Fine art photography

funny that this thread as moved into a discussion of "fine arts" photography. I was just at an editorial meeting for the magazine I'm gathering this material for and the odd thing is that this is the same discussion all artists have.

Painters, sculptors etc. all talk about exactly what all of you are speaking of.
Only a rare few live off their art. Most supplement their income with teaching gigs and with workshops.

For me the issue really revolves around the marketplace. There is no tradition of buying art in most cultures. I don't believe it has ever been different. during the Renaissance there were lots of artists with big commissions and a lot of assistants who did the work and couldn't sell their work.

In America we have no tradition of buying art in the middle class. In the 70s the fine art photo market took off because folks like Sam Wigman and Stephen Stills got into buying photos. But that wasn't the common folk.

I think Roger will agree that its even harder in some countries then others. Often location is an issue. Art in France is centered in Paris and if you don't sell there forget it.

This isn't an answer to anyone's frustration. But did anyone see a hot market for the sale of fine art photos that was just dying to have you participate?

Steve aka Hawkeye
 
MickH said:
I knowthat unversity courses in "fine art" exist, maybe some of you teach, or are students of these. Are there courses in "vanilla" art? I doubt it very much. Googling doesn't help me with a definition, so I am left to my own devices. It seems to me that "fine art" is a relatively recent label used to elevate some work above other art for either commercial or pretentious reasons: "I am (or my client is) a fine artist." Is it really that simple?

I am genuinely puzzled.

Thanks,

Mick
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Universities teach two kinds of art. Fine art and commercial art (also known as graphic design or visual communications).

Commercial art is art that is done for clients who use the art for a commercial purpose. This encompasses a wide variety of things including product illustrations, advertisements, brochures, websites, logos, illustrations for books, etc. Commercial artists usually do not produce work until a client comes along and asks for it. Sometimes the artist is given wide discretion to be creative, other times he/she is given very narrow instructions and is little more than a technician executing someone else's idea. The pay is often very good. Some are self emlpoyed, others work for ad agencies or the marketing departments of businesses, schools, governments, etc.

Fine art is done for personal expression and the artist can do anything he/she wants but may not make money off of it if it isn't something someone will pay money for. Most have jobs teaching art, doing commercial art, or they make money some way unrelated to art.
 
Chriscrawfordphoto said:
Universities teach two kinds of art. Fine art and commercial art (also known as graphic design or visual communications).
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Dear Chris,

And the two are not always that clearly differentiated. When I applied to art school in the late 60s, Coventry offered me a place (at the interview) for a BA in Applied Art (Photography). When I said I was looking for a fine art degree, they shrugged and said, "Fine, BA Fine Art, then."

So I read law instead...

And when my first wife was at St Martins and Central in the mid-60s -- one of the most highly regarded schools in the UK -- she got a Dip. A.D., Diploma of Art and Design. When she was offered the opportunity to have this re-recognized as a BA in the 70s, she turned it down indignantly. Her view was (and is) that a Dip AD is an honourable qualification in its own right and to pretend that it's an academic degree is ridiculous. Pretending you can qualify as a fine artist is, in her view, even sillier.

Cheers,

Roger
 
Roger

Wow. 99.999% right is as close to 100% as I've ever gotten.

For me the irony is the life of an artist after death. Have you been to Giverny? Monet was radical when his work first appeared. Today the gift shop sells umbrellas, posters and place mats etc. emblazoned with his work.

Here's a tale. In the 1970s Ansel Adams sold his images to Folger's coffee to use to decorate coffee cans. After the Adams cans came out, Imogene Cunningham brought him an empty can that she had planted with several marijuana plants.

Steve
 
hawkeye said:
For me the irony is the life of an artist after death. Have you been to Giverny? Monet was radical when his work first appeared. Today the gift shop sells umbrellas, posters and place mats etc. emblazoned with his work.
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Dear Steve,

No, but I've spent a lot of time in Arles: an exact parallel!

