[Leica] William Eggleston on the Today Show

[gpinkcp at msn.com (Gary Pinkerton)]

A recent exhibit in Nashville, "Annointing the Overlooked", featured 50 plus 
prints of Eggleston's.
A couple of 'ladies' came into the first room of the gallery, took a quick 
look around from where they stood, and one of them said "let's go downstairs 
and see some real art".
There were also 3 college age ladies nearby and I overheard one of them say 
"for chrisakes, it's William Eggleston, what more do you want?"
I share the college lady's view :)

> Date: Wed, 1 Jun 2011 14:19:41 -0400
> From: csaganich at gmail.com
> To: lug at leica-users.org
> Subject: Re: [Leica] William Eggleston on the Today Show
> 
> Thanks George, refreshing to read that again.  I like the part about his
> work not being a step forward, meaning that as far as success in the world
> of art and gallery,  photography has plateaued on the fictionalized self
> portrait, a la Lucas Samatras, Sherman, etc, Their work lacks factuality 
> and
> is sufficiently self-absorbed for the modern art tastes.  Eggleston is
> sufficiently self-absorbed but also factual, which modern art looks down
> on.  His real contribution is to show the rest of us how to make color
> photographs, using color as form as subject in a consistent body of work.
> When I started to take his work seriously I realized that color work, done
> correctly, is more difficult then B&W.  I gained a similar appreciation for
> Bob Dylan when I tried to play his songs.  At first I thought of them as
> somewhat banal, a good place to start learning.  It wasn't long until I
> understood just how wrong I was.
> 
> Chris
> 
> On Wed, Jun 1, 2011 at 12:22 PM, George Lottermoser <imagist3 at 
> mac.com>wrote:
> 
> >
> > On Jun 1, 2011, at 1:14 AM, Mark Rabiner wrote:
> >
> > > I find Szarkowski eloquent above all else. He's my favorite photo 
> > > writer.
> >
> > >> From: Christopher Saganich <csaganich at gmail.com>
> > >>
> >
> > >> Eggleston is interesting, he is non-Descartes, not existential, but
> > focused
> > >> on remembering the familiar.  He is factual but is mostly driven by
> > >> composition and light.  Reminds me mostly of Plato's idea that we 
> > >> forget
> > or
> > >> overlook the obvious, that our history is forgetting the familiar.
> >
> > >> I wish I
> > >> has Szarkowski's foward for the Eggleston Guide.
> >
> > Szarkowski's introduction to Eggleston
> > <http://www.egglestontrust.com/guide_intro.html>
> > his conclusion:
> > "As pictures, however, these seem to me perfect: irreducible surrogates 
> > for
> > the experience they pretend to record, visual analogues for the quality 
> > of
> > one life, collectively a paradigm of a private view, a view one would 
> > have
> > thought ineffable, described here with clarity, fullness, and elegance."
> >
> > Regards,
> > George Lottermoser
> > george at imagist.com
> > http://www.imagist.com
> > http://www.imagist.com/blog
> > http://www.linkedin.com/in/imagist
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > Leica Users Group.
> > See http://leica-users.org/mailman/listinfo/lug for more information
> >
> 
> 
> 
> -- 
> Chris Saganich
> www.imagebrooklyn.com
> 
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