YOU MAY HAVE READ / HEARD THE DESCRIPTIVE MONIKER about one picture or another that it is a photograph about photography. Most would think that descriptor to be rather tautological cuz, duh, of course a photograph is about photography, right?
<p>Answer: Wrong. In the Fine-Art World, Photography Division, that phraseology is used to describe a picture that was made utilizing / emphasizing one (or more) of the medium's unique characteristics. For example, its inherent relationship to/with the real world. Or, the medium's ability to capture / "freeze" a precise moment (or a tiny fraction thereof) in time.
The aforementioned characteristics are well known , in one degree or another, to just about everyone who makes pictures. That written, there is one characteristic of the medium that few picture makers, especially many who are engaged (and should know better) in the pursuit of making fine-art, are aware of...that the work product-a photographic print-is a flat-as-a-pancake thing that lives in a 2D world.
Sure, sure. Everyone knows that a print-or a screen on a digital device-is as flat as a pancake. However, very few picture makers think of a print as a 2-dimensional thing. As a matter of fact, most "serious" picture makers attempt to create (think so-called leading lines) something that a 2D print does not have - the missing 3rd dimension, aka: depth. In other words, instead of utilizing one of the medium's characteristics, they strive to contravene it.
To be certain, I am not suggesting that the "illusion" of depth is not possible on a photographic print. However, my point is that, iMo (and I am not alone in this), one of the primary differences that distinguish art from fine-art, Photography Division, are those pictures in which the medium's 2D characteristics are made readily apparent-to those who can see it-by the picture maker's intuitive ability / skill / creativity to see the literal referents in his/her select section of the real world-imposed by his/her framing-as non-literal 2D visual properties which can be arranged / organized on and across the flat field of a photographic print....
"This recognition, in real life, of a rhythm of surfaces, lines, and values is for me the essence of photography; composition should be a constant of preoccupation, being a simultaneous coalition – an organic coordination of visual elements." - Henri Cartier-Bresson
I also believe that, in order to recognize and appreciate Fine-Art photography, a viewer must learn / know how to look at a photographic print by seeing beyond its literal representation. That is, seeking to see and feel a sense of balance created by a rhythm of surfaces, lines, and values, aka: an organic coordination of visual elements. And, FYI, in my experience, when making or viewing a picture, I almost always feel it before I see it. When I feel it, I know that what I am seeing is something else.
"I believe that a spectacular photo of something ordinary is more interesting than an ordinary photo of something spectacular. The latter is about something else, the former is something else." - Jim Coe
ADDENDUM I believe the key to being able to see / feel a rhythm of surfaces, lines, and values, aka: an organic coordination of visual elements, is the idea of "soft eyes.", the effortless combination of both peripheral and foveal vision. With soft eyes, you let your eyes physically relax. Instead of focusing on one thing (your "featured" referent), you allow that thing to be at the center of your gaze, while simultaneously taking in the largest possible expanse within your full field of vision in order to increase your awareness of everything going on around your selected referent.
