Re: Has this been done before? Really? Show me.

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From: Cactus Cowboy (cactus@tritel.net)
Date: 08/23/02-09:58:40 PM Z


One print I submitted for an assignment at Colorado Mountain College (in the
early eighties) was a tight b&w closeup of a lichen-encrusted waterpocket
with dazzling reflections of sunlight dancing throughout the image. The
picture was a surreal, other-worldly 'landscape', with no sense of scale.
My instructor loved the photo, praising it at length. She asked if I'd ever
seen any of Minor White's work. I had not. Although some of my work was
strikingly similar to White's, she did not dismiss it as having "been done
before". It was more important that she was able to recognize the spark of
creativity in my work, and push me to develop my vision. She was a good
teacher.

There are very few subjects that haven't been done before. A good
photographer will find a way to create an exciting, fresh, and different way
of depicting the most mundane, ordinary subject. Rather than shaming and
brow-beating students into not photographing sunsets and pets, maybe
teachers should challenge students to breathe new life into overdone
subjects. For example, the same instructor (who loved my b&w closeup) gave
us an assignment to photograph a "dog's tail so it looks sexy"! Not only
was that a challenge, but it was fun, and yielded some very interesting
work.

Best regards,
Dave in Wyoming

----- Original Message -----
From: "Shannon Stoney" <shannonstoney@earthlink.net>
To: <alt-photo-process-l@skyway.usask.ca>
Sent: Tuesday, August 20, 2002 2:24 PM
Subject: Has this been done before? Really? Show me.

> Diana,
>
> It's hard to talk about these things without being in the presence of the
> images under consideration themselves. I know what you mean by safe
beach
> sunsets, pictures of pets, et al. But people in my class had gone way
> beyond that, yet they were still being castigated over and over again with
> the "that's been done before" rap. I'll try to describe the kind of work
> that was being done.
>
> One person was trying very hard to deal photographically with issues
having
> to do with her sexuality and relationships with men, a difficult topic and
> one not easy to photograph "about." She tried over and over again
> photographing herself nude in different ways--color, b and w, sexy, not
so
> sexy, gagged with plastic bags even --each time to be told that "it had
been
> done before," or the other golden oldie, "what is your point here? well,
> we're not getting that." By the end of the year her work had completely
> degenerated, and she was no longer even making photographs, but simply
> zeroxing and transferring to newsprint stuff out of sex manuals! (By the
> way, this was very well received.) I think it's sad that she was
discouraged
> from continuing with her much more ambitious project.
>
>
> Another young woman was attempting to translate her interest in landscape
> photography away from pretty nature scenes, to the Houston urban
landscape.
> She would bring well-crafted pictures of freeway overpasses, etc, and be
> told, of course, "that's been done before." She too got very discouraged
at
> getting shot down each time she tried ANYTHING, and in the end was making
> very little work.
>
> Another young woman was trying to portray her frustration about living at
> home, being ready to graduate but not quite having flown the nest yet. She
> photographed herself nude behind a wall of cellophane, attempting to cut
the
> cellophane with a knife. You could sort of see her body but not clearly.
> Ok, maybe not the clearest metaphor in the world, but she was really
trying.
> And what was she told? "That's been done before." By whom? Where? Show
me!
> Of course that never happens. This woman had gotten off to a slow start
and
> had finally done something sort of ambitious. After this failure, she
went
> back into hiding again and didn't come out the rest of the semester.
>
> Yet another woman was trying to deal with the issue of body image and
makeup
> and fixing yourself up to be attractive to men. She put some sort of
latex
> makeup on her face and then photographed herself in front of the mirror
> peeling it off. Some of these images were quite grotesque and a little
> shocking, enough to be "edgy." But, of course, it's been done before. We
> should know that by now.
>
> I could go on and on. By the end of the semester I was beginning to
suspect
> that since the teachers don't know what to say, they trot out two or three
> stock criticisms. Speaking of taking the easy route: it saved THEM from
> having to think. And, I can count on one hand the number of times they
said
> anything positive about somebody's work, or pointed out a strength that
> somebody could build on.
>
> Maybe these things HAD been done before. But if they had, whose fault was
> it that these students didn't know about this work?
>
> The photo history teacher, meanwhile, who doesn't come to our studio
> critiques, was puzzled as to why the students seem so downcast and
> demoralized, and why they didn't seem to have their heart in their
studies.
> In other words, the demoralization was obvious to people other than
myself.
>
> Perhaps dwelling on the failings of this particular department is
irrelevant
> to the larger discussion, but I have gotten the feeling from talking to
> people at other schools that this sort of lazy critiquing goes on in a lot
> of art departments. My partner says it's a form of hazing, like the
> gruelling residency that doctors go through. But young doctors are made
to
> feel that eventually they will be good at what they are bad at now. That
> doesn't happen in a lot of art schools.
>
> --shannon


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