[Leica] Adams

[paul at paulhardycarter.com (Paul)]

I can understand anyone saying Adams' work isn't to their taste, but to 
denigrate it on the grounds that you're bored of it I find 
extraordinary.

Someone cited Beethoven's Fifth as the musical equivalent. So be it. 
Anyone who listens to that piece all the way through, and says they are 
bored, simply doesn't appreciate it. I'm not trying to be elitist here 
- I know it is quite possible not to like Beethoven, or orchestral 
music in general - but simply that to say you *can* appreciate it and 
then to say it's boring is rather adolescent.

However, this is a photographic list and not a musical one. Ansel 
Adams' work may be everywhere, but it is still sublime. A mere darkroom 
technician?! Is that really, honestly, all you can see when you look at 
his work? I don't mean individual examples, but his body of work? You 
don't see the fabulous composition? The perfect exposure (incidentally, 
if you think it was all done in the darkroom, read his book "The 
Negative")? And, yes, in many of his landscapes, that holy of holies, 
the "decisive moment"?

The way he worked is not the way I choose to work, but I still find him 
astoundingly good, and many times I've seen a picture of his and it's 
simply taken my breath away.

Boring. Yeah, right.

P.

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Paul Hardy Carter
www.paulhardycarter.com
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