Earlier today, Rob Haggart at A Photo Editor put up a nice post referencing Laura Miller’s “Why We Love Bad Writing,” and the post I made in January applying one of Miller’s observations to the world of photography. (Okay, to fairly represent the chain of citation, the observation originally belonged to CS Lewis.)
Rob is optimistic about the possibilities for building bridges between the realms of what I referred to as “literary” and “unliterary” photography. He writes,
…There’s a lot that can be done to create bridges across the chasm and I wanted to point this out to photo editors, because I’ve been in those arguments about photography with editors where factual trumps sophisticated, but I’ve never thought to turn it on them with a literary example. The two articles I’ve linked provide plenty of ammo to do that. I’ve always believed the only way to engage readers is to challenge them. High dollar advertising will always prefer engaged readers over hits.
Which is heartening. It’s easy for someone like me (i.e., a filthy hippie) to think of market forces as intrinsically inimical to virtue, but it’s good to remember that that’s not actually the only way for things to play out.
As a result of Rob’s post, we got a bunch of new eyes looking at 1/125 (welcome, folks!), and there are some meaty new comments both here and on the post at A Photo Editor.
I particularly liked this one, from Moya McAllister:
If challenging a reader literally requires a dictionary or a master’s degree, that’s one thing. But I truly believe that all viewers, regardless of education, respond viscerally to images. They may not notice “bad photography” if the content is there but they recognize good photography when they see it. A good or even great photograph can convey bigger concepts behind the story or a theme that reaches the reader on a different level than the text. Therefore, the response to the story is more complex and engaging.
I absolutely agree, and I think it’s important to try (where possible) to separate out the question of quality from the question of qualification. Doubly so because making qualifications or resources a prerequisite for the appreciation of “good” photography is virtually the same thing as equating good taste and judgment with socio-economic class, which I consider to be a serious error.
That being said, I would still say that there is a substantial amount of photography in the world which possesses a greatness that will be entirely non-obvious to a lay observer. But I would agree that an attentive, patient viewer (even if untrained and unpracticed) will be able to see that there is something important there and will probably be able to hazard a guess as to what it might be. (This is the process by which I have come to appreciate most of the photographs and photographers I like.)
But in order for that to happen, the person must first suspect or be persuaded that there is good reason to be attentive and to spend some time in careful looking at the photograph. And once they have caught on to the presence of that something, they will probably be able to gain a deeper appreciation of it by spending further time learning about why the photograph was made and in what context (historical, social, critical, etc.) it was made. In photography, we need more places where people can get that kind of initial nudge, and more places that help them figure out where to learn more about what they’ve seen.
I also like this comment by Juanita:
My take on the good vs. bad photography debate is directed at those who are framing what is available to the public. The army of museum and gallery gatekeepers and curators; the stable of photo reviewers and editors; the crowds of print and online media tastemakers. It’s their version of what’s ‘good’ and ‘bad’ that informs what we get to see and what gets picked up as cool or thought provoking.
I’m tired of the sameness of it all: e.g. the legions of photographers pursuing constructed reality, the poseurs trying to put out their version of “conceptual” photography— just look at “500 Photographers” and tell me it isn’t 90% the same. But of course it all looks the same, because Pieter Wisse is reading the zeitgeist through his lens of what young, new, edgy (dare I insert the word “good” here???) photography currently is, and that’s what is being highlighted.
It’s not my aim to throw sticks and stones at artists… Everyone is on their own journey when they pick up that camera–including me. I want to make a dent in “da Machine;” hope that nuance comes through in this post.
This is extremely important. The task of bridging the gap is one that has to be pursued by people who put work from various photographers in front of the eyeballs of viewers.
I think is something I was insufficiently clear on in my original post. I wrote, “To provide opportunities for everyday people to expand and improve their photographic tastes without making them feel like they are being sold something they have no use for at a price they do not wish to pay is one of the more important frontiers in photography at the moment,” which I think some folks took to mean that I thought certain photographers need to make work more inviting to unfamiliar audiences.
That’s not what I meant at all; what I was referring to is a deep and largely unmet need for venues (publications, websites, blogs, physical installations, retailers, etc.) which operate in the space between the “literary” and “unliterary” communities in photography.
I should also probably say why I keep referring to “literary” and “unliterary”, instead of using terms like “good” and “bad.” I do this because the issue is not one of absolute quality, but of different and potentially conflicting contexts for evaluating quality.
“Literary” does not simply mean “better” — it denotes something more specific and less value-laden: it means you have to really read it, and that reading it is rewarding. An “unliterary” work is not necessarily bad, but it does not require or reward deep scrutiny. What you need from it you can get casually, without effort or preparation. (There are many, many photographs that are deeply “literary” that I also regard as total wastes of time.)
What worries me about photography is not that there is too much unliterary work, or too little literary work, but that people are too likely to only know and enjoy one kind or the other. That’s why I say that creating venues for breaking down that dichotomy is a major frontier in photography right now.
