urban ku # 135 ~ fiction and truth

History, fiction or both? • click to embiggenStephen Connor wrote; "... Jeff Wall's photographs are "true" in the sense that, yep, he accurately (very) photographed something in the real world. He photographed actual events. But, he truthfully photographed a staged event. The models were really there, really doing what Wall shows them doing, but what they were really doing was acting. So, where does the "truth" lie (so to speak) in these photos? Real photos of real actors really pretending to do something that they really weren't. Except that they were. But not really."

Which brings to mind the fact that fiction can more real than truth. It is the truth of a well-told story. It is true not to life but to a shared experience in imagination. 'Truth' that is imaginative without being imaginary.

Photographers are hard on themselves when it comes to 'truth'. We allow authors, film makers, poets, sculptors and other artists to create 'fictions' in which we can find any number of 'truths' - Tolstoy's War and Peace, Dylan's Masters of War, Picasso's Guernica are ripe with imaginative truths. But, show us an accurate photograph of an actual event, place, or person, one that also tells us a 'story' about that event, place, or person and we start to yammer on about how it isn't 'true'. About how, in fact, it can't be true because, as we all know, a photograph of a thing is not the thing itself.

Maybe it's that the Doubting Thomas' amongst us are too aware of the deceits of the medium to suspend their disbelief in order to enter the realm of belief.

Fiction is history that didn't happen and history is fiction that did. ~ George Orwell

urban ku # 134 ~ 'truth'

A truth • click to embiggenFor those of you who have not, as Paul Maxim opined, "avoided Mark's invitation to express their thoughts on "truth", like it was a visit to the dentist", let me offer the following for your consideration.

Amongst the many definitions of the words 'truth' and 'true' are these; 1. being or reflecting the essential or genuine character of something; 2. conformity with fact or reality; 3. a verified or indisputable fact, proposition, principle, or the like.

In light of these notions, let me ask this question (as one example of a zillion I could ask) - have you never seen a photograph that not only accurately depicts the (pick one) visual ravages, tragedy, insanity, brutality, devastation of war and, by so doing, also conveys clearly and without reservation at least one human 'truth' about such things - something that every rational human being knows to be 'true' about war?

The fact that a 'truth' or something that is 'true' about war is not the whole truth about war does not make that 'truth', untrue or false. There undoubtedly would be more 'truths' about war to be discovered and to know but, once again, I do not see how that negates a truth that any given photograph of war might convey.

Update on Thursday, November 15, 2007 at 08:14AM by gravitas et nugalis

Featured Comment: Sean McCormick wrote, "... I refuse to apologize for any manipulation I use on my images since, as a former chef, my view has always been that I'm doing nothing more than assembling a recipe -- one uniquely my own -- from raw ingredients.

If my work isn't your cup of tea, no problem. I thank you for the time you gave me and I hope the next artist you encounter is more to your liking."

my response: Sean, I'm not exactly certain what caused you to think that your work isn't my cup of tea. The 'truth' that I am writing about in my last few entries is the implied 'truth', the metaphoric 'truth', the content of a picture that is separate from the form of a picture - the 'truth' of the meaning that can be found in a photograph.

Hope you aren't about to abandon ship.

urban ku # 134 ~ abiding care

Leaving the American Museum of Natural History • click to embiggenWhile I was reading a review about a photographer's pictures, I came across a sentence that I liked very much wherein the writer stated that to view his pictures in a certain way "... would be to shrug off their (and our) abiding care for what we see in them, and the beauty that seems to emerge from such benign attentiveness as well ..."

Does 'abiding care' and 'benign attentiveness' fit into your picturing?

urban ku # 133 ~ 'truth'

Wildness close to someone else's home • click to embiggenRichard Avedon wrote, "All photographs are accurate. None of them is the truth."

On my long journey home from Pittsburgh, I was actually thinking along these lines about the picture presented here. I made it from the window of friend's loft (where I was staying) while I was in Pittsburgh. It certainly qualifies for Wildness gallery - it's just not wildness close to my home.

In any event, I was thinking about this picture because, in a way, it defiantly stands in direct contrast to the preferred visual image of Pittsburgh as decreed by the Pgh Chamber of Commerce. Those pictures almost always present a dramatic view of the city skyline as seen from the top of Mt. Washington (not actually a mountain, MW is a very steep and high hillside right across the river from downtown Pgh. The pictured view is always dressed in a soft, alpenglow-like light which gives a jewel-like presence to the cities many glass enclosed towers.

