Robert Frank: "There are too many images."

[paulr]

I see nothing but evidence that the public cares about photography (as art) more than ever. I see higher prices paid for photography at galleries and auctions, I see more photography-only galleries and more galleries that include photography among other mediums. I see more photography books published than ever, more photography grants, more photography programs in schools, more photography web sites. And more interest in participation.

This year I've also sold more work than I have before, and it's been to people with no formal art collecting background.

I have not seen evidence of the gutting of the mid-range (but I also wonder what era people making these claims are comparing with ... have they adjusted for inflation? $500 in 1988 equals $1000 today ...). If there is indeed a loss of the middle-market, this could be interpreted in different ways. An obvious one is that the price disparity between photography and other media is eroding. How often do you see a $500 painting at a commercial gallery in a big city?

Frames for my prints cost more today than my prints did back when I was in college. So I'm glad to see expectations for cost on the rise.

None of this has anything to do with the commercial photography world, which indeed seems to have been gutted. Part of that is everyone having a camera, part of it is the move to stock imagery, and part is just the internet culture of not valuing "content."

[Toyon]

From an interview in Vanity Fair, Robert Frank’s Unsentimental Journey, April 2008:


Quite provocative, eh? What value is there for the watcher, when all that is watched is equal?

For myself, that means that the dedicated photographer becomes more important. The photographer must not only see, but the images must be seen, and rise above the noise. Without that, it all becomes lost. While there is value for the creator, the real creator who is dedicated to creating, the value for the watcher diminishes because there is an overloading avalanche of information. Moonrise, puppy dog, Mona Lisa, lunch food on the plate, all the same, all delivered the same way.

"It is the same with him about photography. Digital photography destroys memory, he believes, with its ability to erase. Art school is another problem, teaching students to be blind. Editors are worse—they poke the artist’s eyes out. Photography: one minute it’s not art at all. Then perhaps it is. And then again it is not. That’s Robert Frank."

It is not a great argument by Frank. There has been an exponential increase in images in recent years, probably on the same order again as that enabled by cheap Kodak photography. But, as long as great images have the power to stop people in their tracks and elicit strong emotions, there will be photography as an art. Furthermore, his connection between the much lower volumes of imagery in the past and the credibility of photography as an art seems tenuous. It seems that he is an old man feeling overwhelmed by the magnitude of change in his world.

My fear is a little different, that young people may no longer be able to comprehend imagery that does not move or respond to their touch, or that is manipulated to serve their personal data profile. It seems many have already lost the ability to look at art for a sustained period of time (more than momentary). Looking at art is not only instinct, there are aspects to be learned and skills to be developed.

[Fred L]

...My fear is a little different, that young people may no longer be able to comprehend imagery that does not move or respond to their touch, or that is manipulated to serve their personal data profile. It seems many have already lost the ability to look at art for a sustained period of time (more than momentary). Looking at art is not only instinct, there are aspects to be learned and skills to be developed.

I wouldn't worry about this too much, at least from what I'm observing. In Toronto, a number of small galleries were opened up by young photographers/curators and they hang work produced by other young/emerging photographers who work in either media (film and digital). From my personal experience, they're discussing the work as well and not just superficially.

Might it be because Toronto has the Contact photo festival and there *might* be more photographic literacy here, I don't know. Exhibition spaces run from high end galleries to very public, large outdoor displays. There have also been guerrilla displays as well (some friends did this a few years ago).

I tend to agree with the 'filtering' concept. There are fewer filters now as people can post what they please without any critical walls to pass through.

[VictoriaPerelet]

From an interview in Vanity Fair, Robert Frank’s Unsentimental Journey, April 2008:

April 2008? Too many images? At that time only few selected hardcore Apple fans had iPhone and "selfie" was not part of everyday lexicon. 1st Android phone was sold in small quantities. I'm not sure if instagram was around either. In April 2008 portraiture busines was listed in Yellow pages.


That was long time ago Now everybody has camera in the pocket and selfie is preferred way of capturing personality.

Car driver was very specialized profession at the beginning of the last century. Nobody complains about too many cars today, except environmentalists.

[Tin Can]

April 2008? Too many images?....Nobody complains about too many cars today, except environmentalists.

