Photos by Edward Weston
I liked my skim of his daybooks so I thought I’d have a look at this essay he’s written. Also, I’ve taken to photographing fruit because of him, and he may talk about fruit!
- The early Art strain of photography veered erroneously to painterly effects as that was the dominant and seemingly closest tradition. This was anti-photographic.
- That is why the photography that we respect from the past is not art photography but amateur or commercial as they weren’t concerned about bending it into something it isn’t. That’s a smart reading and certainly explains the love of Atget.
- Sweet metaphor of singer’s paying out musicians for using machines.
- Nature of the recording process: instant.
- Nature of the image: precision of detail and ‘unbroken sequence of infinitely subtle gradations’. He then goes to argue that only this clarity, and ‘lucidity’ is to be respected. But as Frank and those after have shown, eschewing this doesn’t necessarily make something anti-photographic.
- Because of the two points above: the ‘finished print must be created in full before the film is exposed.’ Wrong, of course. That’s like saying Jazz players shouldn’t, or by the very character of their instruments, can’t improvise on the spot. And his denigration of luck as a factor is short sighted. But it isn’t for him. He believe in his theories and did great work based on those theories. You make up what ever lies you need to get the work done.
- Makes an interesting point that far from a photographer not having enough control, they have too much. Does he mean it would be much more photographic if we were reduced to some basic forms of control such as framing, shutter speed, and focus.
- Makes the important point that photographers do not stay with simple equipment long enough. Speaks of having one lens and really learning to see with it. I’ve just shot 20,000 photos with one fixed lens.
- He speaks of the photographer knowing how a scene will look as a finished print. Compare this to Winogrand’s ‘I photograph things to see how they will look as a photograph.’ I think it would be boring to know exactly how the photograph will look in the end. But you want to have the ability to control how you represent what you see either. Winogrand’s Utah 1964 involved aesthetic choices which result in its greatness.
- Photography’s honesty (it’s detail) makes just surfaces, or faux surfaces and inappropriate medium. It’s a little sad to read this and think of the Beauty industry and what it does with photography.
- Says that pre-planning of composition according to traditional compositional rules is impossible and shouldn’t be done before the fact but should be done afterwards in editing. I don’t know about that. You can see from HCB’s rolls that he would experiment with compositions on the spot.
- End advice is great: ‘his greatest asset is the directness of the process he employs. But this advantage can only be retained if he simplifies his equipment and technic to the minimum necessary, and keeps his approach free from all formula, art-dogma, rules and taboos. Only then can he be free to put his photographic sight to use in discovering and revealing the nature of the world he lives in.’
Posted 2 years ago
