Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1999/01/13
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Dominique,
You wrote, "Geometric inspiration for HCB; humanitarian inspiration
for D[oisneau]. When I see the HCB's picture entitled 'la Seine'...,
I understand why people...don't look at the camera. HCB is not
interested by people, but by a geometric picture in which there are
people."
Perhaps it may allow you to further appreciate HCB if you consider
that any work of art is, primarily and essentially, an organization of
the elements of its substance (words in a poem, notes in a piece of
music, people and/or objects in a painting or a photograph) into an
expressive form (e.g., the "geometric picture" you mentioned). A news
photograph may convey some expression (e.g., the sadness on the faces
of victims), but it is likely to be no more than the straightforward,
limited expressions of the subjects (e.g., the people in the picture)
the photographer was concerned with depicting. But an artist must be
concerned, primarily, with creating his artwork---that is, the form he
is creating that will express itself to those who will appreciate his
work. That's not to say that he is "not interested" in his subjects,
but only that his primary interest, at the time he creates his work,
must be in what he is creating. Without form, art is nothing and does
not exist; form is the means by which a work of art expresses itself.
Art Peterson