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MORE NEGATIVE NATTERING FROM THE Doomsday crowd, Photography Division:
Doomsayer # 1: “It's clear to me that we're in the sad twilight of the era of photography as a serious hobby.”
Doomsayer # 2: “I'm interested in what stuff looks like now. And I'm much more interested in the popular media for viewing images now. The web. The monitor. The screen….I've been to too many galleries that cater to customers my age.….Mewing over the "wonderful tonality" of a print with content as boring as a tax audit. While all the good stuff is floating around in the ether….. It's like art stuck in amber…. I haven't shown a print or made a print in at least ten years.”
Re: “the sad twilight” - pure BS. I live in a small town (p.600) in a rural area. Every once n a while, aka: when I get the itch, I post a notice on an local online newsletter that I am conducting a improve your Phone picture making class. It regularly draws 6-8 people. People who are what I would call the new “serious” picture making hobbyist inasmuch as they are “serious” about making better pictures and they spent a fair amount of time and creative energy making those pictures. And, I might add, it it just delightful be around picture makers who are not gearheads, who just go out and make pictures.
And, while it constitutes just anecdotal evidence, I also have 2 baseball-style caps that I wear which display photo related messages; one simply has the KODAK logo, the other simply says 18% Gray. Both hats are frequent conversation starters with complete strangers who are, not surprisingly, amateur picture makers. The KODAK hat draws out a surprising number of film picture makers. Not surprisingly, the 18% Gray hat draws out the true cognoscenti. However, in either case, it is interesting to discover how many picture makers are out there hiding-unadorned with cameras-amongst the populous .
Now if your picture making (dimwitted) prejudices dictate that you can’t be serious unless you have “serious” gear (or wear a “photo” hat), then I guess the millions of such picture makers as described above are just flotsam and jetsam that have been thrown off the true-believer (photography) ship of state. Which, iMo, is a good thing inasmuch as all the killer sharks are actually on the ship.
Re: “I haven’t shown or made a print in at least 10 years” MORONIC - I am a true believer in the adage that it’s not a photograph until you make a print. That’s cuz it seems very obvious to me that a photograph is a thing - a physical / tangible object. You know, an actual thing that one can find in a shoe box after the person who made the thing is dead and gone.
In the visual arts world the thing is the thing. Sure, sure; in some quarters digitally created and digitally viewed images qualify as a visual art but ya can’t go the gallery gift shop and buy a postcard of it that you can place on your refrigerator door. Or…
Consider this…since we are discussing photography, it is safe to assume that, if one is creating art that is a reflection of one’s unique vision, then it also safe to assume that one tries to express that vision on the surface of one’s prints. That is, a print which exhibits / presents to a viewer one’s vision is a precise-fixed size, specific surface texture, color /tonal balance-and permanent manner. Qualities and characteristics that, quite simply and truthfully, can not be had in the digital domain on a display screen.
Forget the idea of making art and just consider the making of pictures of family, friends, travels, events, et al. The best way of sharing these pictures is in print form. I make both photo books and prints of our travels and events which, of course, include family and friends. The prints are on walls and in piles of small prints all over our house. They are constant, ever-present reminders of our life experiences and are a constant source of curiosity for friends and visitors.
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All of that written, I believe we are in a happy decline of the traditionally embraced ideas of what constitutes a “serious” picture maker. The result of which is a freer / looser picture making attitude that is slowly but surely producing more diverse and interesting photographs.
I also believe, as demonstrated by the growth and popularity of online print making services- prints and books-and the emergence of combined print making + framing services, the walls of homes will be adorned with more framed photographs than ever before.