Horses Think

“The reason I enjoy photography so much is because of the ways it is similar to skateboarding. The beauty of skateboarding is that it is about virtuosity. Everyone who skateboards is essentially riding the same thing, so the progression of the sport is about what you can do on that thing, how you look doing it, and how you decided to do it, but you can’t step off of your board. Because of their loyalty to the sport, skateboarders must progress slowly, feed off of one another, and take cues from their peers. That is beautiful to me, that competitive aspect is beautiful.

Skateboarding is definitely about doing new tricks, but it is also just as much about doing older tricks well. Every skateboarder can do a kickflip, but you can still see someone do a really good kickflip and be wowed by it. The invention of new tricks is rare, but the pushing of older ones in new directions is commonplace. That is sort of how I think about photography.”

-Josh Poehlein writing on Why Photography is Like Skateboarding

I had a conversation recently with a close friend relating to the current state of photography.

This friend (who is as art obsessed as any person I know but doesn’t really consider himself to be an artist so to speak) was explaining that he had been spending a considerable amount of time looking at contemporary photographic work online and found much of what he saw quite unimpressive and repetitive.

The work he seemed to like the best showed the hand of the artist in the making more obviously. He was talking about what he considered to be more creative work, which I understood to mean photographic work not based in some sort of realistic depiction.

I mentioned the Paul Graham discussion I attended a while ago and what Graham had to say regarding the staged photograph and why it’s so fashionable today. I mostly agree with Graham on his point but what he says doesn’t exactly explain why so many artists are making set-up work, it only explains why the work is so popular with viewers, collectors, gallerists, dealers and museums.

My friend’s point seemed to be that work based around the idea of the document tended to blend together and look too similar in the end. I think part of his response is due to the inherent homogeneity of seeing photographic work online (everything is about the same size, backlit by the screen, etc.) but I believe there is some truth to what he was saying.

I brought up the idea that photography can often seem like a dead end with so many photographers searching for that interesting or exotic portrait subject or that unique location or poetic thin red line to explore. I’ve also often come away from many contemporary photographic books or exhibitions with the thought that the medium lends itself too easily to gimmickry (I would include my own work in that assessment).

In the end we agreed that most photography is and has always been about some sort of access. Of course it’s also very much about making the choice, not just to try to access a particular situation, but also to actually explore a specific subject. It seems that today more than ever, that choice of what to photograph is more important than how one photographs it, that if you show a subject that hasn’t been seen or explored before, people will be quickly interested. Yes it helps when that subject is explored in some unique way, but it doesn’t always seem necessary.

This is where the quote above about skateboarding comes in as it offers a different understanding of contemporary photographic practice and the idea that we can only perfect and re-create in a new way what has already been done before. In the grand scheme of things photography is a very young medium but I really wonder where it can go in the next 100 years.

We all know that painting as a medium was declared dead many years ago but just a quick glance around proves that painting is not dead yet.

I obviously don’t think that photography is dead but it’s definitely due for some re-invention and I don’t mean the digital kind.

Lately, I’ve been excited by some photographers who seem to have found a natural way out of the medium. That’s not to say that they give up on making photographs. On the contrary, they continue to make photographic work but they are also beginning to engage in other art making practices. The freedom to begin exploring visual ideas through other mediums seems to lead to a re-freshed perspective when it comes back to photography.

Brian Ulrich, City Life, 2008-2009

I’m thinking about Brian Ulrich’s recent foray into sculpture and installation with his rescued neon signs which have been lovingly brought back to life albeit in a completely new re-contextualized setting. Even though the signs are very much sculptures, there is still something very photographic in their existence on the wall as objects.

from Christian Patterson’s Out There

I’m also thinking about Christian Patterson’s new work Out There which we’ll hopefully be seeing more of soon enough. Most of the work is photographic in nature, but Patterson has also been incorporating found images, objects and some facsimiles into his exploration of Charles Starkweather and Caril Ann Fugate and their three day sprint on the road through the Nebraska landscape. While the project is an exploration based in some sort of reality or fact, the result is clearly a personal and intense journey into the unknown.

submitted jpeg from Jason Lazarus’ Try Harder

Jason Lazarus is another artist I can’t help but think about, as he has completely expanded his repertoire to include much more than just photographs.

Sam Falls, Figure Drawing (girls like us), 2009

Lastly, I’ve been impressed with Sam Falls and the way he seems to be expanding the definition of photography. I’m not even sure that the work is completely photographic in nature, but he definitely has me intrigued and looking with excitement.

At the end of writing all this, I asked my friend to comment further on his feelings about photography, below is what he wrote back to me.

Keep in mind that this is only one opinion:

“I think you should also mention the fact that this homogeneity stems from the fact that art education, specifically MFA education in itself has become standardized. It’s become an industry. It tends to push artists into this certain way of thinking: come up with a concept, photograph it, make large prints, put it on a wall and try to sell it. It’s not just MFA programs that are at fault, also complicit are galleries that show a very specific type of work. Combine the 2 together and the artists feels as if this is the work that sells, this is the work that they have to make. Ultimately, for me, that results in works that have a similar tone and feeling to them. Where the subject being photographed, or the location being photographed, trumps everything else. The artist’s hand in the photograph is overshadowed by the photograph itself. I tend to prefer work where the balance between the concept, the artist’s technique, and the end-result are at equilibrium.”

Larry Sultan, from his series Pictures from Home

I first saw Larry Sultan’s Pictures from Home in an exhibition at the Corcoran in Washington D.C. many years ago (along with a concurrent exhibition of Philip-Lorca DiCorcia).

Seeing the work was like being hit over the head. It was the first time I ever paid attention to photography in any serious manner and quickly woke up to it’s intense artistic power.

I probably wouldn’t have taken up photography if it wasn’t for that afternoon alone with Sultan’s family, he will be missed.

(via)

These new ads fro Olympus for their new PEN camera are pretty diverting this early in the morning.

Kevin Spacey is hilarious:

“I wanna be… I don’t know, camera chow, picture wow, something different. Don’t be a tourist.”

I came across some items on eBay over the past few weeks that were implied to be signed, gelatin silver print photograms by László Moholy-Nagy.

Today I see that another one is on sale.

The seller states:

“Since I do not provide certificate of authenticity or any expert statement for this photograph, in keeping by ebay rules the photograph must be sold as after or in the manner of Laszlo Moholy-Nagy. Keep in mind that the picture itself is much sharper than the one appearing here.”

The seller also sells other photographs by some lesser known artists but the Moholy-Nagy’s seem to sell for the most money.

The top photograph seems the most credible in my mind but of course we’ll never know the truth (unless some expert steps up to the plate).

The whole thing seems pretty fishy but at the same time, given the amazing and real things I have found on eBay before, almost anything seems possible.