Art and Landscape Photography

[John Kasaian]

I came across this qoute in an article by Roger Kimball also who wrote The Rape of the Masters: How Political Corectness Sabotages Art:

"This much I think, is clear: Without an allegiance to beauty, art degenerates into a caracature of itself; it is beauty that animates the aesthetic experience, making it so seductive, but aesthetic experience itself degenerates into a kind of fetish or idol if it is held up as an end in itself, untested by the rest of life."

I am trying to understand how that fits in with my own attempts at landscape photography. It seems like it should but I cannot find the correct words to define how the landscape photograph does this.

Any thoughts, suggestions or ideas?:confused:

[claudiocambon]

I came across this qoute in an article by Roger Kimball also who wrote The Rape of the Masters: How Political Corectness Sabotages Art:

"This much I think, is clear: Without an allegiance to beauty, art degenerates into a caracature of itself; it is beauty that animates the aesthetic experience, making it so seductive, but aesthetic experience itself degenerates into a kind of fetish or idol if it is held up as an end in itself, untested by the rest of life."

I am trying to understand how that fits in with my own attempts at landscape photography. It seems like it should but I cannot find the correct words to define how the landscape photograph does this.

Any thoughts, suggestions or ideas?:confused:

Without more context, it is hard to place what he is saying, and so, what he says risks acquiring the status of a truism; in turn, any comment thereon risks being equally vague. Is there a larger quote here, or a more specific reference to an artist or style?

[paulr]

Yeah ... who knows what he meant by "beauty." In relation to art, it's been interpreted dozens of different ways between the ancient greeks and the postmoderns.

If you haven't read Robert Adams' "Beauty in Photography: Essays in Defense of Traditional Values," I strongly recommend it. It's about the power of landscape more than anything else.

[Daniel_Buck]

to me, landscape photos are just something pretty to look at :) I think he might be looking a little to deep! :D

[domenico Foschi]

Why should I copy this owl, this sea urchin? Why should I try to imitate nature? I might just as well try to trace a perfect circle. (Pablo Picasso)

[QT Luong]

While some traditions of photography have placed an emphasis on the esthetics, more recent ones have displaced it in favor of ideas and engagement with the contemporary world. The writer seems to propose that both are necessary.

How does it relate to landscape ? If one thinks of it as "natural landscape", that area isn't considered anymore a fertile ground for expression of ideas and engagement with the contemporary world.

[John Kasaian]

Without more context, it is hard to place what he is saying, and so, what he says risks acquiring the status of a truism; in turn, any comment thereon risks being equally vague. Is there a larger quote here, or a more specific reference to an artist or style?

The context I got was of Art elevated to a plateau where it becomes a positive element of life.

[John Kasaian]

Yeah ... who knows what he meant by "beauty." In relation to art, it's been interpreted dozens of different ways between the ancient greeks and the postmoderns.

If you haven't read Robert Adams' "Beauty in Photography: Essays in Defense of Traditional Values," I strongly recommend it. It's about the power of landscape more than anything else.

Thanks Paul, I'll nab a copy and read it as soon as I can.:)

[John Kasaian]

to me, landscape photos are just something pretty to look at :) I think he might be looking a little to deep! :D

Daniel, you've hit the nail on the head! I'm trying to figure out at what point does a landscape become more than a record and crosses over into "fine art" and what elements drive the seductive aesthetic? Does goosing a negative to put more of what the photographer "feels" in a print make it more fine art and less an accurate record? And which ultimately fills whatever need that needs to be fulfilled?

[DJGainer]

To me the author is saying that art relies on beauty, but beauty in a picture does not make it art. I understand him to mean that there must be a deeper composition that conveys a message to the viewer rather than just, "look at me, I'm pretty!"

I think "accurate records" can be art, but the where mere beauty becomes art is has a low objective threshold and then a highly subjective one.

[Michael Alpert]

John,

I don't think your quote by itself means very much. In the late eighteenth century, Immanuel Kant outlined the modern definition of aesthetic experience. His aesthetics has the experience of beauty at its core, though Kant was mostly concerned about the experience of nature, not the experience of painting and related arts. So, yes, from Kant to at least Santayana, beauty has been a central concept of aesthetics. And, yes, the art-world can be (and sometimes IS) narcissistic "untested by the rest of life." A conservative thinker like Kimball dislikes that aspect of contemporary art, as do I. In response to your call for suggestions, I suggest that you look to more interesting thinkers, for instance, Hans-Georg Gadamer. Based on your quote, I think you will find Gadamer's book The Relevance of Beauty much more satisfying and thought-provoking than Kimball's essay.

