist photographer, it would probably be considered a sin to do so . If you are shooting documentary, would you move things? If it's art photogaphy , where's the line again. If you are shooting a landscape and some pesky branche s blocks your camera, would you shift them aside or chop them off? Would you rem ove a cigerette butt from an otherwise perfect close-up of some fallen leaves on the ground? Ansel Adams, if I remember reading somewhere, touched up to remove a sign board in one of his landscape prints (correct me if I'm wrong). He was cr iticized. Eugene Smith altered his photographs in the darkroom. In this beautifu l book, High Plains Farm, by Paula Chamlee, some of the interior shots, I believ e, are arranged in small ways. This book really reminds me of the great Morris W right, which I'm not sure if he arranged things. Walker Evans probably don't. I guess my question is is this an ethical, aesthetical or a philosophical issue. D oes it change the way viewers look at your work?
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