RE: [Leica] Robert Frank in Ottawa

["Dave Fisher" <tekapo@golden.net>]

> From: "B. D. Colen" <bdcolen@earthlink.net>
> Subject: RE: [Leica] Robert Frank in Ottawa

> Again, you are undoubtedly correct that far more people know the work he
did
> for the Stones - but don't know that it's his work - than know the
> Americans. But that's truly sad in terms of what it says about people's
> educations in general and visual educations in particular.

You are probably correct, but Frank's work was never going to be as readily
embraced my middle-America as Norman Rockwell was, and in any event, it's
probably also true that since The Americans was published, far more
Americans became connosieurs of rock & roll music than they ever did fine
arts. We can look down our noses at that, but I count myself as one who
considers Jimi Hendrix the equal of Orson Welles or Pablo Picasso, and for
completely different reasons. I'm not ashamed to admit that the first time I
ever saw or heard of Gerhard Richter was from the album jacket of Sonic
Youth's Daydream Nation. I suspect that might reflect badly upon my own
education, but faint praise be damned, it too is one of the greatest rock
records ever made and an artistic masterpiece by any measure.

> By the same token, when I was teaching my photo class last semester and
> Robert Blake was charged with murder, in a complete aside I mentioned the
> movie In Cold Blood and got cold stares. Turned out none of the kids had
> ever seen it. Okay, I asked, but how many of you have read the book?


The book and film are both superb. Again, it doesn't embarrass me a jot to
confess, I didn't really know much about Capote's book or the movie until I
saw Bill Kurtis' A&E specials. I was raised as a TV baby. That's the way it
is with some of us: we come to appreciate different things from many
different angles and sources, and often our formal educations play only a
very small part. Sad but true, I've probably learned more about photography
from rants on the LUG than I ever did in university, and I graduated as a
Fine Arts major.


- --
To unsubscribe, see http://mejac.palo-alto.ca.us/leica-users/unsub.html