[John Kasaian]

Why should I copy this owl, this sea urchin? Why should I try to imitate nature? I might just as well try to trace a perfect circle. (Pablo Picasso)

Lol! This is an observation from an art critic, not a sea urchin(though "art critic" and "sea urchin" might in some cases be synonyms!)---there is nothing to copycat, I'm just trying to figure out what the heck I've been doing with my photographs so I can put it in words. Kimball's idea seems close to what I want to say but I can't quite grasp how my landscapes fit in. I've tried to mentally address each point by point but when I'm done it comes back to the origin, to this:

I shoot landscapes I enjoy looking at and because I enjoy looking at them I feel probably others would enjoy looking at them too.

But why? What keeps it seductive and not a mere caracature or fetish (which is kind of like trying to trace a perfect circle!)
I can see how that could easily be. I see it in other photographs but not my own (and if I do they get shredded) Perhaps I'm not being critical enough in regards to my own work?

[Kuzano]

What is it about Art that has to fit conceptual formulas. If you like what you see, and it pleases you, Who cares about another persons opinion or analysis. Now, if you are selling art, perhaps you have to follow art deviates like the person who made this statement, since he and many others have greased people minds to believe that art for money has to follow their dictates. That's called pimping. You don't get what you like, you get what we sell you.

[Daniel_Buck]

I understand him to mean that there must be a deeper composition that conveys a message to the viewer rather than just, "look at me, I'm pretty!"

I've found that some people will 'see' a deeper meaning in photos that were not originally meant to have any meaning other than just a pleasing photograph. I've had people say some very deep things about some of my photos, and inside I'm just staring at them with a blank expression thinking "hu? It's a photo of a tree!" Maybe I'm not a deep thinker, but I've come to believe that some people can think hard enough about a photo and they will find the meaning they are looking for, regardless of the original intent of the photo. :)

[John Kasaian]

While some traditions of photography have placed an emphasis on the esthetics, more recent ones have displaced it in favor of ideas and engagement with the contemporary world. The writer seems to propose that both are necessary.

How does it relate to landscape ? If one thinks of it as "natural landscape", that area isn't considered anymore a fertile ground for expression of ideas and engagement with the contemporary world.

Excellent point! But why are "natural landscapes" so (relatively) popular in the contemporary world? Is it just for decoration? Some time ago (1970's?) huge colorful wall coverings of photographic forest scenes were briefly popular (almost like wall paper IIRC) Personally, after the initial "wow" factor played out I found them kind of boring. I can still connect with many Ansel Adams prints though---B&W and republished to the point of becoming cliche.

Why is that?

I'm hoping that if I can explain that phenomenon so that I can understand it, then I can see how it relates to my own B&W landscapes.

I've got to get a job! Sitting around thinking about this stuff is driving me batty!;)

[domenico Foschi]

I've found that some people will 'see' a deeper meaning in photos that were not originally meant to have any meaning other than just a pleasing photograph. I've had people say some very deep things about some of my photos, and inside I'm just staring at them with a blank expression thinking "hu? It's a photo of a tree!" Maybe I'm not a deep thinker, but I've come to believe that some people can think hard enough about a photo and they will find the meaning they are looking for, regardless of the original intent of the photo. :)

The issue is not meaning, meaning relates to reason.
Art works on different levels.

[domenico Foschi]

Excellent point! But why are "natural landscapes" so (relatively) popular in the contemporary world? Is it just for decoration? Some time ago (1970's?) huge colorful wall coverings of photographic forest scenes were briefly popular (almost like wall paper IIRC) Personally, after the initial "wow" factor played out I found them kind of boring. I can still connect with many Ansel Adams prints though---B&W and republished to the point of becoming cliche.

Why is that?

I'm hoping that if I can explain that phenomenon so that I can understand it, then I can see how it relates to my own B&W landscapes.

