Social media as sites for posting art photographs

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I’ve been thinking a lot about social media and its relationship to photography lately, in particular about Facebook.  It is a marvel of ingenuity, in that it is free to use.  What is more marvelous than free? Hmm, I seem to remember somebody saying that there was no free lunch. No doubt this and sites like Flickr are ideal ways of sharing photographs with your friends, and posting photographs that you will regret twenty years from now.   Buy hey, this is a kind of narcissistic “live for the moment period in history.”  The problem with Facebook is that it is, or should be, a post for the lowest common denominator kind of place.  Those who are keeping score, whoever they may be (I’m not really sure who they are) count up the number of friends that you have.  So in the mad frenzy for “friendship,” which it isn’t really, you friend everyone on site (sic) and then you have a fundamental problem, anything that you post, text or image, must be shared with everyone.  So if your smart you’re only going to post what you want everyone to see.

I will skip the diatribe on all the dumb people, friends of friends, who insist on posting political BS filled with xenophobic prejudice, sexism, and racism, and well, just plain stupidity.  Yes, you are stupid.  please unfriend me!  I believe in a kinder, gentler world. one filled with beauty and photographs. You, my unfriends, are the polluters of the planet!  Oh sorry, I wasn’t going to talk about this…

Which takes me back to the point.  there are several great photo-groups, known as User Groups, on Facebook: “Black and White,” ” Strictly Black and White,” “Worldwide Photography,” and “Life after People,” to name some of my favorites. And I have seen some beautiful pictures on these groups.  I have also seen some poor taste stuff and even pornographic stuff – there is a line, you know.  If I see for instance a woman in a compromising or suggestive position, I am not shocked, but I am saddened that it doesn’t promote my kinder, gentler world.

The plus side to sites like Facebook is visibility.  It is after all a concentration of friends. I get about equal viewings of my blog on Facebook, where it comes in on an RSS feed, as I do directly to subscribers on my own website.

The real difficulty, I shouldn’t say problem, with Facebook groups lies in the fundamental streaming nature of the site.  Things pour in and, as a result, if you don’t dig for them, are intrinsically ephemeral.  You want to belong to a popular group, because you want your art seen.  But your images rapidly disappear from easy viewing; so in a sense popularity is self-consuming. We can have our fifteen minutes of fame, but nothing more.

Facebook serves what Facebook serves, and I am a big fan of it.  I have also seen some beautiful images on Facebook and despite their limitations, I enjoy the photo-groups.  But, as always the case, with e-technology, where there’s a demand there is a solution (albeit never perfect) and that will be the discussion of an upcoming blog.

 

 

Adamantium claws

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There was another image from “The best of …” series last week that really caught my attention.  It is by Andy Rain of the EPA and shows an auctioneer for Christie’s posing with the “adamantium” claws worn by Hugh Jackman’s in his role as the Wolverine in the X-Men: The Last Stand film. The image is both amusing and just a bit creepy.  In my mind, I think that its power comes from the dichotomy between the demure look of the pretty auctioneer and her delicate necklace set against the viciousness of the claws themselves.  Then too there is the gesture of peaceful submission of supplication (so too the downward almost eyes closed glance), the arms crossed and held to the chest, which again contrasts with the metallic aggressiveness.

 

Sunglasses

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Figure 1 - Sunglasses, Natick, MA. (c) DE Wolf 2014.

Figure 1 – Sunglasses, Natick, MA. IPhone photograph. (c) DE Wolf 2014.

Saturday afternoon I found myself trekking across a farmer’s field to try to photograph some wild turkeys.  The turkeys, perhaps still leery of Thanksgiving, had other ideas, and I learned the reason that farmers wear boots, especially after three inches of rain.  Hmm!  So I am learning, or relearning, the value of a winters walk at the mall, photographing with my IPhone.

Also Saturday, I took this photograph (Figure 1) of a display in the window of Louis Vuitton at the Natick Collection in Natick, MA.  They have incredibly talented window designers and this image falls under the category of derivative art.  It appeals to my sense of symmetry and geometry, not to mention (well maybe I am) the dream of warmer days to come.  After all, next weekend the winter solstice is upon us and the days will start to get progressively longer.  At some point, I hope soon, I will need my sunglasses for my morning commute again!

