The devaluation of photography?
Written by David WhiteHmmm…rather a lame effort over on the Grauniad about whether digital has devalued photography…Personally, I clicked no.
In my opinion direct flash has done more harm 🙂
Hmmm…rather a lame effort over on the Grauniad about whether digital has devalued photography…Personally, I clicked no.
In my opinion direct flash has done more harm 🙂
Discussion (8 Comments)
Very lazy from The Guardian… I expected some arguments from both sides of the spectrum.
I saw that earlier, assumed it was a well written piece with input from Goldin and the Guardian picture team. Turns it is was nothing more than a photographic equivalent of HotorNot.com
Goldin’s interview was quite good though, if a bit depressing. Not sure if I agree with her top tip of “Don’t do it. There are way too many photographers” and that you unless you need to make art to stay alive you shouldn’t make art.
They might as well have asked whether Fox Talbot’s discoveries devalued photography – or whether it devalued the daguerreotype. Maybe digital photography devalued 35mm film photography, sure, but to assume that it devalued the medium of photography risks the assumption that film photography is the Only True Way of Creating an Image.
How do we define photography? I notice that Wikipedia defines it as “the art, science, and practice of creating pictures by recording radiation on a radiation-sensitive medium, such as a photographic film, or electronic image sensors”
Personally, I would not define ‘photography’ in such as technical way, and consider it as a technological means of recording, commenting or observing one’s vision of the world. perhaps.
Her ‘Top Tip’ in the original article is a more interesting discussion point:
“Top tip: Don’t do it. There are way too many photographers. Try to draw or get politically involved in something that matters. And unless you need to make art to stay alive, you shouldn’t be making art.”
I agree with Olivier – very lazy from the Guardian.
Has digital devalued photography? Well yes, if one takes a broad view, in so far as it has flooded the market with material and the value of an individual image has in many cases dropped.
Has it compromised photography? Absolutely not. It has fostered interest in it, it has opened up new ways of seeing the familiar, and shown us the unfamiliar for the first time. It has democratized image-making and it has had a profound impact on the ways we can tell stories, explore truths and explode myths and lies. In some cases it has tipped the balance of power by enabling the suppression and brutalization of citizens by their state to be exposed and condemned.
We have a new technology- but it hasn’t arrived with a new way of seeing. Until it finds its “voice,” it will continue to make more of the same much faster.
Here’s what digital is doing in the US of A
http://www.alternet.org/story/151806/15_years_in_prison_for_taping_the_cops_how_eavesdropping_laws_are_taking_away_our_best_defense_against_police_brutality?page=2
The devaluation of photography? http://www.duckrabbit.info/2011/07/the-devaluation-of-photography/