I've got to get a job! Sitting around thinking about this stuff is driving me batty!;)

If there is the wow factor in an image , as you rightly say, the wow reaction will lessen with time just as much I will get used to the wonderful bone structure of Sarah Palin's face.
I can understand how Adams' work instead keeps you engaged.
Adams' work is a study of how Adams sees the landscape and not of how the landscape stands in front of him.
Adams prints, have a strength not easy to define or quantify.
They are done with the language of Beauty where the subject is a mere pretext for what the Artist has envsioned.

[domenico Foschi]

Let me further it.
It is a cooperation between Nature and the Artist where Nature inspires. challenges and invites the Artist to find his/her own voice, not unlike the cooperation existing between the Artist and the Model.
As it has been said that a portrait of anybody is always a portrait of the Artist, the same can be said for landscapes.
It is the communion of two seemingly separate entities.

[paulr]

What is it about Art that has to fit conceptual formulas. If you like what you see, and it pleases you, Who cares about another persons opinion or analysis.

I'm not sure what conceptual formulas you're talking about.

For many people, art is important; something worth discussing and struggling to understand ... sometimes in order to do a better job making it, sometimes in order to get more out of looking at it.

[QT Luong]

Excellent point! But why are "natural landscapes" so (relatively) popular in the contemporary world? Is it just for decoration?

I think a lot of people relate, in a deep way, to the subjects being depicted, as well as to the positive emotions that those subjects inspire.

[Daniel_Buck]

Excellent point! But why are "natural landscapes" so (relatively) popular in the contemporary world? Is it just for decoration?

I would guess because most people in the city rarely ever get to go out to the country side and see the beautiful landscapes. :) Every chance I get, I'm out of the city and up into the mountains, or the desert, or anywhere away from the masses of people and buildings :)

[paulr]

I've found that some people will 'see' a deeper meaning in photos that were not originally meant to have any meaning other than just a pleasing photograph. I've had people say some very deep things about some of my photos, and inside I'm just staring at them with a blank expression thinking "hu? It's a photo of a tree!" Maybe I'm not a deep thinker, but I've come to believe that some people can think hard enough about a photo and they will find the meaning they are looking for, regardless of the original intent of the photo. :)

You seem to be presuming that the origin of meaning in an image is the artist's intent. I wouldn't be the first to argue that this is only one of many possible sources of meaning ... and it's probably one the least reliable ones.

There are deep cultural (and maybe even biological) roots to visual language. Our responses to form, to symbolism, to line, to color, to lights and darks, are often both powerful and unconscious. There's no need for the artist to be conscious of all the elements in an image for them to powerfully effect someone else.

Here's an obvious (probably trite) example: you come from far away and have no knowledge of Christianity. You make a photograph of a dramatic cross-shaped cloud looming over a mountaintop, with a crimson sunset behind it. You're only thinking about the symmetry and the colors. But when people in Mexico and South America see the image, they regard it as a sacred, almost miraculous object. They prattle on and on about all the symbolism they see. Are they being goofy? Are you being blind? Or is this just the nature of art?

[Donald Miller]

I think that artistic expression is simply that...it is an expression of one's self at a level that has meaning to the one that is expressing. It can and at times does serve to approximate tranmitting of experience...recognizing that nothing available to man has the ability to directly transmit experience with any degree of fidelity.

Is it conditional upon beauty...whatever that is? No, I think not.

[domenico Foschi]

I think a lot of people relate, in a deep way, to the subjects being depicted, as well as to the positive emotions that those subjects inspire.

Actually, I think that the majority of people relate in a superficial way to landscape since is the easiest to read and most of the landscape images you find in the common households, whatever that means, are reproductions of mainstream imagery.

[paulr]

Actually, I think that the majority of people relate in a superficial way to landscape since is the easiest to read and most of the landscape images you find in the common households, whatever that means, are reproductions of mainstream imagery.

I don't know if landscape is the easiest to read. I always suspected pictures of people were easier to read (it's more straightforward for us to relate to one of our kind than to trees, rocks, etc.)

People may have superficial, mainstream landscapes on their wall, but you could probably say the same for all the art on their walls (still lives, flowers, kittens w/balls of yarn, etc. etc.)

I like the way Robert Adams addresses the issue of people's choice of landscape pictures in his book. What disturbs him is that the common choice is foreign, unfamiliar landscapes. Basically a kind of escapism. His hope is for people to find a truer solace in landscapes that find beauty in the real worlds of the people who look at them. This idea has become important to me over the years.

