[Leica] Christian's Remarks

[Peterson_Art@hq.navsea.navy.mil]

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     As one who said, in response to Christian Becker's criticism of Eric=
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     Welch's pictures, "it is hard to imagine what benefit any photograph=
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     could derive from just being told that 'most of your pictures [are] =

     unimpressive,'" I would now like to comment on Christian's more rece=
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     explanations vis-=E0-vis that criticism.  He says, "What distinguish=
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     the impressive from the unimpressive is whether there is compassion =

     for the subject," and that "you have to have empathy to be a good =

     photographer" and be "able to transmit feelings to the viewer," and =
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     adds, "If HCB's pictures are impressive THAT is what makes them, not=
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     technical quality, which is the least important thing."
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     Certainly compassion may be one element in making a picture (or any =

     artwork) impressive.  Writers like Shakespeare and Faulkner have sho=
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     great compassion for their subjects, as did Mozart in his operas and=
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     other works, and more recently Robert Altman, in his film "Nashville=
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     showed great compassion for an enormously wide range of characters =

     (even though they sometimes behaved despicably); and many of Henri =

     Cartier-Bresson's pictures have this quality too.  But one should no=
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     fail to recognize that other qualities may contribute to making a wo=
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     of art impressive.  For example, Ansel Adams's photographs, which I,=
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     like most people, find impressive, frequently depict inanimate objec=
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     that neither call for nor elicit anyone's compassion.  Yet, on the =

     other hand, the grandeur, nobility, and magnificence they convey is =

     the product of Adams's masterful manipulation of two other important=
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     elements in any successful work of art: form and technique.  So it i=
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     not true that technical quality is "the least important thing" (whic=
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     is presumably a mere overstatement for emphasis on Christian's part)=
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     Without technical quality an artwork effectively does not exist, and=
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     so how could it be less important than anything.  The point is rathe=
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     that technical quality is not the only thing.  In HCB's photographs,=
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     think, it is the combination of compassion as conveyed through their=
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     form and technical quality that makes them successful works of art.
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     And finally, regarding Christian's remarks on "How could one define =

     picture quality?  My simple answer is - by comparis[on].  If you =

     compare a lot you finally find out;" I think that is a very importan=
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     point, and I emphatically agree.  As B. H. Haggin observed, "The goo=
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     in art becomes the criteria by which we judge the bad."  There are n=
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     absolutes here, only relativities.
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     Art Peterson