Cindy Sherman Print Sells For $3.9 Million At Auction, The Highest Ever For A Photogr

[Mark Sawyer]

The problem with the cult of modernism for the sake of moderism is that it always
has to present something new. Otherwise neither you nor the museum earns its
merit badge. People who successfuly cater to this outlet often prove to be capable
of taking huge risks. In my immediate neigborhood it's Misrach. Do you know how
many complete bellyflops he landed before hitting the right chord? Friedlander was another one of these types; and the kinds of visual experiments he was doing, at least in the 70's, were pretty common here on the West Coast, but apparently came
across as new in certain influential circles. I find many of his images half-baked, or shoot-from-the-hip, even with 8X10,rather than profound, but sometimes interesting
nonetheless. He tried to take things maybe a step further than Harry Callahan, but compositionally left a much bigger mess in his wake. I'm particularly disappointed
in his failure to recognize the significance of the front/back pull of selective focus,
which is something even the then despised Photo-Sessesionists became quite skilled
at. And discussing what he was doing with a dog in the picture? There's no guarantee
he even saw it, or that it meant anything to him. Chopping it straight in half certainly isn't particulary effective.

Perhaps not effective in your eyes, but it did something in his eyes. Whether he saw it or not when shooting, (I'd guess he did, and may even have moved his position to cut the dog in half), he certainly saw it in the editing phase. A very consistant trait in Friedlander's work is always playing with such photographic conventions.

Modernism with a Capital M goes back to the early twentieth century for photography, (mid- to late nineteenth for painting), but thankfully, you used the small m! Current trends seem all over the place, and have since the 1970's. Maybe it's always been that way, and the more distant past seems more coherent because it's all been sorted out for us. Today everybody seems to be jumping on different bandwagons or striking out on their own, trying to be the next big thing, or at least get in on it. Soooo many different directions... and to quote Harry Nilsson, "a point in every direction is the same as no point at all."

[Drew Wiley]

What I particularly despised at the time was the way certain photographers would
blast away at something relatively complicated and simply ignore the issue of focus,
then afterward have it printed it as blaah as possible. It was another one of those
"let it all hang out" prententious ploys to look "creative". The worst images were Misrach's Louisiana swamp series, where he went around in the dark randomly firing his flash gun off, without even seeing what he was shooting. Then there were several guys in So.Cal who were taking analogous pictures in daylight out in the desert - they got their fifteen minutes (seconds?) of fame and I certainly can't even remember their names. Friedlander artsified this same pretentious approach to landscape by doing it in "classic" 8X10 black and white, but with the same deliberate flaws in technique. Just a gimmick as far as I'm concerned - doesn't add anything to the images' visual merit or interest. Just detracts. There is always a risk of
premeditating or pandering to the sterotypes of the museum circuit once you choose that career path. Reminds me of the hippies back in the day ... the more they tried
to look different from everyone else, the more they all started looking and smelling alike.

[Brian K]

Brian, yeah you've made yourself very clear already. You don't seem to want to engage in discussion so much as build walls at the edges of a 'camp'.

FWIW I enjoy your work, but certainly no single school of expression holds the rights on beauty and meaning. Would you prefer that I not admire your work if I also see merit in Eggleston and Friedlander? Are the tastes irreconcilable?

Colin, you didn't exactly keep the context did you? "Colin, you can break down photography into 2 camps, obviously there's a million different ways but here's just two major differences in point of view." The term "million" denotes many other means to differentiate work. But I think that the two opposing points of view I mention are pretty common and are a deep divide in philosophy.

And actually expression is not a term up for re-intepretation. Expression is an absolute, it's a did or didn't. The most common definition of express used in terms of art and communication of any sort is, "to make known the opinions and feelings of oneself" (Webster's). Honestly without reading something about the meaning of his work, or this particular image, do you know with reasonable certainty what is being expressed? Has Freidlander made his opinions or feelings known in this image? If not then by definition this image is not expressive.

And while beauty is in the eye of the beholder, most notions of beauty have endured for millennia and the way in which the human eye perceives things has changed little. Do you think that Friedlander's work is beautiful or interesting?

As for your view of my work and Friedlander's work maybe being of irreconcilable tastes, that's up to the viewer. My POV is different than yours because my photographic background is very different from yours. We all bring or own life experiences to our opinions and when I get this crap about being closed minded, maybe it's because after more than three and half decades of doing this full time at a pretty competitive level, I've edited out or have little patience for the bull shit. And BTW I'm not the only person in this thread who has little regard for Sherman or Friedlander.

