“Good composition is merely the strongest way of seeing.”

[Tin Can]

you broke cover and scramble, good!

I run hot, without passion we are stone

I wake each morning with so much energy, I take notes for later, as reality appears...

sadly

This is where I diverge.
...It is unclear to me how one translates emotion into the making of a photograph. In fact I eschew emotion in any creative process because it seems to limit possibilities. Keeping open visually, maintaining a calm awareness, once one has skill/craft honed, is the way I work.

[pdmoylan]

Weston’s Excusado is an object which is framed distinctively but which lacks in visual impact, though for its time, it was breaking free from convention. Like many Dadaists of the period, it is providing a new perspective on a familiar product.

So take Caspar David Fiedrick’s “Wanderer above Sea and Fog”, or Wyeth’s “Christina”, are these about a subject, or more about a concept of the artists, therefore objects within the scene.

And if the girl in “Christina” is rather the subject, why is her back toward’s us, and why is Wyeth so keen to provide the curve of her body as a balance to the broader landscape?

Neither of the people in these paintings is the “subject”, but rather a visual amplification of the artists concept, for Friederick, a romanticized notion of man’s relationship with nature, and for Wyeth, a penetrating psychological journey into an individual’s vulnerability perhaps.

[h2oman]

.. but which lacks in visual impact...

I thought I was sort of in your camp on all this, but now I'm not so sure!

[pdmoylan]

well H2O, I believe it was J. Campbell who said follow your bliss, but with ageI am following the dictates of my brain. Sorry, not trying to confuse.

[Tin Can]

we may be moot

humans are caught in many corners, we may not escape

art...

for whomhttps://www.google.com/search?q=art+...hrome&ie=UTF-8


I think you missed my earlier handle

NOT ART

[pdmoylan]

“… handle”.

Nothing there to latch onto - seen but neither understood nor embraced.

[h2oman]

Light, Form-Shape, Composition are three foundational and fundamental language elements of any 2D image be it a Photograph, Painting, Print or similar. Subject is merely a means to utilize these three elements of visual language.

I like the Weston toilet image for several reasons. First, it was a video centered around Weston that started this thread. Second, when I look at it, all I see (see, not feel) are light, form-shape (and I'll include here texture - the polish of the porcelain), and composition. Finally, there are some very distinct compositional choices Weston made, that are quite easy to discern.

Those who photograph portraits or still lifes get to determine the arrangement of their subjects in space, but those of us who photograph things like architecture, nature, or toilets control composition only by where we place our camera and how we put a frame around what is in front of us. When I look at Weston's photograph from a compositional point of view, here is what I see: He chose to center the subject in the frame, and make it occupy almost the entire frame (the latter done done by choice of focal length). He chose to photograph from a low point of view, and slightly off-center. And that is the end of composition as I see it, in that image. The subject is very important (especially how it reflects light), as is the direction and intensity of light, but I wouldn't consider those to be aspects of composition. (Bernice seems to agree with me on that.) Nor would I consider any emotional feeling the artist had when making the image, or that they might try to evoke in a viewer, to be part of composition. (The idea of trying to evoke a particular emotion in a viewer is a bit laughable, as we have no idea what life experiences a viewer brings with them.)

I'm not trying to change anyone's mind here, just expressing this simpleton's notion of composition!

[Vaughn]

His toilet was an inspiration! On my bathroom wall: Our beach motel room's toilet, Costa Rica, ca1992 and a line of no longer used urinals at the Marin Headlands. Available light. Both 16x20 prints from 4x5 negs. with 150mm lens.

[h2oman]

I enjoyed comparing and contrasting the composition of your second image with the composition Weston chose for his single toilet.

[Vaughn]

Thanks...Watching me making the toilet image in Costa Rica, is when I think my (now ex) wife realized I was probably not going to make a lot of money as a photographer.

BTW...the single toilet image is titled, "No Excuse"