[domenico Foschi]

THE MAINSTREAM LANDSCAPE IS.
ROBERT Adams landscape, which I greatly admire isn't.
I am sorry for the caps lock .

[John Kasaian]

John,

I don't think your quote by itself means very much. In the late eighteenth century, Immanuel Kant outlined the modern definition of aesthetic experience. His aesthetics has the experience of beauty at its core, though Kant was mostly concerned about the experience of nature, not the experience of painting and related arts. So, yes, from Kant to at least Santayana, beauty has been a central concept of aesthetics. And, yes, the art-world can be (and sometimes IS) narcissistic "untested by the rest of life." A conservative thinker like Kimball dislikes that aspect of contemporary art, as do I. In response to your call for suggestions, I suggest that you look to more interesting thinkers, for instance, Hans-Georg Gadamer. Based on your quote, I think you will find Gadamer's book The Relevance of Beauty much more satisfying and thought-provoking than Kimball's essay.

Thank you Michael, I'll put that on my reading list! :)

[John Kasaian]

What is it about Art that has to fit conceptual formulas. If you like what you see, and it pleases you, Who cares about another persons opinion or analysis. Now, if you are selling art, perhaps you have to follow art deviates like the person who made this statement, since he and many others have greased people minds to believe that art for money has to follow their dictates. That's called pimping. You don't get what you like, you get what we sell you.

Kuzano,
I'm not trying to fit my art into a conceptual formula but rather I'm attempting to figure out how to go about defining what I'm doing with my landscapes, in the hope of not just churning out the same ol' same ol'.

Not to confuse the issue, but take portraiture for example. Karsh took some fantastic portraits. He had a definate style which his portraits reflected, but I find that secondary to his "capture" of the subject sitting for him. I've never met Sophia Loren or Winston Churchill or Ernest Hemingway, but seeing their Karsh portraits I feel that I know them better than I've ever known them before---better than the character in a film, a voice giving a speech, or a novel read. In seeing these people through Karsh's eyes, I see not Karsh but the people. (but I couldn't see the people without Karsh's eyes!) I think this is a pretty cool thing about photography.
Now, if a landscape is essentially a portrait of terrain and it's features, how do I describe what I'm trying to do?
Admittedly the print should say it all for me, but when writing a proposal I think I'd be expected to be able to explain what I'm trying to do with words.:confused:

[Steven Barall]

Over thinking this stuff will never do you any good. If you're looking for some sort of justification for doing what you do all you're going to end up doing is wasting precious time. Just do what makes you happy.

Don't think that because something has been published someplace it is automatically important and should be taken seriously. Have some fun. Cheers.

[John Kasaian]

Over thinking this stuff will never do you any good. If you're looking for some sort of justification for doing what you do all you're going to end up doing is wasting precious time. Just do what makes you happy.

Don't think that because something has been published someplace it is automatically important and should be taken seriously. Have some fun. Cheers.

Good grief this isn't over-thinking---it's simply thinking.:)

[Jim Ewins]

I know it when I see it.

[Leonard Metcalf]

I would guess because most people in the city rarely ever get to go out to the country side and see the beautiful landscapes. :) Every chance I get, I'm out of the city and up into the mountains, or the desert, or anywhere away from the masses of people and buildings :)

I think this is a very valid point. The mainstream person stays at home and has lost so much of their connection with nature, that a pretty image on the wall helps them establish this to some extent, which accounts for their popularity.

Len

[Stephen Willard]

"This much I think, is clear: Without an allegiance to beauty, art degenerates into a caracature of itself; it is beauty that animates the aesthetic experience, making it so seductive, but aesthetic experience itself degenerates into a kind of fetish or idol if it is held up as an end in itself, untested by the rest of life."

I am trying to understand how that fits in with my own attempts at landscape photography. It seems like it should but I cannot find the correct words to define how the landscape photograph does this.

Any thoughts, suggestions or ideas?:confused:

This quote makes perfect sense to me.

It simply states that as an artist you must take your art to the market place and sell it. If your art is highly sellable then it will possess a combination of both beauty and aesthetics that has broad appeal to the market place and the artistic sensibility of many people who constitute that market. Selling your art in a market place is where your art is tested “by the rest of life” and not just the artist himself.

