[Leica] On the art of constructive critique

["Mark E Davison" <Mark_E_Davison@email.msn.com>]

Musical performance has a long tradition of constructive critique, which may
contain some lessons for photography, and the LUG, if we move forward to a
monthly critiquing session.

Some points of possible relevance:

1. To be constructive, you need to know where the player is in their musical
education. It does not help a beginner to be critiqued as if they were a
master (nor the reverse).

2.  The person doing the critique must understand and have sympathy for the
kind of music being played. If the player is performing jazz improvisation,
then they should be critiqued by experienced jazz musicians. A critique from
someone who hates jazz will only reveal the strongly held prejudices of the
critic.

3. The person doing the critique should understand how people can improve
their playing. Identification of faults is incomplete. Suggestions for how
to improve are what make critiques constructive.

There is an unfortunate tendency to believe that photography is all one
thing, which can be judged by anyone. But I do believe that there are
different distinct branches of photography (e.g. street-photography,
portraiture, landscape, cityscape, etc.), and within those branches there
are identifiable styles. To be helpful in offering critiques you should
stick to the branches and styles that you understand. If a photographer is
experimenting with abstract cityscapes (say along the lines of Aaron
Siskind) it will not help if your critique consists of a diatribe on how
much you hate abstract photographs of peeling paint, and how the only "real"
photography involves revealing photographs of street people (or whatever).
If a photographer is trying to understand the strange dissonances of
Eggleston or Friedlander by imitating their style, it won't help if you
simply say that all modern art photography is self-indulgent twaddle.
Silence will communicate best.

Mark Davison