And I don't expect to change your opinion, all I am doing is expressing my opinion. I don't appreciate Friedlander or Sherman, you do, so what's the big deal?

[Jim Jones]

[QUOTE=paulr;732548]. . . I moved to NYC in 1995 partly so I could have easy access to the photos I wanted to see and the people I wanted to show work to. Not too many years later, it stopped mattering where you live. Anyone can see any work online, and the galleries, publishers, and curators don't want to see people or prints face-to-face anymore. It's all done by email. I have the same access to the Brooklyn museum living in Brooklyn as I would if I lived in Guam. . . .QUOTE]

Viewing good photography online is rather like listening to Mahler's 8th symphony on a cheap clock radio. No wonder the quality of some photography is so dismal.

[paulr]

Viewing good photography online is rather like listening to Mahler's 8th symphony on a cheap clock radio. No wonder the quality of some photography is so dismal.

Listening on a clock radio is better than not listening at all.

It's funny, I'm a recovered (I hope) audiophile, but still have the remnants of a decent stereo. My friend Evan, a composer, hangs out listening with me from time to time. He gets a kick out of hearing music on a good system, but makes it clear that it's of no substantial importance to him. As he puts it, "I'm a notes and rhythm guy." And I know he hears more in the symphony played on a clock radio than I can hear live at Lincoln Center.

At any rate, seeing photographs on screen often gives me 90% of what I need to know. There's very little work that's so dependent on print quality or scale or minute detail that you'll have no meaningful idea what you're looking at. The quality tradeoffs are worth the access. Isn't it great that people don't have to live in major cosmopolitan cities just to stay in the loop?

[Marko]

Viewing good photography online is rather like listening to Mahler's 8th symphony on a cheap clock radio.

Viewing good photography online/listening to good music on a cheap pocket radio beats not being able to see/listen to any photography/music at all. Hands down.

It is easy to forget how many people in this country alone, much less the world, would have no access to galleries, libraries or concert halls without the Internet. The very fact that some of our heavily rural members even need to be reminded of the simple fact demonstrates how profound it really is.

[Colin Graham]

No big deal Brian, sorry if it came across that way. I might have misdirected a little irritation at you due to the general harrumphing in the thread.

Interesting point about expression, but I don't buy expression being conditional on a mutual, agreed understanding of a statement. I'm sure many artists would blanch visibly at the reasons why I like their work, doesn't make it any less valuable to me. I've made work I am quite proud of that falls absolutely flat- again, doesn't make it any less valuable to me.

I'm not very good at explaining why I like things, words just fail me. I'm out of my depth there. But I know I enjoy looking at much of Friedlander's work, it just sort of clicks into place, and then I want to see more.

[paulr]

And actually expression is not a term up for re-intepretation. Expression is an absolute, it's a did or didn't. The most common definition of express used in terms of art and communication of any sort is, "to make known the opinions and feelings of oneself" (Webster's).

Even if we could all agree on the definition of "expression," that doesn't mean we'll agree this is the only possible goal of art. In fact, until the Romantic era, you didn't often hear artists talking about it. Their goals were largely different. And afterwards, Modernism largely moved away from personal expression (I can make a very strong case that all of Ansel's and most of Stieglitz's work is Romantic with a capital R in this regard).

The late modernists moved especially far away from ideas of personal expression (at least as the primary goal of what they were doing) and postmodernists were more interested in undermining tropes like expression or self.

None of this is to privilege one goal over another, but to demonstrate, again, that your ideas about these goals are not universal or timeless, but rather come out of a movement that can be traced to a particular time and place.

Also of note: once upon a time, this movement was seen as new, faddish, and decadent for many of the reasons you're dismissing movements that came later.

Honestly without reading something about the meaning of his work, or this particular image, do you know with reasonable certainty what is being expressed? Has Freidlander made his opinions or feelings known in this image? If not then by definition this image is not expressive.

Any image that communicates with "reasonable certainty" what it's about strikes me not as expressive, but as reductive, simplistic, and boring. I see enough work that's free of ambiguity, open-endedness, irony, or mystery when I'm forced to look at ads.

[paulr]

Szarkowski is by far my favorite author on photography subjects. I thought I had all his books and don't remember reading anything about Friedlander. I'll do some checking around and see what I can find.

Yes, yes, he wrote tons about Friedlander. Friedlander was his favorite of anyone in the late 20th Century.

A really nice essay in Looking at Photographs (p. 204 in my edition).

[Mike Lopez]

And the introductory essay to Self-Portrait is well worth reading.