In his brilliant article “Art after Philosophy,” Joseph Kosuth scathingly denounced traditionalists. Explaining that the purest definition of conceptual art would be “that it is inquiry into the foundations of the concept ‘art,’ as it has come to mean,” he ridiculed critics who did not understand that all art is conceptual in character. “Formalist critics always bypass the conceptual element in works of art. Exactly why they don’t comment on the conceptual element in works of art is precisely because Formalist art is only art by virtue of its resemblance to earlier works of art. It’s mindless art.”
Today’s quotes are from the essay, Landscape as Concept, in the collection of essays, Landscape as Photograph, by Estelle Jussim and Elizabeth Lindquist-Cock (1985):
Concepts can be boring, exciting, beautiful, ugly, fragmentary, unresolved, simple-minded, amateurish, complex, aggressive, passive, memorable, faddish. They are all, necessarily, products of the mind and are associated with underlying philosophies — ideologies, if you prefer — about the nature of the world, the nature of Nature, human nature, the nature of art, photography, communication, money-making, fame, success, the pleasures of creative activity, technology, politics — the list is endless.
“Thinking is radically metaphoric,” according to the great logician I. A. Richards. He believed that the mind takes hold of phenomenological reality by “the analogy, the parallel, the metaphoric grapple or ground or grasp or draw by which alone the mind takes hold. It takes no hold if there is nothing for it to haul from, for its thinking is the haul, the attraction of likes.” We haul in images with cultural nets; we unconsciously carry with us a stream of associations for such abstractions as liberty, progress, strength, time, omnipotence, sorrow, and we either construct visual symbols for these ideas or we find analogies in nature’s happenstance. The pathetic fallacy, the anthropomorphizing of natural forms — a proud stand of oaks or a sorrowing willow, a majestic mountain or a joyful brook — occurs as readily in visual images as in poetry, even if visual images are more ambiguous.
For photographers to deny that their work is conceptual would be the equivalent of admitting that their work is utterly mindless. For landscape photographers, particularly, to deny their conceptual operations would be to suggest that they simply wander the face of the earth without purpose or ultimate destination.
It seems to me that the essay is stating the obvious, but then there are an awful lot of people who deny that there is necessarily anything conceptual about photography.
-Julie
It seems to me that the essay is stating the obvious
I agree, but – for me anyway – the process is nothing like their description of mapping landscape on to pathetic fallacy (of a sort that looks like the tritest of nature poetry). While I can’t say I’m consciously guided by it, prospect-refuge theory (see Landscapes in mind) is the best description I’ve seen of my own approach to landscape photography, more to do with primitive reactions to landscape than with complex constructs like pride or majesty.
Comment by Ray Girvan — July 3, 2009 @ 5:09 am
I don’t know why I thought of Rod McKuen when I hit the bit about “a proud stand of oaks or a sorrowing willow, a majestic mountain or a joyful brook.” That’s why I have one of those little bags they have in the pouch in front of you on an airplane when I read anything by him.
Would agree, have always agreed, with the prospect-refuge theory. It must be one of many primitive neuropsych structures, like music, that evolved to help us survive. In this case, survive boredom. Oooh La La do I sound like Jung or somebody?
Comment by Dr. C. — July 3, 2009 @ 1:02 pm
Prospect-refuge is primarily what you see? When you see animals in a picture, predator or prey is primarily you see? When you see a fruit still-life, a juicy snack is primarily you see? When you see a Madonna, a MILF is primarily you see?
(She intended to reference bad poetic metaphors; she’s making a point about how common cultural abstractions are.)
Comment by unrealnature — July 4, 2009 @ 7:03 am
“When you see a fruit still-life, a juicy snack is primarily you see?”
But of course! Others, I surmise, focus on the little bugs introduced to show off the artist’s skill in minutae. Or maybe they focus on other critters (lower right corner). And I suppose an apple could give me a fuzzy feeling about life in the The Garden before the temptress got hold it (the apple, I mean).
Madonna?
Comment by Dr. C. — July 4, 2009 @ 12:26 pm
What Garden would that be?
And the picture of Felix dressed as a chicken made you think of … ? … chicken nuggets? … grade A extra large?
Comment by unrealnature — July 4, 2009 @ 12:39 pm
As to the fruit, likewise. I’ve just been looking at fruit still-lifes, and my first-pass reaction is definitely to assess the fruit’s edibility. Considering the art comes later.
As to yer Madonner (as they say here) maybe such images are (consciously or unconsciously) contrived to foster the right attitude by switching off a sexual perception? Religious context apart, carting a baby about is a signal of unavailability due to an existing relationship.
Comment by Ray Girvan — July 4, 2009 @ 3:18 pm
I guess you could consider still lifes (lives?) as having subtle messages such as phallic: droopy, bent, subtle, hung, alcoholic, and so forth.
Comment by Dr. C. — July 4, 2009 @ 4:02 pm
“Subtle phallic” . . . I think I would recommend six months of torsion; oops, I meant to say traction.
You do know what a fruit *is* don’t you?
See if this doesn’t help clear things up:
Why I Am Not a Painter
by Frank O’Hara
I am not a painter, I am a poet.
Why? I think I would rather be
a painter, but I am not. Well,
for instance, Mike Goldberg
is starting a painting. I drop in.
“Sit down and have a drink” he
says. I drink; we drink. I look
up. “You have SARDINES in it.”
“Yes, it needed something there.”
“Oh.” I go and the days go by
and I drop in again. The painting
is going on, and I go, and the days
go by. I drop in. The painting is
finished. “Where’s SARDINES?”
All that’s left is just
letters, “It was too much,” Mike says.
But me? One day I am thinking of
a color: orange. I write a line
about orange. Pretty soon it is a
whole page of words, not lines.
Then another page. There should be
so much more, not of orange, of
words, of how terrible orange is
and life. Days go by. It is even in
prose, I am a real poet. My poem
is finished and I haven’t mentioned
orange yet. It’s twelve poems, I call
it ORANGES. And one day in a gallery
I see Mike’s painting, called SARDINES.
Comment by unrealnature — July 4, 2009 @ 7:12 pm
Ah, ha! But since they are artistes, once the image has been created, it is always there. Of course the sardines are there as a sort of palimpsest thingy or, more accurately, but not exactly, a pentimento. (Which cascaded back to Lillian Hellman, Julia, Dashiell Hammett, and on in a sort of memory pentimento which is different from photography until the advent of Photoshop but then, what would I know. For instance, my girl friend’s girl friend was Lillian Hellman’s companion in her dotage and, by report, Ms. Hellman was every bit as bitchy as advertised.)
(Footnote: Does not apply to the color ‘orange.’)
Comment by Dr. C. — July 5, 2009 @ 10:49 am
Mmmm … pimentos. Though olive pimento bagels sound nasty. Too much pentimento for me.
Comment by unrealnature — July 6, 2009 @ 9:55 am