Two Philosophers of Art on Photography
Although one of these philosophers wrote thousands of years before the advent of photography, and the second addressed his remarks to painting, it is possible and, I think, instructive to apply their remarks to the practice of photography as art.
Aristotle (384-322 BC)
The main topic of Aristotle’s Poetics is the nature of tragedy. I’ll extract two remarks which are pertinent to the practice of photography as art.
“Plot,” Aristotle claims, “is the soul of tragedy.” And the (good) tragic plot must exhibit “unity.”
Unity of plot does not, as some persons think, consist in the unity of the hero. For infinitely various are the incidents in one man’s life which cannot be reduced to unity; and so, too, there are many actions of one man out of which we cannot make one action. … As therefore, in the other imitative arts, the imitation is one when the object imitated is one, so the plot, being an imitation of an action, must imitate one action and that a whole, the structural union of the parts being such that, if any one of them is displaced or removed, the whole will be disjointed and disturbed. For a thing whose presence or absence makes no visible difference, is not an organic part of the whole.
A good plot is not a recitation of all the facts; the poet must pick and choose so as to make an “organic whole” – that is, an artwork in which all the parts exhibit a structural relation to one another, and nothing is present which is unnecessary.
Here is a lesson for photographers. It is tempting when viewing something to take it all in when snapping the shutter. While this may make for a photo of some interest, it may not make for a unified photograph. Therefore, frame and if necessary crop with a view, not to showing “everything,” but to making an organic whole.
Unrelated to unity, but a comment that bears on photography:
Objects which in themselves we view with pain, we delight to contemplate when reproduced with minute fidelity: such as the forms of the most ignoble animals and of dead bodies.
Some things give “pain” when viewed in real life – “eyesores” we might call them. But an eyesore might make for a good photograph “when reproduced with minute fidelity.”
The contrary of this seems also true. Some objects might when viewed in reality give pleasure, but are hard if not impossible to turn into art photographs. Mountain ranges, for example, are magnificent to view, but do not always make for a photograph of equivalent impact.
Clive Bell (1881-1964)
Bell’s short book Art (1915) presents a theory of “visual art,” by which Bell intends to include painting, drawing, sculpture, and architecture. By the time of the publication of Bell’s book, photography had been practiced for about 60 years. For whatever reason, though, Bell does not include photography as one of the “visual arts.” Indeed, the only mention made of photography is to commend it for hastening the abolition of realism in painting: “But photography has made impossible any such transmutation of modern rubbish” (Bell is sneering at Frith, a prominent realistic Victorian painter). The thought is that if photography is naturally realistic, painting is therefore forced to seek another venue to exploit.
The principal motivation for Bell’s book is the advent of modern painting – Cézanne, Matisse, Picasso, etc. – and the concurrent attention to so-called “primitive” pieces (pre-Columbian art, archaic Greek art, etc.). All of these works eschew exact realistic depiction. So what makes them art?
There must be some one quality without which a work of art cannot exist; possessing which, in the least degree, no work is altogether worthless. What is this quality? What quality is shared by all objects that provoke our aesthetic emotions? What quality is common to Sta. Sophia and the windows at Chartres, Mexican sculpture, a Persian bowl, Chinese carpets, Giotto’s frescoes at Padua, and the masterpieces of Poussin, Piero della Francesca, and Cézanne?
Only one answer seems possible—significant form. In each, lines and colors combined in a particular way, certain forms and relations of forms, stir our aesthetic emotions. These relations and combinations of lines and colors, these aesthetically moving forms, I call “Significant Form”; and “Significant Form” is the one quality common to all works of visual art.
So (visual) art is significant form; and significant form is the relation among lines and forms in a work, a relation that moves us.
If the essence of visual art is significant form and not realistic depiction, then an abstract or “primitive” work might have more claim to being art that the realistic paintings of William Frith (assuming, as Bell thinks, Frith’s works lack significant form).
What lessons for photography can we draw from a theorist who, by intent or neglect, excludes photography from the visual arts, and whose theory explicitly eschews realistic depiction as necessary for art – given that photography is a naturally realistic medium?
First, the photographer must consider all the elements in the frame. Second, he must consider the relations of these elements to one another. Here considerations of balance, complementarity, and contrast come into play. Third, a judge of a photograph must rely on his or her feelings – Bell terms these our “aesthetic emotions”. In this sense, a judgment of the quality of a photograph is subjective; but the judge’s feelings are to be directed towards the “form” of the photograph (what is more commonly called “composition”).
