Working Collaboratively

[Scott Davis]

I think this concept probably has gotten lost inside the Chuck Close thread, so I'll pull it out and start it on its own.

Has anyone here ever done a collaborative work with another artist, be it photographer, painter, sculptor, or other kind of artist? If so, how did you handle the creative authorship of the work? At what point did you determine whose contribution would be subordinate, if you did make that determination at all? If you were the subordinate contributor, was that a difficult challenge for your artistic ego, or was it a welcome situation for you?

[Michael Graves]

I'm not sure if this is 100% relevant to your question...but it's at least partially so. I've edited two collections of short stories for a publisher. Holiday Choir and Emerging Voices. I had to deal with multile writers, with muliple egos and each one of them had multiple personalities. Some of them took criticism well and allowed a certain degree of editing. Others were prima donnas who assumed their writing was as good as it could ever get and refused to cooperate until I threatened to cut them from the book. There was one who chose to get cut.

The key question to ask is, who is ultimately responsible for the final product. That is the person who should have final say in critical decisions....but that person should make all decisions as a cooperative effort with the others involved.

[tim atherton]

LF photographers Virginia Beahan and Laura McPhee have worked jointly on a number of projects (right down to, at times, being under the dark-cloth together) and cert6ainly collaborating on individual pictures.

I just checked and their book No Ordinary Land has a joint copyright for the two of them

[Ralph Barker]

I think a lot has to do with the nature or level of the collaboration, as determined by discussion and pre-planning. The best time to agree on copyright or "authorship" rights would be in advance, of course, and an attorney would likely suggest that it be in writing.

Tim's example is good for cases where two photographers are equally vested in the creative process, making joint copyright the appropriate solution. In many cases, however, the level of collaboration is more tiered in nature.

Take the typical spec fashion shoot, for example. The team may consist of the photographer, an assistant or two, a wardrobe stylist, a makeup artist, a hair stylist, and the model. Each of them, and their respective talent, is completely essential to the finished product, and all of them may contribute to ideas developed in pre-planning the shoot. In most cases, however, the photographer retains full copyright, but credits the others on the team, whenever practical. Publication credits, however, are often limited to the copyright holder.

[paulr]

In the past I've gotten so much help with editing from a couple of different people that I'd be happy to call them collaborators.

Aside from that nothing, but the idea interests me a lot. I once approached a poet whose work blew me away about collaborating on something (no specific project in mind .. it just felt right). But she never got back to me.

[Oren Grad]

Grist for the mill:

http://ctein.com/Collaboration_portfolio.htm

And specifically about their collaborative process:

http://ctein.com/collab_essay.jpg

[N Dhananjay]

Michael Smith and Paula Chamlee were collaborating on a project - if memory serves me correctly, it was "The Bonsai of Longwood Gardens". Bruce Barnbaum's "Tone Poems" were books accompanied by music played by Judith Cohen. You could try emailing them for their experiences on the project. Obviously it would be more difficult tracking down collaborations that did not make it, that fell by the wayside or were difficult ones. I collaborate with other researchers in the publication of research and have observed collaborations in that environment. It tends to runs the gamut from frustrating to abusive...;-) But on those occasions that it works, it genuinely can be a 'the whole is greater than the sum of the parts' kind of experience. All parties gain a new understanding and the work can be particularly powerful with emergent qualities that are hard to predict ahead of time. So, while I'm sure trying to bash out details ahead of time might be practical, I doubt it would address the actual complexities and frustrations that might arise. By definition, the things that stump us are the unanticipated things, the stuff that comes out of left field. Mutual respect prior to the project probably helps. And it has to be a respect for the other person, not their previous work or their habits or resources, but a respect for who they are and their intentions and integrity in growing in a particular way. The trick of course is in maintaining that respect through the course of the project, and hopefully beyond.
Cheers, DJ

[Bill_1856]

Speaking specifically of photography, I believe that it depends on the uniqueness of artistry or craft supplied by the "second" party. Having a job done by a commercial lab certainly doesn't justify the term collaborater. But in the case of Close whose work was only possible because of Spagnoli's unique skill and contribution, IMO it should be considered (and credited) as a true collaboration.

[Scott Davis]

Michael and Paula are sort of an anomaly - one almost never hears their names mentioned separately. It's almost one single name - MichaelandPaula. I know they each make their own images, but the two of them seem joined at the hip, so I don't know how much different their collaboration on the longwood gardens project would be from their day-to-day working habits.

It would be interesting to hear from Bruce about working with the musician on that project, especially about the dynamics of the interaction and the project concept. Was it a case of music first, then images, or images first, then music, or was it a parallel development process?

I think my interest in starting this topic is that I feel like there is much more collaborative work going on in the greater artistic community as a whole, and not so much within the photo community. We're an ocean of individuals, forging ahead with our own vision. Perhaps it is specifically because of that little black box we stare into to make our images. I just find this phenomenon intriguing, and would like to hear from folks who do work collaboratively, as to why, and also from folks who choose not to why they do not. Is it for fear of loss of authorship and/or control? Is it because you've not found someone with whom you share an artistic synergy, or is it just because you've never thought of doing it before?

[tim atherton]

I guess there's also Terri Weifenbach and John Gossage. Husband and wife who normally work separately, but collaborated on Snake Eyes - equal billing

http://photo-muse.blogspot.com/2007/03/snake-eyes-wiefenbach-and-gossage.html

I suppose there are as many degrees of collaboration as there are artists...

[Gordon Moat]

Some famous fashion photographers are actually duos. Mert & Marcus, Vinoodh Matadin & Inez van Lamswerde, and a few others. They all shoot at the same time the same subject, then their clients get images without knowing exactly which of the duo took which shots. I suppose there is a uniqueness to this idea of a dual approach to creative problems.

Personally I have never met someone whose style complimented my own in a way that I would consider working on a dual project. I would not be against the idea, if the results were better than something I could accomplish on my own. Probably about as close as I might ever get would be a compilation of images in a book, though in such a situation I would simply be a part of a project, and not really a collaborator.

Ciao!

Gordon Moat
A G Studio (http://www.allgstudio.com)