we've witnessed all the magical morphing and seen all the clever tricksi care to disagree. i'm still wow-ed by photos. Granted: for a photoshopped image to amaze me, it has to be really well 'shopped. But when it comes to unaltered, unadulterated plain old photography (especially the kind that plays with lighting and/or perspective) you'll still hear me saying "gee whizz"! Agreed. Great photographs can be simply a brilliant 'snap' but the majority have been 'made' by darkroom techniques. New media emerge from new technologies, and while the old retain their magic, as with film's incorporation of digital technolgies, the new are magic too! Good question. It seems that photography has become more of an art form nowadays, than a strict medium for capturing history and reality as in the past. The "spectrum" of photographs and imagery has broadened. I would add that attempts to pass fiction (Photoshop manipulated imagery) as reality is dubious. Not that I am against PS -- I use it regularly -- but call it what it is. Photography is far from being dead, as an art form it had NEVER anything to do with bearing THE truth, best case a photo bears A truth, the truth of the photographer creating the photograph. I completely agree with the above comments. Photography is far from dead. It's becoming democratized at the same time as it's becoming easier to manipulate, but since the days of double exposure "ghost" photos, photography has been an interpretation of reality, not a direct, unfailing representation of it. Could not agree more Eric, every photo is an interpretation of reality, just by the choices the photographer takes, in the lighting, crop and angle he takes his shoot. I concur with all comments above. The main difference between older (chemical) photography and digital photos lies in the very nature of how the images are produced. The indexical nature of chemical photography, ie images are produced by the very things they represent (like a footprint), means that they always held an element of reality in each image. I assume this is where the phrase "the camera never lies" derives. However, with digital photography, it does not have the indexical nature held by chemical images, so already they can be perceived as being in some way contrived, even when no software manipulation has taken place. I remember fierce discussions with my lecturers at art school... I think everyone is agreed! It is good to see a certain restrained indignation as to the question. However! I think the polemical question is less an invitation to defend the status of photography, digital or otherwise, as an art form than a question of given the affirmative answer how, in a context of saturation of imagery, we can look to an aesthetic valuation of the form of an individual piece. The article seems to me to suggest that a truly great artist of the new medium/form is awaited. Not with alanocu at Clipmarks!!! :~) |
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