An excellent example of untested art is the conceptual art that is practiced at our foolish universities. Its focus is purely about the aesthetic experience and is basically unsellable and untested by the rest of life. Its efforts must be subsidized by grants and programs like art in public places. It would never be able to compete in a real world market place. Conceptual art is what I call welfare art, and personal I find it to be foolish and has “degenerated into a kind of fetish or idol”.

This quote states that its absolutely vital that an artist practice his art in a real world market place. Only then will his art become viable and worthy. Most of the great artist of our times did not come from our stupid universities, but rather had their feet placed squarely in the life of the market place. They went hungry selling their art, and that hunger became the great motivator for producing great art. I mean Shakespeare had to sell tickets to pay the bills, and thus, he had to produce plays that had broad appeal in the market place from the steerage that sat on the dirt floor at the Globe Theater to the Queen Elizabeth who was no dumb chick.

So stop thinking that commercialism will corrupt the artistic experience because it will do just the opposite, and start selling your photographs. If they do not sell then do some market research and figure out why. Only then will you be able to get better at it and starting making truly great works of photographic art that are highly sellable and possess great beauty and aesthetics.

Great quote!

[QT Luong]

> Actually, I think that the majority of people relate in a superficial way to landscape

A significant number of people who talk or write to me about my images do not say they admire them because they are pretty, but instead tell me about some of their experiences and emotions awaked by the images. Personally, I would not presume to call that superficial, but maybe it's just me.

> If you're looking for some sort of justification for doing what you do all you're going to end up doing is wasting precious time. Just do what makes you happy.

John Szarkowski, concluding the essay in Ansel Adams at 100 after musings about art:
"So if we ask the question, what did Ansel Adams do for us ? one useful answer would be : nothing, he did it all for himself"

> This quote states that its absolutely vital that an artist practice his art in a real world market place. Only then will his art become viable and worthy. Most of the great artist of our times did not come from our stupid universities, but rather had their feet placed squarely in the life of the market place.

The contemporary art galleries are also part of the marketplace. 1 x $20,000 = 100 x $200 ?

[John Kasaian]

Stephan Willard,
I makes perfect sense to me as well---I just can't figure out how to explain my photography in context with the thesis. Perhaps that's not important if the photographs can speak clearly for themselves?

[John Kasaian]

> Actually, I think that the majority of people relate in a superficial way to landscape

A significant number of people who talk or write to me about my images do not say they admire them because they are pretty, but instead tell me about some of their experiences and emotions awaked by the images. Personally, I would not presume to call that superficial, but maybe it's just me.

> If you're looking for some sort of justification for doing what you do all you're going to end up doing is wasting precious time. Just do what makes you happy.

John Szarkowski, concluding the essay in Ansel Adams at 100 after musings about art:
"So if we ask the question, what did Ansel Adams do for us ? one useful answer would be : nothing, he did it all for himself"

> This quote states that its absolutely vital that an artist practice his art in a real world market place. Only then will his art become viable and worthy. Most of the great artist of our times did not come from our stupid universities, but rather had their feet placed squarely in the life of the market place.

The contemporary art galleries are also part of the marketplace. 1 x $20,000 = 100 x $200 ?

Great observation, QT!
I think I get confused sometimes by what constitutes the "Art Establishment" To sell a print to real people, that can be appreciated and enjoyed by real people who find meaning in it (not "forced" by a museum or confederation of critics) would be a valid guage of a work getting the "Art" thing accomplished.

[Michael Alpert]

> Actually, I think that the majority of people relate in a superficial way to landscape. . . . Most of the great artist of our times did not come from our stupid universities, but rather had their feet placed squarely in the life of the market place.

I don't think that either of these quoted statements is useful. Most people in the US and Europe live in urban or suburban situations. With little experience of wilderness, these people relate to nature emotionally, not intellectually; but I would not characterize their response as superficial. They simply do not have enough experience to articulate what they feel when they are confronted with unfamiliar terrain. I think it would be prudent to assume that they know more than they say.

The second quoted remark is really questionable. Many of the great artists of the last century were, in fact, well-read and interested in ideas. Kandinsky comes to mind, as does Rothko. I (and you) could name many more. They may not have taught at universities (though some did, e.g., at the Bauhaus or at Black Mountain College), but they were alive to history and to the thought-provoking cultural currents of their time. To say that the market-place is in opposition to the kind of intellectual curiosity found on college campuses is mistaken. There is no opposition here; the two poles that are posited are apples and oranges.

