[QUOTE=Darin Boville;491751
The art world seems to produce lightweights like this by the bushel. It's a sign of what a intellectual backwater art is--utterly dwarfed by the achievements in science, literature, film...
n[/QUOTE]
Literature and film aren't art? Okay
I suspect you are willfully missing the point.Originally Posted by Nick_3536
--Darin
Wait -- let me get the popcorn going!
Politically, aerodynamically, and fashionably incorrect.
For the NYT piece, the context was not purely art. It was supposed to be an artful inspection of the impact of the housing crisis, seen via incomplete and empty buildings. The places shown were presented as being real places, and real outcome of the crisis. A commentary on the end of a gilded age.
The problem was that the places were not real. The 'digital manipulation' sounds as if maybe he cloned out a pole, or a person, or perhaps a little dodging; it was not. He did things such as take one half of a photograph and mirror it to the other half, meaning fully 1/2 of the photograph was 'fake'. He PS'd the second half slightly to make it not an exact duplicate. Many of his photographs show evidence of this sort of technique. The symmetry gives the photographs a very interesting, very formal and cold flavour that I quite like, but they are no longer photographs of the original place; this goes far beyond the usual tweaking.
He is, IMO, a talented artist who was not content with that, and lied about his work to gain further work and fame.
His response is drivel, trying to justify his actions, when he should just be hanging his head and accepting his medicine. Have a little shame, man.
So it would seem.
The only paragraph in all the links that was intelligible was the first paragraph written by Alex Fradkin. But I could distill it even plainer:
Martins work does not depend on factual representation, and nobody looking at his work would expect it to. But he made a deal with the Times knowing their rules and policies, supplied photos that broke those rules, and then fibbed about it (perhaps by default). He got caught, and his response was to confuse the issue as much as possible with a long and incomprehensible diatribe about the nature of truth and reality. Manipulating photos for the sake of art is as old as the medium itself, and is utterly expected in all other forms of art. But it's a no-no when claiming to represent plain physical reality. When caught fibbing about it, an appeal to the meaninglessness of the concept of plain physical reality is likely to fall on deaf ears. Especially when it's done in language only an art student could love.
It reminds me of when I moved to Virginia. I was having a house built here, and needed a place to stay for a few months, mostly for occasional sleep between long business trips. So, I thought I would rent a room. I responded to an ad in the paper, and went to view the room and talk to the owner. He told me the story of the previous renter: "He was unable to synchronize himself with the harmonic resonance of the household."
My response, "He never paid his rent on time, eh?"
"Never once."
Me, again, "I'll tell you what. You put a good lock on that door, and I'll pay you by the 20th of every month. Does that harmony resonate with you?"
"Deal."
Rick "wondering if he has essentialized the topic" Denney
Now it's been discovered that some of Capa's most famous,heroic,risky,daredevil WWII combat photos were faked (safely staged far from the front line). Pretense runs all through this business!
Which ones ? I was aware only of the controversy about a Spanish Civil War image (see the Lounge). A photographer who landed with the first wave of troops on Omaha Beach will always have my respect.
QT - this Capa thing seems to becoming quite a debate. Since I'm certainly no expert at it, the dust will just have to settle after the historians have done their work. It reminds me of when some of the famous Eugene Smith shots turned out to
be doctored. Same thing has occurred in the literature of exploration. Many of the
stories which John Muir and Clarence King wrote about their life in the Sierras, for
example, contained a considerable amount of utter BS to make their books more
marketable. Having been to many of the same places you get an idea for what was
authentic and what was embellished. In that era people read a lot of books for
entertainment; today a lot of our after-hours recreation is visual. Photoshop is
merely the most efficient way to bend the truth, but certainly not the only way!
Since the Capa thing is still unfolding, people are snooping around to see if any of
his work outside the Spanish civil war is also suspect. Certainly doesn't mean he
wasn't capable of great bravery if that was what was required to get the shot,
but it does sort of bust him as a myth.
What isn't
Who isn't
Show me the people in this thread who have not cherry picked from others and claim that work as their own original thought
Show me something new
Seems to me if the people talking were original they wouldn't EVEN bother spending time on largeformatphotography.info/forums
I just doubt it
Take the books away from people and see what you get
Not saying you shouldn't borrow
Just that if you
ONLY
borrow
:/
If you're smart you know these types
If you're smart and do not
You're one of em
I love the fashionable words people use too
The ever so eloquent phrasing
It's real
Each and every time
One or two always sneak in to discredit
always
but "they're" the ones doin all the fakery
I'm calling 85% BS or 100% http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ymsHL...e=channel_page
One dude is fake but he's comedy
The other is a mess
A true dude wouldn't bother with the other or at least at least wouldn't overplay himself
None of this sht round these internets though
never
Cannot happen
The clique will form a ring
I visited his web site and found much of his work to be soulless and bland. I've seen better color rendition out of Holgas. However. That is not the question being asked. The issue seems to be about the verbage in Mr. Martin's response.
Case in point: "I acknowledge that digitally altering photographs, in itself, does not constitute a problem when presented in a non-indexical context."
I graduated from Penn State University with a degree in English / Creative Writing. I have no idea what a "non-indexical context" is. When I entered college, I was of the opinion that the larger the words I used, the better a writer I was. A wise professor, whose name I forget, wrote on my first writing assignment, "This is verbal masturbation." The effect on my style was immediate. Someone should tell Mr. Martin the same thing. His reply to the criticisms about his use of Photoshop are rendered utterly meaningless by the stilted language.
As a direct answer to QT Luong's question, do you have to be able to express yourself in such a way to fit into contemporary art photography? No. He's just being a boob.
--Gary
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