wdj's blog/

I went to the Baltimore Museum of Art "Looking through the lens: 1900-1960". They own some works of several famous photographers, for example Ansel Adams, Robert Cappa, Man Ray and Paul Strand. For example, they own Man Ray's Tears photograph and Paul Strand's Blind Woman, among many others (why the Getty museum has it on their website, I don't know). It was 93 degrees and humid when my wife and I arrived and 101 degrees when we left. A typical Baltimore summer day. Photography was forbidden insider the photography exhibit but allowed in most of the museum. The indoor shots that did come out well weren't very interesting, but I posted some of the shots of the building fromt the outside.

I am always doing that which I can not do, in order that I may
learn how to do it.
Pablo Picasso, Spanish Cubist painter (1881 - 1973)

In the spirit of Picasso's quotation, this post will be on abstract photography, a subject which I love but have no real experience or formal training in. So, please post or email me with comments or corrections and please take whatever I say with a grain of salt.

First, I'll record a few definitions.

Call a photographic composition abstract if its subject is somehow separate or `abstracted' from
reality. Likewise, abstract art is art that does not depict objects in the natural world, but instead
uses color and form in a non-representational way (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abstract_art).

Abstract art places a new world, which on the surface has
nothing to do with 'reality,' next to the 'real' world.
Wassily Kandinsky, Russian abstract artist (1866-1944)

Abstract photography is of course distinct from documentary photography, which illustrates or `reports' something external to the photographer. The book by Hurn and Jay (On being a photographer, 3rd edition, LensWork Publishing, Anacortes, WA, 2007) has an excellent description of documentary photography.

Abstract photography can be subdivided into two subfields:

• Non-objective or non-representational abstract photography. A special case of non-objective abstract photography is geometric abstract photography, which is based
  on the use of simple geometric forms combined into non-objective compositions (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geometric_abstraction).
• Representational abstract photography: A photographic composition representating a real object in an unusual way which illustrates a pattern or abstract concept.

To the complaint, 'There are no people in these photographs,'
I respond, 'There are always two people: the photographer and the viewer.
Ansel Adams, US nature photographer (1902 - 1984)

One might argue that all photography is abstract in that it is a depiction of a moment frozen in time separated from the constantly changing nature of reality. However, abstract photography is not `reporting' a scene or event, it is depicting a concept. A photograph can be both representational yet connotate an abstract concept - for example, an photograph of a place of worship. To some extent, whether a photograph is primarily abstract or not is a subjective matter for the viewer.

I'll end with another quotation by Picasso:

There is no abstract art. You must always start with something. Afterward you can remove all traces of reality.
        Pablo Picasso

Comments?

There is a very interesting, if someone salaciously titled, article on photographers' rights at http://www.schneier.com/crypto-gram-0806.html#1 written by security expert Bruce Schneier. It has lots of great links, is not specific to the US (though I think he only gives links related to US, Great Britain, and Australia) and I thought some of you might like reading it too.
Main points:

• Since 9/11 the harrassment of photographers has increased at public places, such as
  train stations, etc. He says that, in fact, *none* of the terrorists captured so far actually took photographs as part of their planning. (I didn't know this.)
• He gives a link to the NY Times which quotes the following statistic: according to the market research firm InfoTrends, US's amateur photographers produced 28 billion digital pictures last year, 6 billion more than they shot on film,  That does not count pictures deleted before being printed or transferred for storage.
• Lots of links on the "Photographers' rights" and anti-photography "incidents".

I've never run into any problems but thought I'd post this, hoping it might help some of you other ipernity members.