Doesn't "debatable" have only 2 e's?
Larry
andrew fildes wrote:
> If axioms are in themselves debateable,
> >Some Brain Food:
> >-------------------------------------
> >John's Three Photographic Axioms:
> >
> >1. The "Science" is about light. Film doesn't record subjects or objects,
> >it only records light and *only* light [photons within a wavelength band or
> >range]. Understanding light, how it behaves, including optics and how film
> >responds to it is The Science.
>
> Which is useful in a functional way but does little to explain what the
> hell it is really all about in any deep sense.
>
> >2. The "Art" is about *making* versus *taking* photographs. This requires
> >visualizing what the image will be before the shutter is opened. The
> >process rarely requires hours of deep cogitation; it can be near
> >instantaneous. Visualizing does require being able to articulate *why* the
> >photograph is being made. Many times that is also relatively simple. If
> >the "Why" can be articulated, visualization for the image flows, and that
> >determines the "How" [method to make it].
>
> But can you actually train someone to 'see' a photograph and is there a
> relationship between photography as art and photography as record. Thinking
> here of the differences between a social and an aesthetic response - are
> they equally valid and do they overlap? Just bought a nice copy of Avedon's
> 'In the American West' - 10"x8" portraits of working people in West Texas -
> because it moved me. Rips the heart but is it art? Friend and family can't
> work out why I'd spend that much (US$70ish) on a book of pictures of mostly
> ugly people. Nice scene in the otherwise ordinary film 'The Truth about
> Cats and Dogs' where the blonde can't see the point of the male lead's art
> photos while the dowdy smart girl understands immediately - can you
> visualise that which you are culturally or intellectually blocked from
> seeing?
>
> >3. Creating photographs (composition) is a "subtractive"
> >process. Painting is "additive" beginning with a blank canvas to which the
> >painter adds the visualized image. OTOH the photographer begins with all
> >of reality, and subtracts those visual elements that do not (and cannot)
> >contribute to the image and its subject material. Part of this is
> >understanding how to use light in creating and communicating a 3-D visual
> >universe using a 2-D medium, and the general cause->effect releationships
> >humans have to visual stimuli (e.g. brighter/lighter colors advance and
> >duller/darker colors recede).
>
> This is being seriously challenged by digital - it is now possible to
> construct an image and use the camera merely as a device to collect
> components. I suspect that the future of art photography is not in the
> recording of reality but the reordering and assembling of new realities - a
> genuinely additive process. I'm having a ball with Photoshop!
>
> >Aristotle's four aitiai have been most helpful to me in determining the
> >aspects of the subject material to "celebrate" and the ones to "conceal"
> >[from his Physics, Book II, Chapter 3]. Aitiai translates roughly to
> >"causes" which can be used to describe the physical objects we observe:
> >
> > a. "Material cause;" what the object is made of.
> > b. "Formal cause;" its structure, shape and form; what it looks like.
> > c. "Efficient cause;" a poor translation to English because it relates
> > to the object's beginning; how it came to be (or how it was built);
> > the "actions" that created it or "context" that created a need for
> > it and prompted its creation.
> > d. "Final cause;" (Greek "telos"); an object's "purpose" or "end" or
> > "goal" and explains what it does or intends to do, or how it
> > interacts with its environment.
> >
> >The first two aitiai do not require anything but the object itself; the
> >third can usually be determined from the object itself, but sometimes not
> >and can require knowing the environment in which it was created. The
> >fourth requires the object's current context or environment. Without an
> >environment in which to interact, there is no telos! An image can express
> >one or more of the aitiai but should only contain those needed for the "Why."
> >-------------------
> >
> >-- John
>
> Nature, form, process and purpose. Context and telos are what I'm
> struggling with. Art always has trouble with a teleology, I think. Of
> course, one can start to discuss the construction and use of a fine camera
> as art within itself - it has a clearer telos at least and that may account
> for our fascination with it.
> Now, that raises the tone around here I think!
> AndrewF
>
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