"Is Photography Art?"

Was Ansel Adams an artist before he developed his own identifiable style? Or, was he someone who merely took snapshots?
At what point did he tip over into being an artist?

My opinion, for what it's worth, is that photography becomes art when someone tries to represent more than the visual image alone.
A couple of years ago I would have seen a beatiful landscape, lifted my camera and "snap". I now have an accurate representation of the landscape, but I would usually be disappointed with the result.

These days, successfully or not, I would approach things differently. I would see the landscape, but be aware that maybe the light is wrong. So I would wait for the sun to come out etc. so that my produced image also gave the "feel" of what I was seeing. I would want to express what made me take the shot in the first place.

Now, maybe it isn't good art, maybe I don't spend long enough developing a style, but I do think that is where it crosses into art.

Another example, using an artist I don't (personally) understand.
Tracy Emmin: I leave an unmade bed every morning. She has her unmade bed shown in the Tate. The difference? She is trying to express more than untidy sheets. Whether or not I understand what she is trying to express is a side issue. She made the effort to express it.

That's pretty good, Father Ted. I would also say art is about expression. If you have expression of an emotion, idea, etc., then you have art.

It can be good art whether or not it satisfies the creator only or also others who view it.

Bad art is perhaps where the creator aspires to create something but there is actually no real idea behind that creation.

I would put everything I've done with photography so far very much into the "snapshot" category. But I deliberately avoid looking at other photographs partly because if I'm going to be cliched I can at least be cliched unknowingly!!!

I quite like the idea of taking brief snapshots (whether light is good, or whatever) of a specific time and place as that particular moment will never happen again. I've been doing a bit of this locally, certainly with my film cameras. Not art but interesting to me.

But art is a subjective thing. If we were all the same it would be a boring world (Look at the inserted Cliche there!!).

Hmmm. I deliberately looked at other photographs. In fact, the most helpful book I read wasn't on how to take photos, but how to look at them. That way I could see what worked and why it worked; and then decide what wasn't working in my shots.


But, as you say: if we were all the same......

A wonderful coicidence, but The Online Photographer had an interesting article discussing this last week: link. Make sure to read the 'featured comments', some very astute observations in there about what separates photographers whose prints sell for thousands, and artist/photographers whose prints sell for hundreds of thousands.

I have form for losing interest in things once they become either a chore or too involved........... I don't think I'd lose interest in photography per se, but I am aware, esp with my music background, that I don't like to think really, really hard about things that are my hobbies. And I like experimentation.....

Having read through all of the posts in this thread and have been trying to come up with something to add but I think Father Ted has hit the nail right on the head.

The following is lifted from Wikipedia

"Art is the product or process of deliberately arranging symbolic elements in a way that influences and affects the senses, emotions, and/or intellect. It encompasses a diverse range of human activities, creations, and modes of expression, including music, literature, film, photography, sculpture, and paintings"

I can't see why it matters. Photography is photography... it's very simple to define.

Someone might define it as art one week and say it isn't the following week, but they will never be able to say it isn't photography

To me a lot of art is just garbage anyway

Are you sure about that? Is a photogram made on a scanner photography? Is a photogram made on a piece of conventional photograhic paper photography? Do you need a camera to make a photograph? When does photography become graphic art?

At the limits, it could be quite difficult to make a definitive definition, even though in our own minds we're probably quite clear as to what we think photography is.

If it's in a book about the history of photography then it's OK by me although generally a camera and lens should be involved

My favourite piece of art was when KLF burn't a Million Pounds
Try doing that with a camera

B******s!
This criteria rules out many of the greatest artists of all time.

Picasso, Da Vinci etc did not stick to a single style (Picasso's early work is VERY different from his later stuff). Indeed to work in diverse media/subject matter it would be impossible to.

Perhaps it is trying to work within definitions such as this that have produced 'artists' who create dubious 'art' such as a pile of bricks, in order to be distinctive.

There are many schools of art where, Joe public may be able to identify the style (cubist etc.) but not have enough knowledge to identify the artist, this doesn't stop it being art.


Certainly lots of photography is art. The photographer can take ages arranging the subject, selecting the ideal veiwpoint, time of day , tweaking lighting, post processing etc.
I've seen other published work where the image was fairly random (photographed out of the side of a car whilst driving through a city...) in these cases the question of is it art becomes a bit more uncertain.

Of my own stuff, the only photo I've taken to win a competition, (until last month the only one I'd ever entered) was something that caught my eye when I first got a Pentax (The very first film through it) which was taken as a snapshot. Many others that I've tried for a specific look have failed to please.

Maybe an artist is purly somone who is capable of repeatably producing art.

Mike

B*****s!

Are you saying that it is impossible to distinguish a Picasso from his contemporaries? Even though he went through distinct 'phases' it's not as if he did a little bit of this, a little bit of that - "ooh today I'll do a nice Fauvist crucifixion scene, and tomorrow I'll have a crack at painting sunflowers... just as soon as I've finished writing 'this is not a pipe' under this, er, pipe"

Have you never heard on 'undiscovered' works of famous artists turning up & having the art world in debate as to if they're genuine or not?

If the experts can't agree, how should I be expected to!
(To my point of view it should be irrelevant anyway - The value of art should be from how good it is NOT who did it!)

My wife is currently studing the history of art, and the other night I saw some of Picasso's earlier work. If I'd not seen who's it was, it could as easily have been Rembrant's sketches, as Picasso's. Totally diferent to any of his Impressionist work.

In the past people were much more fixed in location than today, this often led to them doing similar sorts of views. If Counstable had been to the Alps on holiday, would his paintings there be recognisable as his?

Surely there is a relativly limited number of 'distinct original styles' possible. (at least distinct to anyone who is not an absolute expert on the specific genre) It must be very hard as an artist to find an opening these days.

I agree that not having a distinctive style shouldn't necessarily rule out your work as 'art', but if I may modify Doug's statement slightly:

Everybody's view of what constitutes art is different. If you like your own creation then it is art. If nobody else does then it is still art but does not conform to someone else's definition of art. As more and more people like your creation the more justifiably you can label it as art.

If Leonardo had painted the Mona Lisa and then chucked it in a skip without anyone else seeing it, would it have been art?