Notes on Photography: #1 Art and Realism

#1

Is there a realist art work (photography) any element of art?

Is there an art work without any element of realism?

Is it the subject matter or the nature of the subject that makes a photograph realistic or artistic? If so, does it mean that some things can never be the subject of art photography and some other things can never be the subject of realist photography, while some things can be the subject of both art and realist photography? Yes, culturally some things are considered to be more overtly associated with social, economic and political aspects of life than some other things; it, however, does not mean that art and realism are in the things in themselves irrespective of how they are employed in works of art. If properties such as art and realist are not in the things itself, then we must look somewhere else for the sources that determine a work of art more artistic or realistic. Is it the aesthetic values of the work along with other essentially extra-aesthetic properties (such as intellectual or ideological valences of the artist that inform the making of the art work) that makes the work of art more artistic or realistic? Or do both the formal properties of the work, the cultural associations of the subject, the ideological valences of the artist, and the values the viewer come with interact to form the final genre decision arrived at?

Art works can be studied politically and political works can be studied artistically.

Any sort of work of art inescapably has elements of art and realism. The degree is what matters here.

It is what you (as a viewer or as an artist) choose to see. What aspect you choose to see? In a real life physical setting, say in a busy metro station or a riot scene, we do not see every small act of all those happening that cumulatively make up the living scene or event. Our senses have limitations and the sources whose sense data that predominantly reach us occupy most of our attention and we have our own choices which can be understood in terms of selections. Our understanding and perception of things are always mediated by the circumstances of physical perspectives and our intellectual, cultural and emotional valences, and thus it is not the same as the thing themselves. This mediation can be conscious or unconscious, and it always makes some addition to or removal from what is perceived but this fact does not make mediation necessarily biased—everybody inescapably does this. If mediation is a fact of the sentient life such as those of us humans due to our biological constitution and the subsequent psychological make-up, then photography or any work of art can be free from it. Selection can be understood in three essentially relevant senses here in photography: (i) the properties of the equipment chosen, such as camera type, processor, lens, light sensitivity of the camera, and settings inbuilt on the camera, (ii) the part of the physical scene chosen along with other physico-aesthetic decisions such as distance, angle, time of the day and light conditions, etc., and (iii) what is done during the processing of the photograph, such as darkening or brightening certain selected areas at certain chosen degree thereby adding or removing light intensity at certain judiciously chosen values.

Passport photographs