Re: [Leica] Salgado

[Andrew Schroter <schroter@optonline.net>]

A photographer brings their own vision/point of view to what they
photograph.  A critic is responsible for looking at the works of many
photographers and making sense of the whole while placing a particular
photographer's work in the context of the whole body of photographic work.
If someone identifies pattern in what everyone's photographing it is valid
to identify those patterns.  A particular photographer often is too focused
on what they're photographing to be able to interpret what they're doing in
light of everything else that's going around them.
- ----- Original Message -----
From: "Peter A. Klein" <pklein@2alpha.net>
To: <leica-users@mejac.palo-alto.ca.us>
Sent: Monday, August 13, 2001 1:29 PM
Subject: Re: [Leica] Salgado


> I have no quarrel with anything you've said here, Guy.  My problem is
> with people (often academics or people with political agendas) who
> insist on viewing everything through the same "lens" (pardon the pun).
> And if the art doesn't fit, they distort it to fit or dismiss it.
>
> One of the beautiful things about all art is that it is evocative rather
> than rigidly declarative.  It allows us to relate to it from our own
> experiences.  But it also allows the artist to communicate his or her
> feelings and attitudes. Ignore either and you've got only half the
> glass.  There's a difference between "relating" to a work of art and
> hijacking it.
>
> You'll note that Valéry was open to other interpretations of his work.
> People with fundamentalist devotion to various "isms," usually aren't.
> It doesn't matter what the "ism" is, only that it overshadows all else.
>
> --Peter
>
> I said:
> > >For example, there's the well-known story about science and science
> > >fiction author Isaac Asimov.  One day Asimov was on a college campus to
> > >give a talk, and was walking the halls beforehand.  Through an open
door,
> > >he heard a class discussing one of his stories.  The professor was
going on
> > >and on about hidden meanings and metaphors and archetypes, and how this
> > >symbolized that, blah blah blah.  Finally, Asimov could stand it no
longer.
> > >He walked into the class, and said in effect, "I'm Isaac Asimov, and I
> > >wrote this story, and it doesn't mean any of the things you say it
> > >does.  The prof shot back, "Just because you wrote it doesn't mean you
know
> > >what it means!"
> > >--Peter
>
> Guy Bennet said:
> > Though his remark is condesending, I think that the teacher was right in
> > that Asimov could not possibly predict the various meanings that the
text
> > might have when read by people with widely varying personal experiences,
> > people who would inevitably see in the story things that Asimov might
not
> > have known were there, though he was the author. To bring the discussion
> > back to photography, hasn't it ever happened to you that, when you've
shown
> > some one your work, they've seen things in it that you were unaware of?
I
> > seem to recall that some of the PAW shooters had that reaction when
people
> > commented on and/or criticized their work here on the list. Whatever the
> > case may be, I definitely disagree with the idea that the author alone
is
> > the sole and complete authority on his text, that it means only what he
> > says it means, and that any reader's personal experience with the piece,
> > any responsable interpretation he might give of it is wrong if it
doesn't
> > agree with the author's explicit intent. If such things were true, the
> > fundamentalists would be right: the book means exactly what it says,
> > nothing more, and to suggest that it does is blasphemous.
> >
> > There is an equivalent, but opposing anecdote to the Asimov story above.
In
> > his later years, the poet Paul Valéry attended a colloquium given in his
> > honor. He was present when one scholar presented his interpretation of
one
> > of Valéry's poems. At the end of his talk, the scholar addressed Valéry
> > directly and asked if he had correctly interpreted the poem. Valéry
> > responded that he had no idea that the poem could mean all of the things
> > that the scholar discussed, but that the latter's reading was plausible.
> > Valéry also said: "My poems have the meanings that people give them."
("Mes
> > poèmes ont le sens qu'on leur donne.")
> >
> > Guy