SO, HERE I SIT POISED TO GO OFF, YET AGAIN, on yet another bit of, iMo, unadulterated piffle from the keyboard of Mike Johnston. That written, I must admit that I have some reservations about how to articulate my thoughts on the subject inasmuch as I do not want to come off as engaging in an ad hominem attack on Johnston. So please bear with me as I try to continue without going down that back alleyway….
What was it that got my knickers in a twist this time? Well, in installment #4–he might have a fish bone stuck in his word writing throat–on his BONES driven fascination, he write this beauty:
“How then do you go out into the world, encounter one of those subjects in what you think are promising circumstances for shooting, and not think of the fact that, back at home, you've got a box going on that very subject? What, do you just wipe it from your mind? How would you do that? That's like not thinking of an elephant. I'd argue that it's impossible not to shoot without any idea once you're actively collecting pictures based on an idea.”
The first thought that, upon reading this clueless drivel, entered my mind was to enter a Bob Dylan quote–something is happening here but you don't know what it is Do you, Mr. Jones?–and move on. But, thinking about it, I felt it might be a bit too snarky and definitely leaning in the ad hominem direction. So, I cooled my jets and decided that a cooler, more informed retort would be a better bet.
Johnston wrote that in response to the idea that he believes no one–especially Lee Friedlander–can make a photograph, much less a really good photograph, without an intellectual structure to guide one’s picture making. That opinion is a direct contradiction to Friedlander’s actual words–spoken throughout his life–on the subject of ideas:
I tend to photograph the things that get in front of my camera….I take more to the subject than to my ideas about it. I am not interested in any idea I have had, the subject is so demanding and so important….Anything that looks like an idea is probably just something that has accumulated, like dust. It looks like I have ideas because I do books that are all on the same subject. That is just because the pictures have piled up on that subject.… I am not a premeditative photographer. I see a picture and I make it.
When confronted by an interviewer, re: the idea that “There is a difference between photographs where the image itself is beautiful for aesthetic reasons (light and form) and images that are beautiful for other reasons (the more ephemeral qualities they contain)” It went like this:
LF You are over my head. I never think about things like that.
What do you think about?
LF Not much.
You try not to.
LF It is not a matter of trying. It’s indigenous.
iMo, it seems so obvious that that even a blind person can see that Friedman does not think about much, if anything, when making pictures. And, beyond any shadow of a doubt, he sure as hell ain’t no idea man.
However, enough of trying to pin down someone else’s M.O. Let met me write about my M.O. which, if I mght be so bold as to write, is exactly like Friedlander’s M.O. Always is, always has been…. I see a picture and I make it. Absolutely no thinking / ideas involved. Nada. Never. Case in point, this AM…
…I made the 3 pictures in this post this morning. Even though each of those pictures could eventually end up in one of my referent-specific “photo trays” the idea that they might do so never entered my head prior to making each photo. Rather, each photo was made, as all of my photos are made, by a viseral–Oxford Dictionary: relating to deep inward feelings rather than to the intellect–reaction to what I see.
It’s as “simple” as that. Except, of course, it ain’t really all that simple inasmuch as discoverying one’s vision, accepting it, and trusting it really ain’t all that simple. And here’s where this ramble veers toward ad hominum…
Most “serious” amateur photographers–I would consider Johnston to be one, at least a part-time one since he is really a writer)–have never discovered their unque, prenatural / indigenous vision (assuming there is one to be found which by no means is always the case). That is precisely why they cling to intellectal ideas as the M.O. / justification for their picture making endeavors.
And, it is their procivity / predisposition to embrace / cling to such things that makes it inconceivable for them that a picture maker who is not confinded to / motivated by conventions, rules, structure(s), intellectual ideas, concepts, et al, is able to make pictures that end up on fine art gallery and institution walls.
Ya know, like, say, as Johnston says “I'd argue that it's impossible not to shoot without any idea once you're actively collecting pictures based on an idea.” There are so many problems with that statement, the most obvious being that he seems incapapble of imagining that a picture maker might not be collecting pictures based on a pre-exisitng idea but rather, that he/she (saracsm alert) stand back, hold on your seats, just might be collecting pictures of any thing they see and if there is sorting to be done it will be done after the picture making fact.
To which I would add that there are many picutres makers who are very capable of…yes…gasp!!!….believe it or not, just wiping any thoughts from their mind when engaged in the making of a picture.
Imagine that, if you can.
