jeffbuck@swcp.com
Date: 08/27/02-02:34:10 PM Z
Sorry for keeping after this stuff. Please just ignore this posting, if
you're glazing over. This is a little different though:
All this about the nude got me to thinking about pictorialism. In one way or
another, many of us have commented on the distinction between the pictorial
nude (which overlaps with Judy's "young" + "female") and the non-pictorial
nude.... In my own "work," I've usually found myself wrestling with the
usually-thought-of-as-pictorial (e.g., Mount Fuji, Brooklyn Bridge, Lisa
Lyons) and the not-so (Metropolitan New Jersey, Sears Tower, Zero Mostel)....
Twenty-four years ago, in photography class at Univ. of New Mexico, I made
these very pictorial images of brightly lit semi-trailers against a night sky.
They were pretty good. Honest. Anyhow, the bottom line was to make a pretty
picture but, you know, I really wanted to use this not-pretty subject. I have
been arguing with myself about this ever since. I've been uncompromising
about wanting to make a pretty picture, but all over the place about what this
means I ought to be putting a camera in front of. I'm on the lookout for
things that are inadvertently pictorial (those semi-trailers) and I've been
trying to warm up to things that are cheaply pictorial but also, it turns out,
actually pictorial (detail of a new public building or private residence). I
like the just plain pictorial, but feel like a fool taking pictures of it.
The woods, the young/female, and Gateway Arch are too deliberate.
Jeff Buckels
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