Why "no people" in American Landscape Photography?

[Gordon Moat]

I try to distinguish between landscape and wilderness. Quite often wilderness images appeal to adventurers, travelers, and escapists, or hark back to nostalgic paintings of the American West. I think what is often lost, especially in images of tall trees, or even taller rock formations, is that without some human sense of scale it becomes difficult for the viewer to appreciate the grandiose nature of the wilderness.

Landscape is what I would consider any images mostly showing land. Oddly enough, when I view my website statistics, and see the click-throughs from LF Forum, most of the viewers first wander to Landscape on my website. Undoubtedly some might be disappointed to see cities, buildings, beaches, and people. The landscape I grew up in was a seaside port, and it is that landscape I enjoy, and that which I am most familiar.

Ciao!

Gordon Moat Photography

[h2oman]

I just received the book "Glen Canyon: Images of a Lost World." The Photography is by a fellow named Tad Nichols. The first thing that struck me was how many of the photos have a human in them. They are usually strategically placed as a sillhouette against a light background, or light against dark. I'm not sure whether I like it or not. It seems fine for a few shots, but then starts to feel a bit cliche.

Oh yeah, I just thought of what may be my favorite landscape with humans in it, by Bradford Washburn. It is number 9 in this gallery:

http://outside.away.com/outside/feat...rn-photos.html

Select "View Bradford Washburn's Gallery" and go to photo #9.

[John Kasaian]

FWIW,I think humans sometimes provide a needed sense of scale within landscapes. Other than that, IMHO, the photo becomes less about landscape and more about people. Not bad---but not landscape.
I've got attempted landscapes which over the years have morphed from being landscapes to historical oddities such as "hippies smoking dope at Big Sur" and "RVers watching tv in Yosemite Valley."

This is, IMHO and unfavorable contrast to more painterly inspired pictures of the past, where people were a part of the landscape and not regarded as ecological trespassers.

I wouldn't hesitate to take a photo of a meadow being turned by a plow boy working a team of draft horses, or young girls picking wild flowers.

Of course plow boys and teams of draft horses aren't very common these days, and picking wildflowers will get you a citation!

[nathanm]

Landscape photography allows the photographer and viewer to have a brief respite from people for a little while, and to imagine the world as you want it to be, not as it is. We deal with fellow humans all the time and it's nice to stare into a little window devoid of all the issues humans bring along with them.

[Frank Petronio]

Because when the settlers were traveling West, they killed everyone in front of them, and that ethos carries over to today.

[kev curry]

...

[Toyon]

Because when the settlers were traveling West, they killed everyone in front of them, and that ethos carries over to today.

There was plenty of murder before the settlers arrived. But the settlers did add racist and religious rationalization.

[Frank Petronio]

Right. Before that Indians killed their neighbors with similar beliefs and DNA.

[Bill_1856]

The question came to mind after looking at some Chinese landscape paintings that included people as part of the overall view of nature.
Thanks
Ric

There is a great deal of difference in a viewer's interpretation between pictures portraiting people as distinct elements of the composition, and those where the people are merely generic figures in the composition.
And don't you be dissin' St. Ansel neither, bro.

[Nathan Potter]

I don't think I know of any current ethic that disallows people or their objects in landscape pictures. The decision is wholly up to the photographer. What you are seeing in current landscape photography is mostly landscapes. Those images devoid of people are planned that way either for a lack of someone to stand in the picture or perhaps the photographer believes the inclusion of a human will weaken the composition.

I suspect that those among us who do landscapes are recording and celebrating the natural beauty of the scene and inclusion of human form or related artifacts don't contribute to the image.

OTOH the inclusion of the human form may be appropriate for some photographic statements when the presence of the human form is intimately connected to the landscape in some fashion.

It is indeed curious how much Chinese and Japanese artwork contains both figures and landscape. But then I recall that such artwork often tells an extended story of some sort and the connection of the classic landscape to people is a kind of sacred heritage maybe where the landscape emulates the people. That kind of connection has yet to evolve in western culture.

Nate Potter, Austin TX.