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

[Bernice Loui]

"Subject is merely a means to utilize these three elements of visual language."
~Bernice Loui.

Assertions re-imposed again. Not just Photographs, it applies to what is processed by the visual perception system and much more.

This applies to each and every photographic image made to this date. Definition of a ~Photograph~
Photo = Photon aka light as defined as a small section of the electro magnetic spectrum.
Graph = "A diagram showing the relation between variable quantities" in the case of a photographic image, this would involve varying densities of tone-contrast ratios and possibly color.

Given these basic definition of the noun Photography, this implies then defines graph made using light. By extension the given will be light, shape/form then composition which is the overall system which these elements exist on a 2D flat sheet.

Without light, there can be no visible image, without shape/form there will not be content for the mind-brain to translate into meaning which is directly related to emotions and memory. Know the human mind-brain is a remarkable pattern recognition system. This is why shape/form is so important and holds meaning to what is processed by the human visual system coupled with the mind-brain.

As for your lecture, link to this lecture on the web or published Thesis or Studies on your Academic Assertions?


Bernice

Strong disagree here.
Place your sentence in any other context than photography and see how appealing it sounds?

Will you come to my lecture? Subject to me is merely a means to experience the sound of my own voice.

Ditto to Vaughn, it can be a trap to be so form-oriented.

[r.e.]

As for your lecture, link to this lecture on the web or published Thesis or Studies on your Academic Assertions?

I'd like to suggest that you re-read what Leni wrote about his lecture (the two italicised sentences, post #18).

His two sentences did trigger a question in my mind: "What would Marshall McLuhan respond?"

[r.e.]

The view on criticism that Bernice and Vaughn appear to hold reflects one approach that became fashionable during the 20th century, especially after World War I. It has been applied not just to the plastic arts, but to arts like theatre, dance and writing.

I think that matters such as what preceded the work, story and values are more important than the theory credits. For that reason alone, I did a double take at the equation of Weston's pepper with a Rodin sculpture. The theory requires a re-evaluation of the work of most of the important figures in the history of photography. It's entirely possible that the result is to say that the work of just about everybody from Julia Margaret Cameron to Jeff Wall is rubbish.

When asked what I think are the two greatest novels that I've ever read, I have no hesitation in replying Don Quixote from La Mancha and War and Peace. However, according to the theory that Bernice and Vaughn appear to recommend, I don't know whether these novels are any good, let alone masterpieces, because I've only read them in translation. To wit Robert Frost: In translation "poetry is what gets lost".

I suspect that most of the participants in this forum are well-aware of these differences of view. What interested me in this thread is that Bernice and Vaughn appear to be taking a position that is particularly hard line. Nothing wrong with that. They aren't the first. It just isn't my cup of tea. It's also not worth debating, because nobody's going to change his or her mind

For people who are interested in the issue, I would like to recommend Paul Fussell's The Great War and Modern Memory, first published 46 years ago but still very much in print.

[Jody_S]

A crucial element of photography remains storytelling. Nick Ut's Napalm Girl isn't a strong composition, focus might be a little off, it's grainy, but it remains one of the greatest photos of the 20th century. Contrast that to Kevin Carter's Starving girl with vulture, which is a much stronger composition with Kevin taking some pride in making an aesthetically pleasing photograph with all the right light and textures. But in so doing, he changed the story from 'there's a child starving to death about to be eaten by a vulture' to: 'why didn't that asshole help her instead of poncing around taking pictures?'

So light and a 2d area remain important elements of a photograph, but outside of what most of us do, storytelling and emotional attachments play a much greater role than textures and shapes and contrast.

[Bernice Loui]

The "hard line" is rooted in the current scientific-medical understanding of how the human visual systems coupled with the mind-brain functions.
It is a product of Neurology, Brain/mind studies, Psychology and similar Academia-Intellectual endeavors. Once these observations of the human condition is coupled trying to understand human behavior nets some consistent and viable fundamental aspects of why Art and Creativity is appealing to few or many.

Lets try it this way:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZbFM3rn4ldo

In the Feynman example of a flower, once that 3D to visualized/processed by the human visual/mind/brain system has been flatted into a 2D image, those three fundamental elements apply.. Light, Form-Shape, Composition which is a fixed given by the frame edges of the 2D image or the peripheral vision limits of the viewer..

Then we get into how visual perception is filtered by an individual's history, emotional make-up, personality tendencies and every other aspect of the human condition.


Bernice

[r.e.]

Bernice, if you want to be taken seriously, don't start saying that your views on art criticism are the necessary result of physics. At that point, you're saying that nobody can have a different view than yours, and that we should dismiss almost everything that has been written about aesthetics and art criticism for the last two thousand years, starting with Aristotle.

Really?

Have you re-read what Leni wrote and now understand what he was saying?

[lenicolas]

I don’t need to know more about the mind-brain that Rothko did, or Caravaggio or AA for that matter.

Maybe if these considerations enter an Artists mind when composing their pictures, is it why I find it hard to connect with said pictures?

[rdenney]

I enjoyed the comment about color taking the place of composition. A good way of putting it.

Adams said something related in the FilmAmerica biography of him. He said that color has a lot of scenery value, but that it can’t be manipulated as deeply can black and white without becoming “obviously unreal”.

Rick “interesting idea” Denney

[Tin Can]

August 2021 Artist in Residence: Nicole Mauser

https://www.latitudechicago.org/news...eid=66d7e0698e

[pdmoylan]

Color is its own genre. B&W images that usually work best for me have the widest gamut of tones and lots of information, but with a clear vision. Where E Weston perhaps fails us and where Adams found some success, is incorporation of the zone system and using the sharpest lenses available. My reference to John Sexton’s work, including his commercial B&W work, is technically and visually his is superior because he has the benefit of knowing how to maximize values and the skill as a printer to extract them. Take a still life Westin vs Sexton. Quite a difference in tonal palette and detail.

Other than the fact that Weston’s pepper looks like say an oddly lighted OlMec sculpture, I see no relevance to the Rodin sculpture - well maybe their surfaces reflect light similarly? IDK

Whether taken in color or B&W, the Human Condition has the greatest value to us because ii is closest to our own experience. Salgado, McCurry, war photographers generally, Jacob Aue Sobol (some of his work is quite extraordinary) or a host of others their images tug at our emotions. Observers tend to look at such images longer and with an eye of understanding and empathy (perhaps true also with images of animals).