[John Kasaian]

I don't think that either of your general statements is useful. Most people in the US and Europe live in urban or suburban situations. With little experience of wilderness, these people relate to nature emotionally, not intellectually; but I would not characterize their response as superficial. They simply do not have enough experience to articulate what they feel when they are confronted with unfamiliar terrain. I think it would be prudent to assume that they know more than they say.

Your second remark is really questionable. Many of the great artists of the last century were, in fact, well-read and interested in ideas. Kandinsky comes to mind, as does Rothko. I (and you) could name many more. They may not have taught at universities (though some did, e.g., at the Bauhaus or at Black Mountain College), but they were alive to history and to the thought-provoking cultural currents of their time. To say that the market-place is in opposition to the kind of intellectual curiosity found on college campuses is mistaken. There is no opposition here; the two poles you are positing are apples and oranges.

Michael,
I see what you're saying (I think) I'm musing over this with my second cup of coffee (I had a very late (4:30AM) night last night) and this occurred to me: Most portraits I see in people's homes are held in great reverence because they represent someone who is loved. Landscapes OTOH tend to fall into two categories: Either

1) it is a photograph that strikes a personal chord with the homeowner---anything from a snapshot of last Summer's vacation to one of Adam's Yosemite masterpieces in which the homeowner sees some value they desire to be either shared with either other members of the family or serves the memory as a way of reminding the homeowner of some experience that rings of a truth and is desireable. Or

2) It looks pretty(after a fashion.) Who determines what is pretty may either be the homeowner or a hired decorator. In either case it lacks any purpose other than to take up space and fill a blank wall. The landscapes in the second scenario tend to be more costly, too.

I'll see what insights I come up with during my third cup of joe!

[Michael Alpert]

QT,

I see that my previous quote might mistakenly lead people to think that the sentences I cited were your thoughts. I'll try to edit the post to make it more neutral. You were quoting others. I just want to make that clear.

[Mark Sloane]

I came across this qoute in an article by Roger Kimball also who wrote The Rape of the Masters: How Political Corectness Sabotages Art:

"This much I think, is clear: Without an allegiance to beauty, art degenerates into a caracature of itself; it is beauty that animates the aesthetic experience, making it so seductive, but aesthetic experience itself degenerates into a kind of fetish or idol if it is held up as an end in itself, untested by the rest of life."

I am trying to understand how that fits in with my own attempts at landscape photography. It seems like it should but I cannot find the correct words to define how the landscape photograph does this.

Any thoughts, suggestions or ideas?:confused:

John,

I can’t answer your question. I can only pose a new one.

Today I listened to “Somebody Like You” by Van Morrison and “Mean Disposition” by Muddy Waters. One had an “Allegiance to beauty” and the other was raw, powerful and filled with pain. Are they both art?

Could you make the same comparison with Impressionists and Cubists?

Paul Strand’s portrait of a blind woman doesn’t seem to have an allegiance to beauty. Or does it? Is it art? Or is it a “caricature” of art itself? And yet to me, the portrait Stieglitz did of his wife with her hand on her bare chest is the epitome of an “Allegiance to beauty”.

There appears to be no easy equation for you to drop your joy of landscape into. The answer(s) may take time to find you.

[John Kasaian]

John,

I can’t answer your question. I can only pose a new one.

Today I listened to “Somebody Like You” by Van Morrison and “Mean Disposition” by Muddy Waters. One had an “Allegiance to beauty” and the other was raw, powerful and filled with pain. Are they both art?

Could you make the same comparison with Impressionists and Cubists?

Paul Strand’s portrait of a blind woman doesn’t seem to have an allegiance to beauty. Or does it? Is it art? Or is it a “caricature” of art itself? And yet to me, the portrait Stieglitz did of his wife with her hand on her bare chest is the epitome of an “Allegiance to beauty”.

There appears to be no easy equation for you to drop your joy of landscape into. The answer(s) may take time to find you.

Beauty isn't neccesarily at odds with raw power or pain. Many natural landforms and features can be scarry and dangerous places exhibiting unrestrained power, but these are natural things and I see beauty in them. I am not familiar with the photographs you mention by Strand and Stieglitz so I can't comment on them but I'm not trying to catagorize the works of others here but rather to compose a statement to describe my own efforts.
You are right of course, this is going to take some time!

