Exhibition read.me
Two pitfalls await me on the way of “seeing” a photograph.
I’ve been aware of the first one for some time already.
It is seeing a photograph as some source of information, trying to reconstruct the truth, to gain some knowledge about pictured things.
It’s not the news report & it’s not a bit of evidence taken at a crime scene. It’s not a puzzle where I need to solve what event or moment of the world’s history is this photo all about.
I am free to imagine all missing parts I want, all space-time pieces I need, which were not captured by a photographer.
Photographer has the power to stop me from using my imagination. If he hasn’t limited me & my fantasy, why should I limit myself?
Even if he tried, I wouldn’t have to obey.
The second pitfall has just been discovered by me. It is trying to evaluate, how good or bad a photograph is. Some eastern philosophers could say that by allowing the possibility of the photograph to be bad from the very beginning you lose the ability to see how good it is.
Going this way prevents me from surrendering to the photograph. Actually, the photograph is more important than me, it leads the way. But the act of evaluating puts me on top & makes it harder for photography to reach me.
I think that this pitfall is especially dangerous for other photographers.
How was it done?
Why did he do it that way, when I see a better one?
How could this photo be improved?
Can I do the same?
Can I do better?
Is he really cool or just lucky?
Looking at a photograph just for evaluating its quality, it’s just listening to a person you talk with just to distinguish his accent & find out where he is from, to guess how rich he is or what he is thinking about you.
I believe that’s why I saw some best-for-me photographs just by chance. When you go to the gallery with a sole purpose to see some exhibition, you almost inevitably ask yourself a question — how good it will be? Will it be worth the time & effort spent?
Maybe, that is the reason, why I gain more “something” from music, films, theatre & painting, evaluation of which is far from being my primary goal.
And when I do, I usually do it afterwards.
I should also mention another side of evaluating problem, creator side. In response to such evaluating approach, some photographers set pleasing such viewers & scoring high marks as their primary goal. I see some similarity between this situation and that special kind of the games, described by Eric Bern in his writings.
писал на инглише сразу, потом переведу
|
)
