all photos ~ (embiggenable)
NOW THAT I AM A DAY AWAY FROM ALL of the aftermath-anesthetic hangover, carrying around a bag of urine on my calf for 5 days, et al-of my hand enlargement / prostrate reduction event, I feel capable of addressing the idea of…
an art of expressing much and suggesting more….evoking a definite, though unstated, emotional response….work in which special intensity is given to the expression of feelings and ideas by the use of distinctive style and rhythm
…as expressed in my pre-op entry wherein I wondered if any one might come up with the word linked to that definition.
Reader Thomas Rink nailed it - the word is poetry. That written, he seems to be curious as to why I might suggest that the medium and its apparatus has a relationship to poetry. Good question which I will try to answer…
CAVEAT I have never been a fan of comparing one form of art with another / different form of art. Especially so when I hear / read the idea that a photograph resembles a painting by xxxxxx. So, fyi, I approach this poetry / photography relationship with a great amount of hesitancy and confliction. END CAVEAT
As best as I can determine, my reason for pursuing this idea derives from my ongoing desire to unravel what I feel when I view a photograph that I consider to be a good photograph (mine or made by others). That’s cuz, when I view a photograph that I consider to be a good photograph I am almost immediately struck by 2 nearly simultaneous sensations; 1) an engaging visual stimulation, and 2) a feeling, aka: an emotional response; akin to Sontag’s “an erotics of art”.
Thoughts rarely enter my mind at that point and I most definitely do not start searching for meaning or the picture maker’s intent. That’s cuz, re: intent, I am looking at the picture maker’s intent-it’s called a picture-which I assume was made with the intention to show the viewer something from the the real world as he /see sees it. Ya know, the vision thing.
How, you might ask, does my very personal way of viewing and experiencing a good photograph relate to poetry?
To be honest I don’t have much interest in poetry with one notable exception, haiku. A form of poetry which, for me, that is an art of expressing much and suggesting more….evoking a definite, though unstated, emotional response…work in which special intensity is given to the expression of feelings and ideas by the use of distinctive style and rhythm.
Haiku also hits me with 2 nearly simultaneous sensations: 1) a cognitive recognition of the words which creates an emotional state of mind, and 2) visual stimulation; the pictures that emerge in my head.
I would suggest, emphatically so, that that definition / description of poetry is, to my sensibilities, a very fitting description of a good photograph. For photography purposes, one might wish to replace “distinctive style and rhythm” with “personal vision and form” but, either way, it still points in the same direction.
All of that written (and I could go on and on), I believe that good photographs and good haiku are both emotionally rich and, surprisingly, visually rich mediums. Does that mean that I believe that my photographs are a form of poetry / haiku. No, I do not. But, that written, I do believe that good photographs are capable, with the skillful use of the medium’s lyrical and descriptive power, of expressing a picture maker's emotions in an imaginative and beautiful way, making them, in a manner of writing, kinda /sorta poetic.