RE: [Leica] What is fine art photography?

[Nick Poole <nick.botton@camphill.org.uk>]

Martin Howard wrote:

>  >I find Sherman's pictures of herself as a commentary
>  >on media, reality, socially constructed ideals of beauty
>  >and value to be valuable contributions to the critique
>  >of the age we live in.

I understand your viewpoint, which art critics often put forward, but 
for me it raises too many questions.

Taken at face value, it merely reduces Sherman's photography to 'a 
commentary onŠ' or a 'critique of'.  I have to admit I'm not an 
admirer of her work, but that isn't the point - the original question 
was whether or not it is art. That her work is a very personal 
expression of her feelings about the world is beyond question, but 
does that make it art?

There are many ways to make biting social comment, whether through 
writing, theatre, graphics etc., but just because it is socially 
valuable does not necessarily raise it to the status of art. For 
example, Emily Pankhurst chaining herself to the railings of 
Parliament was a powerful social indictment, but no one ever claimed 
it was art. By contrast, the social commentary of Dickens on the 
squalor common in his time most definitely would be! (I am 
deliberately not confining my thoughts to the visual arts here in 
order to make the point.)

It seems to me it is HOW the commentary is made that is crucial. It 
may be subtle or crass; it may be offensive, challenging, abrasive, 
designed to upset bourgouise sensibilities, it may be disguised or 
openly political or thrust a revolutionary polemic at us, but these 
are not *necessary* bases of the art that has enriched western 
humanity since Greek times (to take an extremely arbitrary slice of 
history).

I know no definition of what constitutes art. But I do know that very 
few contemporaries ever seem able to shed their preconceptions or 
their criteria for judgement sufficiently to see the value or 
otherwise of something that is really new. It is the avant garde that 
trumpets the new, but posterity that judges it.

I suspect that self-indulgence tells us more about the person than 
the times, although we can of course infer much about the latter from 
it. It seems to me that anyone driven by enough angst (or chutzpah in 
the case of Gilbert and George) can gain notoriety by their egoism, 
but I humbly submit that truly great art is not egoistic; it speaks 
to the universally human in all of us. Of course it takes an 
individual to create it, but it is not *about* the individual.

So I look for something indefinable, yet recognisable, in art that 
elevates the human spirit; that opens new vistas of hope and 
idealism, that suggests greater dimensions for human faculties than 
those we possess today. To dwell on the sordid and depressing can 
certainly be educational or prick an uneasy conscience, but 
ultimately art is about more than that - it is a testament to the 
human spirit which is capable of the very highest aspirations.
Just my view!
Nick.