Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2000/02/14
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]Nathan Wajsman wrote: > [snip]Seldom have > I been so disappointed by a photography exhibit. I did not see a single > picture that I would even bother printing.[snip] I do appreciate > photographic craft even when the subject matter is not my cup of tea (as > in Mapplethorpe's homoerotic images), but here even this aspect was > missing, with many shaken pictures, crooked horizons, botched > compositions etc. > Maybe the artist is playing a joke on us? Awhile ago, I found myself the only one in the crowd (no other smiles, some deep-in-thought looks) who was laughing at the sight of a urinal on a pedestal in the San Francisco MoMA: This one, you see, had been touched by the great Marcel Duchamp and what, 70 years after the fact, his gag still has the power to bamboozle a crowed. In another room was a giant silkscreen painting that Andy Warhol had personally taken a whiz upon (the placard didn't say so, but read his diaries, look at the peed-upon look of the painting and draw your own conclusions). We should probably be grateful that neither of these two men carried these themes to their logical conclusions but no doubt such, ah, creations would've found a place of great honor in galleries and museums. - -- Jeff Segawa Somewhere in Boulder, Colorado