[john borrelli]

What this means to me, for landscape photography and relying only on this quote perhaps out of context....

I would say this quote suggests to me that to photograph an iconic landscape subject for example, without it meaning something personally, emotionally, shall I say artistically to me, might result in a less meaningful image than photographing those subjects that are closer to home, perhaps more mundane, but more meaningful to me.

Sometimes a photograph of a famous Yosemite view looks like a photograph of a photograph rather than of a place that meant something to the photographer standing there.

Someone brought up the example of portrait photography; isn't the best portrait, of a person or landscape, one that captures both the essence of the person and the artist.

[paulr]

Many natural landforms and features can be scarry and dangerous places exhibiting unrestrained power, but these are natural things and I see beauty in them.

You just hit the core difficulty of this discussion. "I see beauty in them." I hate to bring up clichés and truisms like "beauty is in the eye of the beholder," because these kinds of ideas seem to undermine serious discussions. If it's whatever anyone says it is, then it can't have any real meaning at all. But when you say "I see beauty in X" you're telling a truth that I think we can all relate to. Some people see beauty in things where others don't.

And maybe even more to the point, some art encourages us to see beauty where we might not have seen it on our own. Strand's blind woman was someone's example.

I've been fascinated with this almost as long as I've been photographing. Almost all of my work deals with subjects that few people would find beautiful. I'm not trying to make ugly art, but rather to explore the possibilities of finding beauty in more challenging guises. Whether or not the pictures accomplish this depends on who you ask.

Also keep in mind that artists and philosophers have been discussing what "beauty" means for as long as they've been discussing anything. The topic has been evolving, with unfailning contentiousness, for thousands of years. Johh Keats' Ode on a Grecian Urn gives us the perspective of a Romantic pondering the Classical: "'Beauty is truth, truth beauty,' - that is all / Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know."

But who can agree on what the Truth is? Unfortunately they closed the Lounge, so we'll never get to the bottom of that one ...

[Don Boyd]

John, I'm late to the discussion and appreciate the simple questions that I hear in your posting, is there beauty and relevance in my work, and, borrowing from Joseph Campbell, how does it contribute to my experience of being?. [/I][/I]And, like you, I often look at my images and ask myself what am I doing and why. And, probably like you and many others on this forum who pay a high cost in many forms to make our images, the question is a reflection of my frustration at not being able to reach the itch most of the time . . . hell, nearly all of the time.

I started a thread on the "Large Format: Technology of the Soul" over the summer that you participated in http://www.largeformatphotography.info/forum/showthread.php?t=38615. For me there is a strong relationship between beauty and soul, in many cases maybe they are interchangeable. One critical element for me when photographing is the experience of intimacy, a personal deep emotional connection with what I am creating in the way that I see through the lens. I guess I would use the word beauty to describe the experience in the connection. I think of art (and scientific discovery and humor) in the way that Arthur Koestler described it (The Act of Creation) as the connection that occurs when previously unrelated objects form a new meaning in me. It is my participation, the being born in me, that brings to life art. If our art is too far ahead of our times (or our rendering too poor) it will die an orphan, or show up later as the dead prophets voice (think Van Gogh). I think art occurs every time something is created in me, whether it's seconded by others or not. When others like it, and buy it, it gives me more opportunities. When they don't, I probably ask more of the kind of questions that you posed. Thanks for asking.

[john borrelli]

Just to clarify, the quote I am referring to above is John K's initial quote of Roger Kimball. Interesting thread!

[Patrik Roseen]

...
I've been fascinated with this almost as long as I've been photographing. Almost all of my work deals with subjects that few people would find beautiful. I'm not trying to make ugly art, but rather to explore the possibilities of finding beauty in more challenging guises. Whether or not the pictures accomplish this depends on who you ask.
...

On a few occasions I have experienced how my heart starts beating faster and how I stop breathing, as I look at a photograph or at a portfolio of photos. It's a great experience for me and it happens outside my control.

And PaulR, it happens as I look through your portfolio - thank you!

I really wish I could understand what it is that 'turns me on' ...so that I might be able to accomplish it myself.
I do not know how paulr feels about his own work or if he even understands himself how he does it. Genius I suppose.