Canada Goose – Branta canadensis

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Figure 1 - Canada Goose, Marlborough, MA, December 2014. (c) DE Wolf 2014.

Figure 1 – Canada Goose, Marlborough, MA, December 2014. (c) DE Wolf 2014.

Many a Massachusetts High-techer who found themselves dodging wads of goose poop in the company parking lot or worse being “attacked” by a Canada Goose for coming too close to a nest in the grass beside the lot will long ago have labeled these majestic birds as a nuisance. But I believe them to be noble animals descendants of at least a hundred million years of evolution.

And whenever I see them my thoughts go back to an early spring afternoon, when I was driving from Ithaca to Aurora, NY many years ago.  The sky was a brilliant orange and it was filled with Canada geese (Branta canadensis) on the great migration north.  They were all around us, suddenly descending into a cornfield. The scene was inspiring, and I saw these travelers for what they truly are, the epitome of another realm of nature, where the ability to play out deeply programed instinctual behaviour is dominance.  We have our niche, they theirs.

The Canada goose was in trouble years ago and in many areas had to re reintroduced.  As a result many, indeed most, no longer migrate.  Still to me this tough adherence to avian instinct is part of the great appeal of birds.  In Figure 1, I have tried to capture the eye of the bird and used the sun reflecting from behind and to the right to illuminate the it with a catch-light that creates a sense of vitality. I am wondering exactly what he is thinking about me.

Silhouette

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I need to start with an apology for failed notifications, multiple notifications, and extra notifications. Hati and Skoll is now in its third year, and websites tend to run into mail problems at about this point thanks to an army of e-parasites.  I am working on a “permanent” solution and hope to have it in place over the weekend.  But in the meanwhile please bear with me.

Week’s end and I have been going through the usual “Best Photographs of the Week” sections on various sites and there are a few beautiful images to share this week.  There is a wonderful silhouette by Anindito Mukherjee for Reuters showing workers building a rail bridge over the River Yamuna in New Delhi, India.  Silhouette is one of those over done art forms, but when it works, as in this wonderful image, it can be gorgeous, a surrender of grey tones towards a simple geometric statement in black and white. In fact, the man on the right with his blue shirt represents a kind of contrast to the otherwise pure monochrome of the image. Here the appeal is in the vertical geometry of the bars that essentially eclipses the workman.

The Swap

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So much of photography nowadays expands beyond the digital and becomes a web-based affair. I recently came upon a site called “The Swap.” The Swap is an ongoing portrait project, designed and curated by Stuart Pilkington. It is based on a very simple concept. On two separate days two photographers photograph each other and create two portraits. On day one, person one is the photographer and the other is the subject, and on day two they swap roles so that the photographer becomes the subject and visa versa.

This very straightforward concept has two effects. First, it emphasizes the significance of portraiture as an art form, where the creative act is both to reveal how you see the other person combined with how they see themselves. Second, it forces the photographer to step out of his/her comfort zone and to become the subject. For many, I fear, photography is a way of abstracting yourself from life, to become an observer instead of a participant.

I think that the best way to approach “The Swap” is to click on pairings and then to go through each one by one. At first, I was struck by how many photographers are trying way too hard to be clever and unique. Their portraits at best seem quirky. But then as I went through more and more of the images, I started to see some beautiful images and every once in a while the concept of a pairing struck a deep chord of resonance. The photographer had succeeded in a wonderful way.

I recommend a slow perusal of this site, and if you and a friend are truly adventurous, sign up and create a pair of images.

Peter Lik’s “Phantom” the most expensive photograph ever.

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Remarkably a photograph by Australian/US photographer Peter Lik, a wonderful trick of light taken in Arizona’s Antelope Canyon recently sold at auction for a remarkable and record breaking $6.5 MI.  It is now the most expensive photograph ever sold. And it reveals a spectre that would have made Conan Doyle blink with credulity. To the extent that the art market sets the standards, this moves photograph to a new echelon in the artistic hierarchy.

 

Photographic First # 15 – Earliest dance photograph

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Figure 1 - Possibly the earliest ballet photograph from the George Eastman House and in the public domain because of the age of the image.

Figure 1 – Possibly the earliest (1849) ballet photograph from the George Eastman House and in the public domain because of the age of the image.