Summary and a Question
Both Aristotle and Bell are “formalists” in the sense that the most important quality of art is not what is depicted but how it is depicted. Aristotle tells us that the elements in a work must form a unity (each element making some contribution to the whole; the work containing all that is needed and nothing that is not needed). Bell tells us the artist must arrange the elements of his work so as to produce “significance” in the design alone (with significance or its lack being determined by an observer’s aesthetic feelings). To take one example, I think it is the relation among its elements, and not its subject matter, that makes Albert Renger-Patzsch’s Blast Furnaces (1927) significant:
Small comment: In real life, these furnaces would probably have been “viewed with pain” to use Aristotle’s words; yet in the right photograph they make for great art.
Assume blast furnaces are not in themselves art. How can a photograph – a kind of copy of these furnaces – be a work of art? In Aristotle and Bell we get one answer: the photographer imposes form, and it is this form that makes a work of art.
Now, artists have been unkind to theories of art. Tragedy, Aristotle said, must have a “noble hero.” Not so said Arthur Miller, who produced a tragedy, Death of a Salesman, with a distinctly ordinary hero. Art must have significant form, Bell said. Not so said Andy Warhol, whose soup cans and Brillo boxes have decidedly insignificant forms.
But: street photography often captures the randomness of ordinary life, thereby eschewing significant form and unity, as in the work of one of the great practitioners of street photography, Gary Winogrand. Here’s an example (American Legion Convention,1964):
I would say that by the considerations of unified composition, this photograph fails to make the grade. And yet, it is, I think, a photograph with great impact nonetheless.
Question: Is unity of form or significance of form to be prized and used to judge all photographs? If not, when is it relevant and when not? I think camera clubs tend to judge on Aristotle-Bell lines – at the cost of devaluing street photography.
Streets of Santiago
The Presidential Palace, but no Chilean President has actually lived there since Allende was murdered? committed suicide? during the Pinochet putsch.
Speaking of Allende, there is a statue of him outside the palace, but not, oddly, a statue of Pinochet.
Old and new.
Random street shots.
Fish and meat markets.
The goat cheese vendor was positively giddy.
Location:Santiago, Chile
Villa Grimaldi
The Villa Grimaldi was a private estate seized by Pinochet who used it as a prison, torture chamber, and place of execution for rival political opponents. (See, for example, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Villa_Grimaldi)
The main house was destroyed by the army, so the grounds are primarily a park in honor of the victims.
There is a wall of the names if the victims, and names distributed throughout the rose garden.
The guard house, also destroyed by the army, but reconstructed, now contains glass cases with personal effects – a tie, glasses, schoolbook, etc. – of Pinochet’s victims.
Location:Santiago, Chile
Los Baños Morales
Rented a car and with friends Frank and Erhard drove southeast of Santiago, almost to the Argentine border, to the Baños Morales. This was a two hour drive, an hour of which was on dirt roads.
The baths are at an altitude of about 1800 meters (about a mile), and are surrounded by even higher Andes.
Lunch. Isabella was our waitress and cook; and in the very rustic surroundings produced wonderful chicken, pork, and salsa.
The baths are not hot springs, but do contain minerals. They are a wired color.
The highlight is the surrounding mountains.
Despite its – to me – remoteness, the place attracts Chilean families.
Location:Villa del Valle, Chile
Valparaiso, Chile
Valparaiso is the main port of Chile, and where our cruise ends. The name can be rendered in English as “Paradise Valley”, though it isn’t exactly a valley, lying between the Pacific and steep hills (much of the city is on these hills).
The main square and the armada of Chile.
The best thing about Valparaiso is an old neighborhood overlooking the harbor, with bright buildings and restaurants.
We rode a funicular down.
Stray dogs everywhere. Our driver suggested they should be one of the symbols of Chile.
Location:Valparaiso, Chile
Chile: Lakes, Volcanos, Waterfalls
A day of great weather. Lucky for us, as we were able to see the three local volcanos. Puerto Montt is a city of 200,000. Salmon and fruit are exported through its port, and it is surrounded by farms of the Germans who settled there in the 19th century.
It is also an exceptionally beautiful area, and Lago Llanquihue draws tourists from other parts of Chile, Argentina, and Brazil, despite the facts that it rains a lot and the water is really cold. These were taken at Puerto Varas, a tourist town half an hour north of Puerto Montt.
We visited Parque Nacional Vicente Perez Rosales (whew), whose principal attraction is the Petrohué waterfalls, though these are more like river rapids than waterfalls.
Dominating nearly every view are the three local volcanos, the prettiest of which is Osorno.
A roadside view.
A blog about South America would surely be incomplete without a llama.
Location:Puerto Montt, Chile
At Sea
Left Punta Arenas through the Straits of Magellan, emerging early this morning into open ocean and sailing north. The waves, though not the winds, are as bad as Cape Horn. I noticed a new accessory in the ships elevators: puke bags. And I see more people with casts on an arm.
Nothing to see except the sea.
I’ve never seen a sea the color of which could rightly said to be “wine-dark”. What was Homer drinking?
