Gone is the day where all photographers are print makers as well. When the art first started, the photographer would have to develop and print their own plates, film and papers. The photographer did all the work, like I did in the picture above. It was created with film in a wet darkroom. People started to specialize in either making prints or taking the pictures, which I find sad. I found, that I understood more about dodging, burning and other printing techniques my picture taking also improved. Ansel Adams is a great example of a photographer who was also a print maker. He developed an entire system for taking pictures and printing to make it more systematized and easier to do. This is someone who really understood his art.
Many photographers have heard of Jerry Uelsmann, here is an photographer who is more known for his printing skills. I don't know if I have ever seen a print of his work that isn't a montage and I don't know if he has done any since starting to work on his montage technique. Yet, he isn't the first one to pioneer this technique. A lot fewer people know of a lady called Hannah Maynard, from the 1860-1900 she pioneered creating images with glass plates.
Look at that picture. The statue is actually her grandson covered in powder to look like a statue, who is also sitting next to one of her images in the print. She is in the picture twice. But is this photography?
Photoshop has given photographers a whole new range of tools. It allows people to digitally do what Uelsmann and Maynard have done with film and darkroom, though Jerry Uelsmann and his wife have clearly stated that it is not easier to create a digital montage than a darkroom one. (His wife was a former student but does digital work instead) If you have ever tried both methods, you realize they are correct if you are trying to create an image that is seamless and fits together well. I have attempted to do them both. Are these photographs still though? Is it art?
One of the newest techniques is HDR, High Dynamic Range Photography. This is where you purposely take over and under exposed images and use software to create a composite image from them. It gives you more detail and color, especially in the highlights and shadows. There are a few different ways to do it, and there is a pseudo technique using a single photograph, but it isn't truly HDR. However, the question here is, is it photography still?
Now that I've briefly talked about these different aspects I'll give my opinion. All of these can be photography, but a couple of them it can be questioned if it is or not. To me, it comes down to where are the original images coming from? Is the creator of the digital montage taking all the pictures to use in their work? Here, you have a photographer who is just creating the best print her can from his own work. If they are using another photographers images to create the final print, they aren't a photographer, they are a print maker or a digital artist. There are people who won't agree with me, and that's fine. That part of what helps make this art.
Are these art though? I know I hear and read about how many curators don't like photography as they don't see it as an art form. That all someone does is point a camera and take a picture, they aren't putting a lot of time into creating it, especially with landscape and nature photographer as we don't set up the pictures, we don't direct the subject. Personally, I don't think these people understand what art is. Just because they have a degree in it doesn't mean they understand it. Art isn't a complicated thing, it's something that communicates on an emotional level. If looking at a statue makes you feel something and looking at a photograph makes you feel something different, they are both communicating on that emotional level. They both are art. Maybe it makes you feel disgusted, but it makes you feel. If it makes you feel nothing, it communicates NO emotions at all, then you can say it isn't art to you.
-Steven
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