[Leica] a short story

[philippe.orlent at pandora.be (Philippe Orlent)]

Wonderful story. Did you take any photographs during the speech?



Op 8-feb-06, om 22:19 heeft Arche, Harvey het volgende geschreven:

> A short story:
>
>
>
> This happened around 1980, when I was an undergrad at U of Florida.
> Jerry Uelsmann's presence on the faculty brought many notable
> photographers to campus, where they always gave a public talk and  
> slide
> presentation. I remember seeing Ralph Gibson, Lee Friedlander, and
> Robert Heineken (who chain-smoked Kools at the lectern); but by far  
> the
> best visiting artist was Duane Michaels. If any of you have ever  
> been in
> the same room with him, you'll know what I mean about his not only  
> being
> a gifted speaker on the subject of art and photography, but an  
> extremely
> warm, humorous, and humane individual as well.
>
>
>
> Mr. Michaels had finished his presentation and was taking questions  
> from
> the audience when a guy got up and asked a question to the effect of
> what kind of film had he used to get a certain shot, and how had he
> developed it? This fellow was later described to me as being a
> 'photo-weenie' by someone who was a photo-weenie himself. The
> description: a photo-weenie is the guy who thinks the art is all in  
> the
> technical work, who always believes that there is a camera or a  
> lens or
> a film or miracle of chemistry that he simply hasn't found out  
> about yet
> that will, like a magic wand, when applied to his own lame images
> transform them into visions.
>
>
>
> For the first time in the evening Mr. Michaels showed a brief bit of
> impatience. He simply didn't want to talk about the mechanics, and  
> said
> it wasn't something that he worried a whole lot about. He was only
> concerned about knowing what he needed to know to get the pictures he
> saw in his head; he didn't worry about trying to make pictures he  
> didn't
> know how to make, or else he would figure how to get them out when he
> needed to. In short, his imagination wasn't limited by the technical
> skills he had or lacked, and his art wasn't about what he could do in
> the darkroom. This is where he started to turn it into a joke. "Look,
> I'm not one of those guys who spend a whole lot of time trying to make
> things happen in the darkroom". Then he kind of hunched his shoulders,
> got a gleam in his eye and held his hands out as if he were an
> over-eager shop clerk trying to convince us these were the real goods:
> "I'm not the kind of guy who says 'don't you like this print?  
> (offering
> the imaginary print) isn't it a wonderful print? I spent three hours
> making this print!'".
>
>
>
> Of course we all cracked up. Most of the crowd realized that Mr.
> Michaels had turned his commentary into a chance to poke a bit of  
> fun at
> Uelsman, who was present and laughing himself.
>
>
>
>
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