[Leica] GeeBee's 'Street' photography

[bdcolen at earthlink.net (B. D. Colen)]

First off, I am neither a teacher in the sense that you are suggesting,
nor, God forbid, am I part of or reflect of the "academy." And I, too,
hate blanket statements and, as I made clear in an earlier discussion, I
think rules are pretty meaningless. But - not every photo shot in the
street is "street photography" in any meaningful sense. Were it, we'd
all be Gary Winnogrand. And since that is clearly not the case, start to
think about what separates the best work of Winnogrand, Gilden - hell,
Richard Avedon - from every photo shot in the street.


-----Original Message-----
From: lug-bounces+bdcolen=earthlink.net@leica-users.org
[mailto:lug-bounces+bdcolen=earthlink.net@leica-users.org] On Behalf Of
Alastair Firkin
Sent: Saturday, February 26, 2005 7:16 PM
To: Leica Users Group
Subject: Re: [Leica] GeeBee's 'Street' photography


I know its very easy to be critical of others when they make blanket 
statements, but "street photography' does NOT "have" to contain 
anything at all really. Teachers and "academys" tend to insist on 
making classifications, and then the real "artists" often make fools of 
them. To insist that to be a landscape a photograph must contain a tree 
would be stupid. To explain why some street photographers are better 
than others using terms like "irony, humour and pathos" is fine, but 
not every image, or even great image taken as "street photography"  
need contain one of these 3 elements. How about pure horror? Having 
said that -- I just hate blanket statements --, I have to agree in 
general with the sentiments expressed. No form of art/craft is easy 
when it is performed at the highest level.

Cheers
On 27/02/2005, at 5:00 AM, B. D. Colen wrote:

> :-)
> First off, I'd suggest that anyone wanting to do, appreciate, or
> discuss
> "street photography" take a look for minimal starters at the work of
> Winnogrand.
>
> For whatever its worth, street photography must contain either irony, 
> humor, or some degree of pathos. It has to say, or really show 
> something about the human condition. It can't just say 'some people 
> are fat;' 'a girl talks on a cell phone.'

Alastair

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