It could be said that these pictures, in their own visitors-bureau-porn way, could be said to be 'accurate' - the view does exist and it is, at times, bathed in a soft glowing light. But ...

Once a visitor or resident descend from the lofty geographic and pictorial heights of Mt. Washington, the (by far) most commonly encountered view throughout the city is much more akin to that pictured above. In fact (and in 'truth'), the cityscape is mostly that of a worn-out, run-down, rust-belt urban environment. Somewhat depressing, in fact.

So, both representations are, in fact, 'accurate' but it would be my contention that only one of them is 'truth'.

Update on Tuesday, November 13, 2007 at 06:27PM by gravitas et nugalis

Featured Comment: Paul Maxim wrote, ",,,first you quote Avedon's famous line where the first word of the second sentence is "NONE" and then you conclude your little editorial by saying that your image (or images like yours) "is truth". So logically you are saying that your photograph should not be included in Avedon's generalization. Somehow, unlike most of us other mortals, you are privvy to actual Truth.

Only in your mind, Mike.

My response: "the truth" may, in fact, be only in my mind. Something that I think is true for most of us - we all have our own 'truths', many of which turn out to be shared' truths. But that's not really my main point.

If Avedon was implying that in and of themselves 'none of them is the truth', I am inclined to agree ,at least up to a point, but only if the pictures are presented in a void/vacuum. IMO, 'in a void/vacuum' means without the benefit of words. With words, many of them are the truth.

urban ku # 132 ~ just like old times

Johns Brook with approaching storm • click to embiggenOn our way home this past Sunday, after having quite a few Stieglitz moments, I was taken by the idea of visiting a small museum in Glens Falls - The Chapman Museum. The museum has a collection of several thousand Seneca Ray Stoddard (1843-1917) photographs of the Adirondacks.

Having just stayed at Lake George, I was hoping that some his Lake George photographs might be on display, but no such luck. To be honest, the 10 or so photographs that were on display in the Stoddard Room were interesting but rather weird. They were prints made of photos of nature scenes blended with paintings (his paintings) of fantasy characters that he created to illustrate a story (which was never published). The prints were amazingly sophisticated with flawless technique - I don't think he could have done better blending in Photoshop.

Nevertheless, the first 2 prints in the exhibit were not from his fantasy series. They were 2 nearly identical prints displayed side-by-side that demonstrated a before-and-after darkroom technique that he used to put clouds from one negative into the sky of another scene. Again. just like the fantasy prints, the blending was seamless and very impressive from someone working in an 1880s era darkroom. His results look very 'real'.

I mention this because of all the hullabaloo heard these days about Photoshop manipulation. More to the point, that photography has lost its verisimilitude. My position on the subject has always been one of degree - if the results from either analog or digital post-picturing work are 'realistic' or 'natural' and reflect what was actually in the scene, I have no real problem with it.

As in today's picture, I blend in skies quite frequently. The skies are always a separate exposure of the sky made at the same time as that of the overall scene - I never add clouds to a sscene that weren't actually there. When I do this, it is always because the dynamic range of the scene exceeds that of the camera's sensor by a great degree. And, always, the desired result is based on achieving a natural or realistic appearance, not an exaggerated one done solely for the sake of 'wow'-type drama.

While yesterday's pictures were straight out of the box with no dynamic range tweaking whatsoever, today's picture required quite a bit of blending work. the sky required nearly a 2-stop darker (than the overall scene) separate exposure. In blending that exposure with the overall scene, I needed to considerably lighten the blue sky and grey cloud, relative to the cloud highlights in order to achieve a nature look and feel to the finished print.

So, as I stated, I am not above using some tomfoolery in post-picturing processing - just like old times.

urban ku(s) # 127-131 ~ f8 and be there

Over the weekend I was treated to several pleasures. Matrimonial harmony suggests that I mention as pleasure #1 the splendid time I spent with the wife during an all-to-brief overnight getaway in Lake George - a place that, even if I were to have a trans-Adirondack funeral procession, I would normally not want to be caught dead in.

Despite the scenic beauty of the place, during the tourist season, it is .... well ... let's just say that if you want a cheesy t-shirt or to spend some quality time in a video arcade, this is the place to be. It is also worth mentioning that if you want to be in a place in the Adirondacks where there is no visual evidence (in the village of Lake George) that you are actually in the Adirondacks, once again, this is the place to be. Thematically, Lake Georgians have done a terrific job of making it look and feel like a cheesy Jersey Shore boardwalk.

So, why, you might ask, did I find my (un-dead) self in Lake George? The reason was 2fold - 1. college-boy had a crew meet in nearby Saratoga Springs, and, 2. the wife and I had an anniversary last week and this was a mini celebration. So, there you have it. Now on to 'f8 and be there'.

