Hello,

There's something I've been thinking about and I'm wondering if you lovely people would share your opinions and ideas. It's in regards to levels of success that certain fine art photographers have garnered.

On one hand you have the likes of Thomas Struth, Hiroshi Sugimoto, Taryn Simon, Edward Burtynsky et al. who seem to have struck the photography lottery and their work sells for millions. On the other hand, you have photographers like Alec Soth, Bryan Schutmaat, Jack Latham etc. These people no doubt have well deserved success and accolades and are probably making a good living selling their work, but I'm guessing their prints aren't creating bidding wars for high end collectors looking for an investment opportunity.

I guess my question is what separates these two kinds of success in the art world? Why does work by Struth, Sugimoto and others go for such grand prices? Is it the clarity/ universality of their concepts? Is it about scale/ production value? Or is it that, at that high level of art, the artist becomes more important than the work itself?

I don't know if my thoughts are getting across but if anyone has any insight or thoughts I'd love to hear them! To be clear, I'm not trying to put down any of the work from photographers that I've mentioned but it's just out of sheer curiosity regarding the world of fine art and photography's place in it that I' asking!

Thanks!