This was the question put to an esteemed panel of art experts last night at Pixels Gallery. What followed was a captivating, if not cerebral, discussion of the question.
The diverse group consisted of gallery curators, acclaimed photographic artists, and art writers, and of course the unofficial panel – the audience of art photographers of Manitoba. Me among them.
Is “art” only in the eye of the beholder?
Is it in the intent of the maker?
Is it about beauty? Is it only fine art if you want to hang it in your living room/office/bedroom etc? Can ugly and disturbing photographs be art?
Is it about the aesthetic?
Is it about novelty? Must art expose its subject in new ways all the time?
Must it be evocative, emotional, have a message?
Can it be art if you were paid to make it? (The inevitable question arose – are wedding photos fine art? – Yousuf Karsh, today globally recognized as one of the finest photographic artists of modern times, was doing a job – paid to photograph important people, but not to create “fine art.”
Why is what the public considers “art” not always considered art by the “art establishment?” (Dogs playing poker anyone?!)
IS there an ART ESTABLISHMENT?
How does the passage of time affect the acceptance and elevation of an image? (Norman Rockwell in the USA for example was dismissed as nothing more than a commercial illustrator in his day. But now galleries are clamoring to show his work as fine art. In Canada, we have Robert Bateman, while revered by many, he’s often derided by others as a great technician, an amazing illustrator, a successful business person, but most definitely not a creator of fine art. In 100 years from now will those people think differently?
Why are colour landscape photographs not considered fine art by many Canadian curators, while the US is yearning for the same, and are able to sell landscape prints for top dollar?
And so it went….I had no idea that what we as “artists” are doing – making photographs – was such a complex endeavour!
So makes a photographic image fine art? Is there a distinction between art and fine art? What’s the difference? Burtinski or Jeff Wall? snapshots or art?
Freeman Patterson? or Bryan Adams? Banal? Mundane or evocative and visceral?
What do YOU think makes a fine art photograph?
roberto says
Alex, interesting panel. This is definitely an intellectual exercise. It makes no difference if a person is buying it it is art for them. It matters not what you want or intended or anything. It is only what other people are willing to do with what is created.
I find these philosophical questions destracting from the real question of how to make a living doing art.