p.s. I'm totally impressed that you actually knew and worked with some of the greats of photography. In my much more mundane profession I too have met some of the founders and masters... and can't fully describe or quantify the benefits of having met them and worked with some of them.
It was largely dumb luck Brian.
Thanks,
Kirk
at age 73:
"The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep"
I wasn't. By long shot.
*************************
Eric Rose
www.ericrose.com
I don't play the piano, I don't have a beard and I listen to AC/DC in the darkroom. I have no hope as a photographer.
- William McEwenGoing onto a photography forum and asking old geysers their opinions is a perfectly legitimate portion of research for such a paper.
Ha! I like that "geysers" - I'm thinking it wasn't a typo?
That's like saying beautiful women are passé. How much poetry have the Japanese written about cherry blossoms? (A selection of Basho's haiku, link) Or the moon? Or the music of a flute?Originally Posted by rdenney
Or like saying that a tuba is passé?
Or is Yosemite passé?
A photographer photographs what is in front of the lens. That's the way photography works. Beauty in, beauty out; ugly in, ugly out. Want a clearing winter storm? Find one and photograph it. Just remember that before the storm clears, it's going to be storming!
The World Press Photo 2012 winners have been announced. What in them is passé? Suffering? Triumph? Life? Death? Car Problems? (OK, so that's not a world press photo)
Labeling a subject as passé is like revaluing the leaf by burning down all the forests. Then somebody comes along and "rediscovers" the subject, and leaves have grown again.Although it is excruciatingly rich, horrifyingly sunny and more full of wonderfully exciting people than a pomegranate is of pips, it can hardly be insignificant that when a recent edition of Playbeing Magazine headlined an article with the words, 'When you are tired of Ursa Minor Beta you are tired of life', the suicide rate there quadrupled overnight.
"It's the way to educate your eyes. Stare. Pry, listen, eavesdrop. Die knowing something. You are not here long." - Walker Evans
Adams actually wasn't particularly good at self-promotion. He didn't make any real money from photography until William Turnage took over his business affairs in the early 1970s. Before that most of his income came from working as a commercial photographer.
A few things other things about Adams:
He was one of the founders of Aperture
He was instrumental in causing the Museum of Modern Art to create a photography department
He was one of the founders of Group f/64
He was instrumental in causing the Sierra Club to become the significant force for protection of the environment that it has become.
He was one of the first if not the first photographer to use week-long workshops as a means of photography instruction
For several decades he traveled around the country speaking to various photography groups. Many photographers who later became well-known (e.g. Harry Callahan) credit their attendance at one of these lectures with inspiring them to devote their lives to photography.
He and Fred Archer conceived of the zone system as a method of teaching exposure and development.
And that's not even mentioning the influence his books and the photographs themselves have had on generations of photographers.
I don't think it's an exaggeration to say that little if anything of significance happened in American photography from roughly the 1930s to the 1960s that wasn't influenced, directly or indirectly, by Ansel Adams.
I don't know a lot about Thomas Kincaid but I'm not aware that he's had anything even close to the influence on his chosen field that Adams has had on his.
Brian Ellis
Before you criticize someone, walk a mile in their shoes. That way when you do criticize them you'll be
a mile away and you'll have their shoes.
My opinion of AA: Don't do it! Life without a drink in hand is no life at all.
Remember, young person, that quitters never win, and winners never quit.
jbhogan
I agree with everything you say, Brian, except the relationship between self-promotion and money. It's not 1:1. Self-promotion is not a bad thing, nor is it necessarily intended for immediate return. It is a part of business acumen that is often mistaken for selfish, self-centered, arrogant, and/or manipulative behavior. Interestingly, some of the best self-promotors are rather shy and don't enjoy doing it... but they are really good at it nonetheless. I suppose for some "self-promotion" might be a blend of true talent combined with the dumb-luck of people recognizing that talent.
Of the landscape photographs I have seen in person, Adam's are by far the best. I do need to see more though. I would love to see exhibits of Morley Baer and one of the Weston family.
Beautiful women are not passe, but pictures of beautiful women certainly can be. Imagine how much one might lose appreciation for beauty if they spent all day every day looking at pictures of them. No subject, not even one as magnificent as Half Dome, is immune to becoming portrayed by Just Another Picture of Half Dome.
The tuba is definitely passe. How many professional tuba players do you know? How many of those tuba players have ever performed on stage at, say, the Super Bowl Half-Time Show (at last since they stopped using college marching bands about a thousand years ago)? Do you know the name of the tuba player who performed the Mother Ship in Close Encounters of the Third Kind? Do you know who played the iconic tuba solo in Jaws? The movie credits list the second coffee-fetching assistant to the third grip, but not those whose performance became iconic parts of those movies. How relevant can tuba-playing be if some fat, middle-aged weekend warrior like me can be on a first-name basis with a significant percentage of the world's finest tuba players? Of course tubas are passe. Those electric basses are so much easier to amplify (and play).
Rick "not willing to dig for that accented e" Denney
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