Is artistic photography as legitimate as other art forms?

[rumguy]

Is there a photographer who did something like what Picasso did? I mean Cubism really changed everything. Could such a thing be done in photography? Has it already been done?

I believe photography can be art - but it seems somewhat more limited than painting, for example. The photographer can control composition, etc., but he/she can't be like a Picasso, can they?

[GOPisEvil]

1. A photographer can use multiple exposures to get abstract...

...it's as legitimate an art form as any other, I suppose.

[m-jean03]

2. Delete -- That Sounded like a

Kodak Commercial. :puke:

I'll leave this to the art students.

[democracyindanger]

3. What is art?

Chew on that one for a while...;)

[Leprechan29]

4. It depends really...

It is unlikely that a photographer will revolutionize art in the way that Picasso did (at least, not for now), but rather it may be a revolution like the Dadism movement and other movements of that nature.

For the time being, that might be the only way that a photographer could be another Picasso, though in the future, there is a good possibility that that type of person might come along.

[Fovea]

5. Yes

without a doubt, photography is as legit as painting, drawing, or sculpture.

A photographer controls all the same elements that Picasso does.

[rumguy]

7. what is the cubist equivalent in photography?

did photographers even respond to cubism? could they?

[Fovea]

8. I do not think you can

assume that all forms of art express all major movements.

For example, how did 20th century dance address cubism?
How did Stravinsky deal with Dadaism?

Photography deals with issues that painting does not.
Painting is no longer much influenced by journalism, for example.

[rumguy]

9. I don't know about dance

but it has been argued that poetry was influenced by Cubism, for example...not all poets, but some...

how would cubism influence a photographer?

[rumguy]

10. here's something

" Florence Henri was born in New York She studied at the Bauhaus under Lazlo Moholy-Nagy and Josef Albers. She also studied painting with Ferdinand Leger. In Paris she became a portrait and advertising photographer. Her photographs reflect the influence of cubism, often using mirrors to produce pictures that are fragmented and spatially ambigous.

Like other 'new photographers' of the time she also made use of unusual viewpoints, such as her picture looking down from the transporter bridge in Marseilles - also the subject of pictures by Herbert Bayer, Germain Krull and others."

http://photography.about.com/library/dop/bldop_fhenri.htm

[mitchum]

6. Photography was actually a godsend to painters...

in that it released them from the demands of "realistic" representation. I don't think it's any accident that painting exploded after the advent of photography.

Of course, photography can be artistic. See Man Ray and Diane Arbus for examples.

[Don_G]

11. Google Ansel Adams

Look at his work and tell me what you think.

[rumguy]

12. I'm not saying that it can't be art

I'm just wondering if it is more limited than other forms. I shouldn't have used the word 'legitimate' in my thread title.

[exJW]

13. Sure....

:Is there a photographer who did something like what Picasso did? I mean Cubism really changed everything. Could such a thing be done in photography? Has it already been done?


I remember a guy (Aaron Jones) about 15 years ago, who came up with (or perfected and popularized) the idea of "painting with light". He could thereby selectively soften and color parts of the image by filtering differently during different portions of the exposure, and his light looked like no light you've seen before, well, because you haven't.. the light isn't coming from any fixed location(s).

Anyway, his look was totally different. However, it lent itself very well to advertising, and that's where he made it big, and the technique as well.

By now, the world is long since tired of seeing the technique, but it WAS radically different when you first saw it. And yet, it was never looked at for a moment as a "fine art" technique, though I'm sure some people have used it (and use it) in art photography.

But I guess the above is all about technique, and not about a new way of seeing... so *shrug*

[Kickin_Donkey]

14. In my opinion, no ...

I see photography as a lesser art form compared to, say, music, painting, or sculpture.

Photographers merely capture what's already there. Say a photographer takes a really artsy shot of a puddle or a crowd. He didn't create that image of the puddle or the crowd – he just framed what was already there using a device that captures light.

A true artist creates. The painter literally started with a blank canvas, and with his mind and his hand created something that wasn't there. The musician started with silence, and with his mind and instrument (or composing pen) made coherent sounds that were not there.

Photographers don't really create; they capture. This is not to say that they don't produce images that are not plain to the eye – they can indeed come up with interesting, unique shots. That's what art photography is, isn't it? And it's not to say that photography doesn't take some artistic talent, creative choices, and aesthetic sensibilities. One clearly needs those "artsy" leanings to take a good or great picture.

And I'm not saying this to get down on photographers and photography. I fancy myself as a photographer, and I love photography. But I know that when I take photos I'm not creating art as if I were composing a symphony or painting a meaningful painting (neither of which I have any aptitude for). I have no illusions about that.

That's just my two cents.

[electricmonk]

15. I would say yes

As a couple others mentioned Man Ray was a genius with a camera and more importantly the darkroom. Darkroom work especially in this age of Photoshop is the most overlooked aspect of photography since very few people do there own but print manipulation is an art in it's own right.