The discussion of the 1892 premier of Tchaikovsky’s “Nutcracker,” got me wondering about the earliest dance photography. This (Figure 1) appears to be a daguerreotype in the George Eastman House collections from 1849 that unfortunately is by an unknown photographer of an unknown dancer. What is remarkable about the piece is that the dancer is shown in a relatively simple position.  This is remarkable because of the long exposure times required at the time.

Figure 1 is of a contemporary image (~ 1850) a beautiful full plate Daguerreotype portrait of a Spanish dancer complete with castanets. The original is in the collection of the Photo Library IPCE (Institute of Cultural Heritage of Spain) in Madrid. There seems to be a huge temperol disparity between the two images.  The second seems almost modern in its expression.  The turning of the neck creates a marveklous sense of muscular motion, and the coloration is gorgeous in its subtlety.

Figure 2 - Spanish Danscer with castenets. From the and in the public domain because of its age.

Figure 2 – Spanish Dancer with castenets (~1850). From the IPCE – Institute of Cultural Heritage of Spain- and in the public domain because of its age.

 

Tchaikovsky and the Christmas Nutcracker

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Figure 1 - the first performance of the Nutcracker production of The Nutcracker (Imperial Mariinsky Theatre, St. Petersburg, 1892). (Left to right) Lydia Rubtsova as Marianna, Stanislava Belinskaya as Clara and Vassily Stukolkin as Fritz, in the original. From the Wikimediacommons and in the public domain because of age of image. production of The Nutcracker (Imperial Mariinsky Theatre, St. Petersburg, 1892).

Figure 1 – the first performance of the Nutcracker production of The Nutcracker (Imperial Mariinsky Theatre, St. Petersburg, 1892). (Left to right) Lydia Rubtsova as Marianna, Stanislava Belinskaya as Clara and Vassily Stukolkin as Fritz, in the original. From the Wikimediacommons and in the publi cdomain because of age of image.

The weather is turning colder here in Boston. Our skin is cracking from the freeze-drying air, but spirits are high.  One of the important seasonal events is the Boston Ballet’s performance of Tchaikovsky’s “the Nutcracker.”  This is a ritual played out in many American cities, and thinking of it always brings a smile to my face.  My son, at the time, referred to it as “The Nutcrack'” and, out of deference to his mother, tolerated being dressed in itchy wool shorts, knee socks, and a blazer to attend what must have seemed a very boring event with an audience filled with coughing and contagious children.  But it is such a delightful parade of little people in wool and velvet, looking ever so Christmassy. And the ballet itself does capture the unique aspect of anticipation that permeates the holiday.

Hearing about this year’s event got me thinking about whether or not there are photographs of the original performance, and sure enough, hence Figure 1 . The Nutcrack’ was first perfomed on the 18th of December 1892, at the Imperial Mariinsky Theatre in St. Petersburg, Russia.  The performance was conducted by Riccardo Drigo, and featured:  Antonietta Dell’Era as the Sugar Plum Fairy, Pavel Gerdt as Prince Coqueluche, Stanislava Belinskaya as Clara, Sergei Legat as the Nutcracker-Prince, and Timofey Stukolkin as Drosselmeyer.

Counter to current practice children performed the major child roles in those days.  It is, I guess, another one those photographic time travel events, except that the whole pageant seems, in fact, pretty timeless.  This image is especially poignant as it offers up a view of imperial Russia at its height of misplaced and complacent glory.  You look at the picture and, if you live where I do, you can imagine the bone-chilling cold of St. Petersburg just outside the doors of the theatre.

Figure 2 - The Tchaikovskys in 1848. From the Wikimediacommons and in the public domain because of the age of the image.

Figure 2 – The Tchaikovskys in 1848. From the Wikimediacommons and in the public domain because of the age of the image.

In researching this, I also came across a photograph from 1848 of Tchaikovsky as a young child himself. Left to right are: Pyotr, Alexandra Andreyevna (mother), Alexandra (sister), Zinaida, Nikolai, Ippolit, Ilya Petrovich (father). This again is a time trip.  It is wonderful in the way that so many family groupings from that date are.  Not everyone is looking at the camera which creates a sense of abstraction and indifference.  For the little girl in front the whole event seems rather boring.  Perhaps this anticipates the obligatory journey to her brother’s ballet by so many little children then unborn. Certainly the outfit that Pyotr is wearing would be suitable for a modern performance and the cowlick is just wonderful.