Is Photography Dead?

'The next great photographers???if there are to be any???will have to find a way to reclaim photography's special link to reality."

Wow, what an audacious statement. Though I see it more as a challenge, one I intend on meeting head on. Maybe in a few years you'll (hopefully) be writing about me.

Mr. Plagens writes: 'the medium seems to have lost its soul'.
I would like to ask Plagens to define this so-called 'soul of photography' first, before he declares it to be soulless.
Perhaps in Holland there are arguments to accuse photography of 'lack of life' but here the cause of the problem should be adressed more to the lack of inspiring curating and the choices of musea and the institutes, than it has to do with the photographers themselves.
Of course I speak for myself and for myself only when I say that I feel a little bit underrated by Mr. Plagens suggestion, but his wondering about whether there are going to be good(or great) photographers is as ridiculous as his short-sightedness when he only bases his wish for reclamation of photography's 'special link to reality' to what is shown in museums, galleries and the like.
An awful lot of postcard-photography indeed, as 10 in 12 photographers adapted the Becher-Schule approach.
'Objective' (and boring) pictures of buildings, water towers, stadiums and offices seem to be the standard in marketable photography.
But hey! we don't declare poetry or literature dead anytime the phonebook or the yellow-pages is delivered now do we?
I think the biggest mistake Mr. Plagens makes is that he based his conclusion only on what his eyes are lead to by predominantly a culture of impressive huge prints that completely lack any creativity of the photographer and any vision of the curator.
The spectator, the viewer, the public, which always should be critical about the content and the message he or she is confronted with (as in theater, cinema, literature) is not in any way aware of 'the powers that be' in the world of photography with its undefinable yet always seemingly faultless quality standards.
In their vision 'art' photography is either black and white, nudes, landscape, or anything else that is presented as ' art photography' in musea and galleries. No matter what it shows.
The digitalisation has up till now changed the way advertising companies develop their campaigns and fashion labels show their clothes. But it is only one of the techniques photographers use to satisfy the customer and secure their income.
The biggest mistake to make is to think of photography as an outdated medium to keep a link to reality.
As for me -as a photographer- the link with reality is very clear.
So I would like to suggest Mr. Plagens to maybe rephrase his statement after he has done some proper research on photography before any of you readers jump to the conclusion today's photographers aren't as good anymore as they where 'In The Old Days'.

Rogier Maaskant
Rotterdam, the Netherlands

http://www.rogiermaaskant.com

Neither photography nor art is truth, never was. Beauty is truth, truth is beauty....at least so thought John Keats, who first presented the idea that is near universal for us today. Photography is no more than a window to frame in what we see. Or you may want to think of it as a tool for viewing and presenting whatever you will, as long as someone cares to have a look at it. Photography doesn't have a discipline or a topic. Photography has nothing to follow, not journalism, reality, art, truth, not even beauty. Photography goes where we go, and the only query is where do we go?

Photography may be fading away in the main stream (sort of like Dante King's hair), but there are still on-line communities such as POTN for photographers and enthusiasts who have a genuine passion for creating images without manipulating them to a point beyond reality. Casual observers will still stop to notice a great image as long as there are those willing to capture them.

Photography may be fading away in the main stream (sort of like Dante King's hair), but there are still on-line communities such as POTN for photographers and enthusiasts who have a genuine passion for creating images without manipulating them to a point beyond reality. Casual observers will still stop to notice a great image as long as there are those willing to capture them.

heck no!!!!! Photography is not dead! It's here to stay. Thank goodness!!!!!!!!

Heck no! Photography is not dead!!!! Thank goodness!!!!!!!!!

THE SNAPSHOT CONUNDRUM
MOST PHOTOGRAPHERS AND VIRTUALLY ALL CRITICS HAVE BEEN CONFOUNDED BY THE FACT THAT IF YOU GO THROUGH THOUSANDS OF SNAPSHOTS YOU CAN FIND A GREAT PHOTOGRAPH. THEY SHOULDN'T BE. THE GREAT PHOTOGRAPHERS ARE THOSE THAT CAN DO IT CONSCIOUSLY. THEY DO NOT DO IT BY "SELECTING THEIR SUBJECTS CAREFULLY AND FRAMING THEM PRECISELY". LEAVE THAT FOR THE OTHER MEDIUMS. THEY REACT INSTINCTIVELY AND TAKE A RECORD OF SOMETHING THAT CAN ILLUMINATE OR EVEN TRANSCEND. THAT IS IT'S POWER.

The author of this article is ignorant and a luddite. Photography has always been fictional, subjective to the one-point perspective of lens-space, limited to the selection that the photographer makes from "reality." The process of making an image using the light recorded on a piece of film is never "real;" it is always manipulated, in some form or another, by photographers. (Need I even mention the early surrealist photographers? This isn't something new.) Stop writing sensational eschatologies, and start writing real criticism, please.

I just want to thank Peter Plagens and Newsweek for publishing this article. Finally someone who dares tackle this issue and put it out there. I have been waiting for this moment for a long time now. No matter what people say it is important to talk about "you can't help but wonder if the entire medium hasn't fractured itself beyond all recognition". So just a big Thank You for bringing out this debate!

Idiotic article by someone ignorant of photography. Image manipulation dates back to the dawn of photography, and many of our most famous images present a falsehood as factual truth. For this reason, photos cannot even be admitted as evidence in a courtroom without the photographer's afidavit of authenticity. We're at the dawn of a new age, where photography like painting is less encumbered by an absolute physical reality. This expands, not contracts, the creative possibilities.

