U of S | Mailing List Archive | alt-photo-process-l | Re: First define "post-modern" photography, dammit

Re: First define "post-modern" photography, dammit

FINALLY some conversation about Bob's question. Good to see.

If you compare Eggleston to Weston, for instance, you can see very much so the postmodern aesthetic at work. And, from what I understand, the umbrella term "postmodern" doesn't mean that they have to have anything in common.

Hmmm....I wonder if Weston's toilet could be considered "postmodern", or his nude in gas mask..

I agree Jeff Wall is boring.

I think a lot of the postmodernists threw beauty out with the bathwater which is my big complaint.

Oh, there is one guy I love nowadays--Steven Smith. He does a sort of New Topographics but it is beautiful--construction sites, large format BW, vacant and existential, a bit of humor, but really beautifully composed work.

Sherry Levine is my epitome of YUKKKKKK. I mean, her idea may be great but that is it! Well, if that is my standard then I should take Prince off my list. Oh heck, see, if there are no absolutes in pm thought, then I can have these two conflicting opinions at once, so there.

I love Richard Hamilton--he did postmodern works in the 50's.

Oh, there is one guy I love nowadays--Steven Smith. He does a sort of New Topographics but it is beautiful--construction sites, large format BW, vacant and existential, a bit of humor, but really beautifully composed work. They grow on you. Jeff Wall doesn't grow on me.

I personally love Eggleston and Christenberry, but I think they are a lot harder to "get" than others. But so was Shore when he first started showing his work.

A more interesting question, to me, is, who would you put on your list as postmodern and alt?
Chris


----- Original Message ----- From: "Judy Seigel" <jseigel@panix.com>
To: <alt-photo-process-l@usask.ca>
Sent: Monday, November 12, 2007 11:35 PM
Subject: First define "post-modern" photography, dammit


On Sun, 11 Nov 2007, Christina Z. Anderson wrote:
I can't pick my top five but I will give you some ideas. Cindy Sherman, Richard Prince, Thomas Ruff, Jeff Wall, Candida Hofer, New Topographics, I love Robert Frank, William Eggleston, Christenberry, Stephen Shore. Also Nan Goldin, I love Gursky's work, Mike and Doug Starn, Loretta Lux, Simen Johan, Malerie Marder, a bunch of the women out of Yale, it goes on, but this is a start.
Chris
I agree with Chris about many (tho NOT all) of these photographers... tho I cannot stop myself from saying that I lack words to say how dumb dumb dumb R. Prince... but that's not why I'm writing, which is to wonder why Robert Frank, William Eggleston, William (?) Christenberry and even Stephen Shore are considered Post-Modern.

I see Robert Frank as a classic photographer, closer to Walker Evans than Richard (ugh!) Prince. The only thing "post-modern" I can find about Wm Eggleston is that he did it in color, shocking to some -- until Szarkowski made color photography kosher, so to speak.

But then I'm still waiting for someone to define post-modern photography, unless that's done chronologically-- "Post-modern" being anything after such and such a date. Otherwise... what for instance would Robert Frank have in common with, say, Cindy Sherman? (whom I do in fact see as "post-modern," one of the first perhaps).

Then, tho I find Loretta Lux delightful, I could just as well put her with some of the English ladies of the 19th century who played those kinds of games with figures.

etc.

Oh and PS: I may be too stupid to continue living, but I do not think I have ever in my 199 years on this earth seen a more pointless over belabored photograph than the productions of Jeff Wall. They manage however to be so inane while being so humongously produced that the "pony effect" cuts in.... By "pony effect" I mean the story with the punch line "with all that xxxxxxxx there must be a pony in there somewhere."

Judy