ku # 587 ~ Spring has sprung # 21
Thursday, April 23, 2009 at 09:31AM 
Tamarack bog # 5 • click to embiggenReturning to the notion of hand of the photographer, invisible-wise, Wright Morris also had this to say:
In photography we can speak of anonymous as a genre. It is the camera that takes the picture; the photographer is the collaborator. What we sense to be wondrous, to occasion awesome, as if in the presence of the supernatural, is the impression we have of seeing what we have turned out backs on. As much as we crave the personal, and insist upon it, it is the impersonal that moves us. It is the camera that glimpses life as the Creator might have seen it ... [I] would personally prefer that the photograph was stamped Photographer Unknown. This would assure me, rightly or wrongly, that I was seeing a fragment of life, a moment of time, as it was. The photographer who has no hand to hide will conceal it with the least difficulty. Rather than than admiration, for work well done, I will feel the awe of revelation. The lost found, the irretrievable retrieved.
Reading and reading and reading again, this passage brings to mind an experience of a certain artist-photographer of my acquaintance. He was given the opportunity to show his work to one of the prime mover and shakers of the Photography as Art world. Long story short, the aspiring artist-photographer was both stunned and chagrined that his audition lasted all of about 2 minutes - that's about how long it took for the gate-keeper to look at and dismiss his portfolio (not as worthless, just as worthless to him).
Upon hearing about this encounter, my first thought was something about the notion of the self-important-pompous-ass kind of thing - and there was little doubt that there was an element of that just by the manner in which he comported himself - but, on the other hand, the man was most likely just evidencing his personal likes and dislikes. Likes and dislikes that were no doubt derived and tempered from years of experience of either feeling the awe of revelation or not.
Now, I must admit that feeling the awe of revelation, the sense of (re)discovering the lost found, the irretrievable retrieved, or even to glimpse life as the Creator might have seen it - all of these sensations are what I crave and most enjoy when viewing pictures. And, above all, what I most seek and enjoy when making pictures is the feeling of seeing (and picturing) what we have turned out backs on.
And, in should go almost without saying, that I like those sensations and qualities in a picture best when I feel, rightly or wrongly, that I was seeing a fragment of life, a moment of time, as it was. A feeling that puts me squarely in the camp of reality-related picturing, picturing in which the hand of the photographer, if not invisible, is at least an excellent example of visual léger de main, aka - slight of hand. The only thing I want to know about the hand of the photographer is his/her idea of what is important - that is to say, picturing making is, first and foremost, about the process of selection.
IMO, pictures are best when the picture maker simply shows me (and shows me in a simple manner - the notion of an "impersonal" view of things) what it is that you want me to see. I am not all that interested in his/her experience of the thing pictured because, as a human being, I "crave the personal" but I like it best when I am left to my own devices when it comes to decyphering why it is the "impersonal that moves me(us)".
There is a great irony in all of this "impersonal" view of things because, IMO, the best pictures are most often created by a picture maker who, on one hand, is very personally connected to his/her subject but, nevertheless, on the other hand, manages to make pictures that appear to be (léger de main) coolly impersonal glimpses of something that they see that the rest of us are missing. The picture maker thereby offers the viewer, not propaganda, but rather a kind of inkblot test from which we can draw our own conclusions.
Reader Comments (2)
Fine image!
Over the years I "missed" a lot of great images by focusing on what Mark would say are, "the pretty pictures".
But I have changed and I will try to explain it like this.
Drive a car one mile from your house.
Now go back and this time you be the passenger and let someone else drive the route. You will ne surprised what you missed.
Now take it further, walk that same mile, now see what you really missed, you will probably run out of space on your memory card.
It is the only way I can explain it.
My wife and I both look at photography a lot differently then we did just a few years ago.