'F8 and be there' is a time-honored and well-worn photo adage. It implies simply that if you set your camera at its sharpest aperture and be in the 'right' place at the 'right' time, good things will happen, photography-wise. In the landscape division, the 'right place at the right time' has been generally been considered to mean that you should be stationed at a 'grand' or 'iconic' location at precisely the time that the light is at its most dramatic. Some shooters pursue this 'ideal' and this ideal only. They are truly 'addicted to the light'.

The problem is that, while they can put themselves in a 'grand' location, the light doesn't always perform up to standards. Hmmm ... what to do, what to do? The answer for most, is to reach into the gadget bag and pull out an array of filters - warming filters, gnd (graduated neutral density) filters, fog filters, etc., etc. When 'god' doesn't supply the requisite 'wow' factor, man, acting as his anointed art director, will. And then, of course, comes the post-picturing 'processing' which normally includes sliding the saturation dial to 11 (on a scale of 10).

It is also worth noting that, even when 'god' manages to 'get it right', that is rarely 'right' enough for the Velvia-esque gang and their digital-domain ilk. As I have previously opined, for them nothing exceeds like excess.

What inevitably results is an endless parade of 'dramatic' landscape pictures that, IMO, end up diminishing (rather than celebrating) the special quality of those 'real' but most often, rare, moments when 'god' manages to get it done all by him/her self.

That said, my other weekend pleasures where in the form of 'god' getting it right and my luck in 'being there' when he/she did - even if I did use f5.6 and not f8. In her infinite wisdom (sometimes in the form of dumb lick), the wife (not god) picked us a room with a view - in fact, a great view (looking north, right from the foot of Lake George). And, FYI, in my world, that half-empty pool with the algae-tinted water was a wonderful element in the view.

My only problem with 'f8 and be there' is that, while you can put yourself 'there' at a number of places at times when the light might be 'right', it's not always a recipe for 'success'. So my solution is to never be without a camera. That way, no matter where you are, you can always 'be there' and use the aperture of your own choosing.

BTW, the barn and distant snowfall did not magically appear outside of our room with a view. Rather it appeared on our drive home (in fact, within hollering distance from home) as a kind of final 'f8 and be there' puncuation point to the weekend.

Sometimes, all that clean livin' pays off.

FYI, it's interesting that clouds play a strong part in these pictures. Lake George is where Alfred Stieglitz created his 'Equivalents'. For decades, Stieglitz and his wife, Georgia O'Keefe, spent their summer and fall at the the Stieglitz family home on Lake George. Each and every time I looked at view out of our room with a view, I was aware of a Stieglitz 'presence'.

Also, just in case you're wondering, we did not stay at the 7 Dwarfs Motor Court. It was, unfortunatley, closed for the season.

And, of course, it must be noted that no pre, real-time, or post-picturing tomfoolery was employed in the making of these pictures.

urban ku # 126 ~ autumn moonrise

Autumn moonrise with Olympic venues • click to embiggenYesterday was one of those glorious late Autumn days - shirt-sleeve (albeit, long sleeve) weather. Most of the leaves are on the ground which sometimes makes even a middle-of-the-fairway 270 yard drive hard to find. But that didn't effect the view from the 18th green at the end of the round.

These views are presented as they were pictured - in geographic and picturing order from left to right. The moonrise was what got me to bolt to the car and grab the camera. In the center picture, the top section of the new(ish) combined bobsled, luge, skeleton track is visible - the scene of my 2 silver medals in regional luge competition. The track is one mile long, has 20 curves, and drops 420 feet of elevation - in other words, that's equivalent to a 35-40 story building.

Luge speeds are well into the mid-80 mph zone. Non-Olympic class lugers (me) are only allowed to start just above the 1/2 way point (the 'juniors' start) from which 50-60 mph speeds are the norm. Nevertheless, 50+ mph while sliding on your backside inches above the ice is real rush.

On the right is Mt. Marcy - NY's highest at 5,344 ft and growing (the Adirondack Dome is rising every year) - with the 90 and 120 meter Olympic ski jumps in the foreground - and, no, I don't have any ski-jumping medals. An elevator ride back down to the bottom after enjoying the view is good enough for me.

All of the Olympic venues are in constant use for training and World Cup competitions. It's fun when Olympic/world-class athletes and the press come to town. It gives the area are real international flavor.

urban ku # 125 ~ an Adirondack curiosity

now that's a 'house' boat.