[Leica] Diane Arbus (from Marty) (no subject)

[richard at richardmanphoto.com (Richard Man)]

Marty, thanks for your comments. Very interesting!


On Sun, Aug 9, 2015 at 6:16 AM, Martin Deveney <
martinrobertdeveney at gmail.com> wrote:

> > Ms. Diane Arbus' work makes me uncomfortable and I think that's exactly
> her
> point.
>
> Her point wasn't that you should feel uncomfortable.  Her point was that
> we're all stuck in our own imperfect skin, and there are lots of things
> each of us can not get away from.
>
> > This contact sheet shows how she worked
> http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_mbs1usPOL71qaihw2o1_1280.jpg
> The chosen frame is definitely the strongest one, but would I have chosen
> it? Not so sure...  It's the 8th frame...
>
> The capacity to self-edit well is rare in photographers; Arbus was superb
> at it.  She was also amazing at making things look how she wanted them to
> seem.  This:
>
> http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/05/11/AR2005051102052.html
> is an interesting take on how Arbus was capable of editing and presenting
> things as she saw them; the twins' father comments that the famous Arbus
> photo looks unlike all the other photos they have of his daughters.  The
> comments from the by-then 50-year-old "grenade boy" are telling and
> interesting.  And whatever you think of Mike Johnston this:
> http://theonlinephotographer.blogspot.com.au/2006/03/top-ten-number-8.html
> is a great piece of writing, and provides valuable commentary about Arbus
> and the ongoing popularity of her vision despite her being among the most
> analysed and discussed photographers of the 20th century.
>
> All photography projects some of the photographer onto the subject.  It's
> as simple as selecting when to press the shutter by which we choose what to
> show, good, bad or indifferent.  There is nothing more or less exploitative
> about pointing out that a seven-year-old can look crazy than there is in
> trying to make him or her look "good" to get paid.
>
> The print I saw of the grenade boy not only had an obvious and not very
> well spotted dust mark, but had some clear, pretty poor dodging around the
> tip of the boy's clothing strap that had fallen off his left shoulder.  It
> was a late print by Arbus on air-dried, glossy, very cold tone paper (maybe
> Oriental?) that looked like it might have been developed in something
> like Defender coldtone developer.  It also had very funky asymmetrical
> messy borders.
>
> Marty
>
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