Love the Folgers story. "Tea or, uhhhh, coffee?"

Cheers,

R.
 
I don't bother myself much with whether or not something can be called art.
To me, some pictures are interesting (creatively/intelligently made) and some are not. Regardless of the maker's intentions (which we can't really know anyway).

We all know that there are plenty of pictures intended to be art, which stink. And many pictures never intended as art which are wonderful.

Cheers,
Gary
 
hawkeye said:
... In America we have no tradition of buying art in the middle class. In the 70s the fine art photo market took off because folks like Sam Wigman and Stephen Stills got into buying photos. But that wasn't the common folk. ...
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Do you mean Sam Wagstaff? Much of the museum and private interest in modern photography can be linked to him.
 
Roger Hicks said:
... And the two are not always that clearly differentiated. ...
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Case in point Chris - your image from the first page of this thread of the bottle of 'plumpatrin' - identified as commercial art, but isn't it really social commentary disguised as a product shot. The product doesn't actually exist, and so doesn't that fit the requirement of modern art?
 
@Chris & Fred...

Thanks very much for the explanations. Nice and clear now.

It is interesting that studying, becoming proficient in and then practicing a "graphic" discipline is considered artistry, whereas the same thing in (say) law, medicine or business is different. Semantics I guess. I do now understand that what is called "fine art" can also be referred to as "art for arts sake", I perhaps mistakenly imagined that "fine art" had something to do with the quality of it's execution eg. a shark in formaldehide is "art" but The Fighting Temeraire is "fine art".

Thanks again.
 
Roger Hicks said:
Does 'Fine Art Photography' actually exist?

If so, how does it differ from 'good pictures'?

Sorry to be so populist. It's a question I've addressed a couple of times in my columns in AP magazine in the UK, and also on the site in

http://www.rogerandfrances.com/photoschool/ps art.html

If there are any ideas there that are useful, and you want to steal them, the fee is a cross-link to the site...

Cheers,

R.
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Pictures are taken. Art is created.
 
sjw617 said:
Are you saying that photography is not art and never capable of being art?

Steve
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NO! That is absolutely NOT what I am saying! I am saying that art -- any kind of art -- contains an element of creativity. This includes fine art photography. Fine art photography and documentary photography are two different things. Incidentally, I believe I was loosely quoting Ansel Adams.
 
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First, Roger is spot on to suggest that everyone in this thread read The Painted Word, if you are not already familiar with it. Also, anyone who decides on their own to call themselves an artist, most likely isn't.
 
As was said earlier, about art coming from the heart. I show my work in galleries about once a year, sometimes two or three. I usually sell two or three prints from a show. I take photographs for myself. If someone likes one enough to buy it I am flattered, but that is not my motivation. I have had several shows where I have sold nothing. That does not discourage me from continuing to make new images. If my work is considered art that is someone else's decision, not mine. I see myself as a photographer. For something to be art, IMO, it has to move us forward in our understanding and/or appreciation for the subject. If that is what is does for someone then it can be considered art. But when I take the picture I am merely expressing what I see and feel at the moment. I am not moving forward in my understanding, I am already there or I would not have seen the image in the first place. Or, I run the risk of contrivance if I am too calculating with my photos. So if my work reveals something that moves you, YOU can call me an artist, but for me to label myself is just a conceit.
 
Just for the record, it seems to me that Wikipedia limits the number of disciplines recocnized as Fine Arts, to a certain list. But Art, true Art can exist both as part of the list and outside.

A second division it seems to me we should be aware of, relates to who is an Artist. Being "an Artist" today is a coin very much devaluated within a massive number of self declared folks in need to sustain themeselves, some to raise their high profits, and others regarding being an artist as being a dentist.

The problem is to distinguish between the deep talented ones and the commercial drived creators advertizing themselves and producing weird but shallow things.

On top of all these I believe many real artists don't survive the need to sell enough to sustain themseves and/or their families, without compromising their creativeness or leaving it at once.