And retired mechanics.

[JMB]

It's directly trashing digital.

Why should we presume a thing to be above its true name?

[Sal Santamaura]

...Can we all get along? Without trashing each other's methods?

I think there's a difference between "trashing" and upholding something that does have virtues...

Indeed there is. What Toyon posted isn't "upholding" anything. It's directly trashing digital...

Why should we presume a thing to be above its true name?

OK, now that the sequence of posts and replies from which you elected to take a small snippet out of context has been made clear, let's see if there is any meaning in what you posted.

Your wording, in response to "It's directly trashing digital," asks a rhetorical question about whether digital is being held above its true name. That construction is utter nonsense. Chemical photography is a tool set. Digital photography is a tool set. These are English language words for tool sets. Neither tool set is intrinsically better or worse than the other; they're merely different. It is impossible to hold digital above its true name because the name is simply a description of it.

Implicit in your "question" is the claim that digital photography is inferior to chemical photography. It isn't. It's just different. Again, can we all get along? Without trashing each other's methods?

[Maris Rusis]

[QUOTE]

...Chemical photography is a tool set. Digital photography is a tool set. These are English language words for tool sets. Neither tool set is intrinsically better or worse than the other; they're merely different. It is impossible to hold digital above its true name because the name is simply a description of it...
[/QUOTE

Sal, that concept of "tool set" is brilliant. It gets to the heart of all picture-making processes, not just photography, and enables media to be distinctly identified. One doesn't need a degree in cybernetics or information theory to follow the work flow of a very familiar "tool set" I'll try to describe. Please forgive any obscure lapses into abstraction.

First there is illuminated subject matter that sends light to a lens mounted in front of a megapixel sensor. The lens focusses an image of the subject onto the sensor and the sensor transduces the light energy, pixel by pixel, into a stream of electrical impulses that travel up a cable. The electrical impulses are accumulated in a memory from whence they are processed. Processing can include editing the memory by deleting things, adding things, stitching together memories obtained at different times, or summing memories of bright and dark things (HDR if you like) to compensate for sensor limitations, or summing memories at different focus settings (focus stacking if you like) to defeat optical law.

The end result of all the editing, stitching, summing, and subtracting is a picture file ready to be turned into visible form. This is done by a mark-making "engine" operating under the control of a set of instructions that link the picture file with the actions of the mark-maker. Marks are accordingly placed on a flat surface and the pattern of marks is interpreted by a viewer as a picture.

The previous two hard to read paragraphs describe the "tool set" that has generated a large proportion of the world's greatest art treasures namely Western Realist Painting. The lens and sensor system is of course the artist's eye and optic nerve, the memories and processing happen in the artist's brain, and the mark-making engine is the artist's hand wielding a paint brush.

For the purposes of debate I'll suggest that the parallel between realist painting and modern digital picture-making is stunning and persuasive. People today working in the digital domain are standing in the same creative stream as Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo, and Vincent van Gogh. It's just that they don't realise it yet.

Then there are people making pictures out of light-sensitive substances who start with illuminated subject matter but have a radically different "tool set". Their creative stream is so far rather less grand.

Sal Santamaura is dead right about one thing: "Neither tool set is intrinsically better or worse than the other; they're merely different..." And Robert Frank might have worried less about too many images if he realised they weren't endless instances of the same thing.

[Sal Santamaura]

...Robert Frank might have worried less about too many images if he realised they weren't endless instances of the same thing.

Posting a lot of obfuscatory, vaguely positive-sounding "stuff" about digital photography before subtly repeating the "they're just multiple copies resulting from pressing the print button" attack won't work.

Can we all get along? Without trashing each other's methods?

[paulr]

Re: the toolsets being different ...

I think they're different primarily in how the user interacts with them.

If you compare them carefully enough, the fundamental differences seem rather insignificant. Semiotically, as image-making tools, they are identical. And on molecular and quantum levels, I think a lot of people would be surprised to see how similar the light/energy state reactions are between a silver halide crystal and and silicon sensor cell. The differences lie almost entirely in how we work with that captured information.

We may differ in which working methods we prefer. We may even differ in how how important we consider our working styles. It's silly to try to elevate either of these subjective preferences to something of general importance.