From: Judy Seigel (jseigel@panix.com)
Date: 10/24/02-12:57:30 PM Z
On Thu, 24 Oct 2002, Christina Z. Anderson wrote:
> You know what I like most about Barrett? He is not one of those holier
> than thou know it alls that thinks their opinion reigns and no one should
> have any other--he allows for divergent ways of thinking, a quality I think
> all teachers should have. I allow my students to have their own opinions
> (well supported, as Barrett says--judgment must be supported with reasons),
> and wish more faculty would do as such, and get away from the model of
> teacher knows all and students are there to sop it up.
Chris, as you perfectly well know, allowing for divergent ways of thinking
is like giving the tide permission to roll. (I'd also guess, from what
you've said in past, you were hired for your EXPERTISE, which gave/gives
your thinking credibility, not the other way around.)
Meanwhile, Jack is putting us on. He wouldn't direct students to anything
"hip" except as awful warning. Better than Barrett, IMO, would be the
"criticism" pages of old photo magazines in which some (generally
un-named) "authority" explains what's right & wrong about photographs
submitted by readers. INVARIABLY, and I mean 99 times out of 99 and a
half, the only or main or entire thing we would like about a photograph is
what the "expert" decries. That would be interesting to talk about, at
least to my "way of thinking". And would reveal yea and nay the "building
blocks" of a photograph: How the no-nos of yesteryear are the cliche's of
the present -- and so forth.
And/or some of those treatises on "how the eye travels through a
photograph," circa 1930. Mark Tansy got that in his painting "The
Innocent Eye." But that's today, in hindsight. Odds are future
generations will see many of our 9-day wonders as equally sappy.
I'd also be willing to bet that whichever student or students take your
vision as a given are going to be the epigones of yesterday, not the
visionaries of tomorrow. Which is not to say that giving your own opinion
can't be helpful -- like the end of the swimming pool doing laps --
something to push off of. Or let's say I wouldn't worry about about
whoever takes teacher's opinion. The sharp (hip?) will think for
themselves anyway, for the rest it hardly matters.
But one other thing I don't think in-place professors fully realize -- or
maybe it's worse in the East. The institutions, colleges, and
universities I know of are NOT hiring full timers, and are getting rid of
tenure by attrition. They are using adjuncts for teaching, and the
adjuncts (called "gypsy scholars," tho actually more like slave laborers)
earn, as a general rule, less than graduate assistants.
I think that's the most valuable thing we can tell a student and then ask:
Do you want to do commercial photography for a livlihood? Some of the
happier folks I know do, but if not -- think of alternatives. If they opt
for commercial photography, suggest that they check what if anything the
program at their school offers.
And finally, here's my own suggestion for a seminar -- take the Santa Fe
Photography Workshop catalog (just arrived) and invite students to
criticize both the photographs shown and the marketing strategies revealed
in the text below. Could be worth 100 Barretts.
cheers,
Judy
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