Art is not only in the eye of the beholder but first of all in the eye and mind of the artist. To be a real artist requires not just talent and inspiration but an original approach to life, to yourself, and extreme forces for survival and renewal.

Only those sincerely touching their own mind will have the potential to touch other minds.

Talented commercial mercenaries will never cease to exist.

Cheers,
Ruben
 
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ruben said:
The problem is to distinguish between the deep talented ones and the commercial drived creators advertizing themselves and producing weird but shallow things.
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Agreed, Ruben. But sometimes it's a bit tricky. It is not always clear who is who and what is what. Several times I have come across artwork that looks to me like nothing -- like nothing that is meaningful, nothing that fits my definition of art. Later I found out I was wrong -- it was my knowledge and vision that was lacking, not the artwork. Never underestimate how big (and therefore how unknowable) Art can be....
 
This thread is verging on the surreal.

"The Painted Word"? Really? I really like Tom Wolfe, but I don't remember that standing out as one of his best works (it's been probably 30 years since I read it, though).

Cheers,
Gary
 
I just did a google search on fine art photography. I'm still not exactly sure what it is,
but I can report that a surprisingly large portion of it seems to come from Utah.

Cheers,
Gary
 
hawkeye said:
I write for a magazine about business for visual arts here in the States. They want to devote an issue or a large part of an issue to "fine art" photography. So I'm looking for some ideas for everyone so that I'm not just "opinionating."
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hawkeye said:
If you sell prints through galleries and such can you give me an idea of what your experience is like. What the market for print sales like? Can you live off of sales? What sort of problems have you encountered?

I'd appreciate any views and if I want to quote you will get back to you for permission and will credit the writer.

Thanks,

Steve Meltzer
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I am not completely through the thread, but see what people mean by their comments on the potential for drift.

Have you looked at the Catalogues of various museums? Might be a place to see what they think is art, and perhaps further research may give you an idea of which of them are successful in the business sense. I have the Catalogue of the Cleveland Museum of Art, and while they exhibit few photographs, their collection fills a rather large book.

Your questions bring into play ideas that may be in conflict, that of demand of the market, commercial intentions, the intention of producing a technically acceptable image that may be art, and finally artists working only to express themselves in some meaningful way with no restrictions. I do not believe these to be entirely mutually exclusive nor exhaustive.

Which leads to the answer that there may be no specific answer, but rather a set of possibilities, some of which are rather well stated through the thread.

I make some photographs for publication, illustration, or event reportage, but I also look for the right juxtaposition of event and presence to make a good image.

Photography can be seen as a "found" art and the tools to capture it may be manipulated in some skillful and difficult manner, or not. Adams made some photographs quickly, and others very slowly with great developing intent. Time is seen sometimes as an inticator of art in terms of intent and rarity.

Technology also allows anyone who can trip a shutter to perhaps find images, which if entirely accidental, some would say they cannot be art at all.

I have made the acquaintance of several people who seem to "find" more art than others, and have yet to understand why it is they seem to have an ability to do so.

I have also found that while some images seem to be universally appealing, and therefore perhaps possess more potential for immediate business success, in general, photography often is seen by the populace as a craft, and as you can just "run off" prints mechanically, to be of less worth, both as art and commercially. All of it perhaps potentially a calendar to be posted on the fridge?

Which brings in the concept of rarity and cash value in acquiring prints. It does seem that the demise of the artist raises the cash value of his work. I recall some of the prominent photographers going through a phase of destroying negatives once a series was printed. It does seem often you can only begin to make a substantial living on fine art if you are dead.

And if people cannot agree that, for example, all art in and art museum is art, I would not look for consensus in photography soon.

I will say that when I viewed several hundred HCB prints in Paris, I came away feeling much of them were art, but am not sure HCB would have agreed.

It certainly is a set of questions that raise more questions.

A few more worms in the can?

Regards, John
 
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