Is photography dead? I don't think so. It is a bit strange to link digital photography and Photoshop to the beginning of the end for photography. For some fields, such as photojournalism, I do agree that photographers must be careful not to modify the image to the point that they are making history rather than reporting it. And I don't care for some works of art that started with a photograph, but with software end up looking more like a cartoon or a Dali painting.

But for any work of art, be it literature, a painting, the cinema, or a photograph: the truth lies both in the eye of the creator and the viewer. We all have our own frame of reference and set of experiences that affect how we interpret the work of art.

With the advances in digital cameras and film, I think the art of photography is accessible to more than it has ever been today. As someone that still loves to load up a roll of Tri-X black and white film in my camera, or on another day take out my digital camera, I feel photography is very much alive. So grab that old film camera out of the closet, or that brand new 12 Megapixel DSLR, and lets go out and takes some photos for all too enjoy! Who's with me?

Michael Watry
http://windycitycameraphile.blogspot.com

I believe that the photographers of today are great in there own way. If art did not change with the times , we would still be painting on cave walls. As far as making great images, it's about consistency. Allot of people can make one or two great photos, but only a small amount of people can produce consistent bodies of work and that is how you know if a photographer is good or not

Photography is more vital than ever. The digital darkroom is a powerful draw to many tech-savy photography buffs, many of whom would never step near a chemical darkroom. But what Plagens perceives to be the concept of fiction in photography is nothing new; it started in the 1850???s with Henry Peach Robinson and Oscar Rejlander making composite prints using as many as 30 separate negatives. When the public discovered that the dying girl in Robinson???s photo ???Fading Away??? was, in fact, a healthy girl who had just modeled for the photo, people were incensed; they expected photos to depict reality, and the scene in the photo wasn???t ???real???. It sounds like Plagens is making the same argument at a different point in time based on a slightly different definition of reality.
But has the camera ever really captured ???reality???? The camera does not see as the human eye does; therefore, it is not capable of capturing what we see. Often, manipulating the image, digitally or in the darkroom, enhances the image to more accurately represent what we perceived with our eyes. Or with our hearts. Or both. These are exciting times, and photography has multiple purposes. One, which must be based on reality, is documentary; the result can also be art, but it doesn???t have to be. Another is art: the result can also be documentary, but it doesn???t have to be. Let creativity reign!

We are experiencing a similar situation with analog and digital imaging that happened with painting and photography in the late 1800's and early 1900's. Photography's influence upon painting was dramatic, causing painters to examine new ways of using paint, thus creating modern painting, impressionism, expressionism, cubisim etc. Pictorial Photography had to borrow aesthetics from painting to be considered a valid art form. It then rejected the aesthetics of painting and worked with its own inherent characteristics through straight photography. We now are at a similar point in history. Digital imaging has borrowed aesthetics from analog photography. Everything digital seems to be a simulation for something analog. It is time that digital imaging come into its own, by fully exploring its inherent characteristics. This is already happening in the work we see being exhibited. I am excited to be a part of this exploration.

Simon Blundell
www.simonfoto.com
simon@simonfoto.com

We are experiencing a similar situation with analog and digital imaging that happened with painting and photography in the late 1800's and early 1900's. Photography's influence upon painting was dramatic, causing painters to examine new ways of using paint, thus creating modern painting, impressionism, expressionism, cubisim etc. Pictorial Photography had to borrow aesthetics from painting to be considered a valid art form. It then rejected the aesthetics of painting and worked with its own inherent characteristics through straight photography. We now are at a similar point in history. Digital imaging has borrowed aesthetics from analog photography. Everything digital seems to be a simulation for something analog. It is time that digital imaging come into its own, by fully exploring its inherent characteristics. This is already happening in the work we see being exhibited. I am excited to be a part of this exploration.

Simon Blundell
www.simonfoto.com
simon@simonfoto.com

I can appreciate one's view that photograhy has become a subject of often intense commentary particularly about its relative position in the so-called "world of art." But, in essence, the mistake that is made is not so much how a paintng is done, or a photgrapgh is taken, but rather the end result. In the days of cavemen who chiseled figures on the walls of a cave to the latest "photoshop" actions, is it not what we see rtaher than how it was done the more important consideration? Early painters made their own paint using eggs and other materials available to them. Is that not basically the same as using technology to create another view of life? We use whatever is available to make the end result, which is the key to the entire process. The problem that exists today is the limited view taken by those who cannot for whatever reason enter a new era. They are stuck in th past and with little ability tomove foward and accept change. Art is art. How one creates it is not as important as what has been created. And to say iphotography is not real is essentially saying that anything created in the mind is not real as well. What would all those religious painters from centuries gone by who painted their own versions of Jesus Christ say. I mean did they ever meet him or really know what he looked like? And whether is is a statue, a painting a photographgh or graffitti, it is all art. Enjoy it. It will be here forever.

The overall of Andy-Rooney-esque tone of the piece is making me crazy, first of all... It's as if it's saying, "Today's photos are not real like the ones when I was a kid, and that bothers me." The thesis here, that somehow photography has become lately unreal in its Photoshop-drenched depictions, is old news in any sense (see Walter Benjamin's famous 1936 essay "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction" for example). Anyone observing a photo today has seen enough films, TV commercials and magazine spreads to know almost instinctively that a printed or projected image is a manufactured object. As for this call to action at the end of the article: "The next great photographers???if there are to be any???will have to find a way to reclaim photography's special link to reality. And they'll have to do it in a brand-new way," it's adolescent and ridiculous. Of course there are going to be great image-makers of tomorrow, and no, they will not have to "reclaim photography's special link to reality," which never really existed in the first place. The great overarching story of the medium from Talbot to Sherman (and beyond) has been the gradual acknowledgement that photography is not the same as your own uninflected eye, but a largely subjective effort. That's why we call it an "art".