Hello there!
I’m excited to introduce the next media that we will be studying.
It’s a media that you use the most on a daily basis and will continue to use the rest
of your life.
Today we are talking about photography, and it is my aim that after this segment, the
photos you take every day on your phone or camera will be forever improved and enhanced.
By studying qualities and traits of successful photos, you can use the techniques to better
capture moments that are most important to you, and you will also have a greater appreciation
for this incredible art form.
It’s really amazing to think how photography affects our life and how so much has changed
in this media in just the past few decades.
It’s incredible.
When I was in college, I would take a photo and then have to wait and get the film developed
at the store before I could see what the image looked like and I know it sounds like I’m
aging myself, but I assure you, it wasn’t that long ago.
But, wow, digital photography has just changed so much.
Now any 5 year old can pick up a phone and knows how to take pictures. It’s actually said that
the average person takes around 20 pictures a day, which is double than it was just five
years ago.
And, you know, I believe that as technology just continues to increase on our phones and as we become more visually-oriented
as a culture, I think this number will just continue to escalate.
But, you know what, in the fine arts, photography is still a relatively new media and it’s been interesting
to track its journey since it was introduced in the 19th century.
When it first came out, people merely thought of it as a mechanical process and didn’t
really see it as an art form.
People argued that it doesn’t take as much time or skill to take a photo of something
as it would to paint it or sculpt it.
But a man named Alfred Stieglitz in the 20th century, he believed otherwise.
He was a photographer, and he ran this modern art gallery, and he believed good photography was
created by using the same playbook of design as a painting—so balance, rhythm, emphasis,
contrast, and harmony—all those things.
He believed all of these could be achieved and accomplished in photography as well.
When he composed pictures like "The Steerage," he was looking at the composition in terms
of its shapes and lines.
And through his camera work, he showed how one could be intentional with the formal aesthetic
qualities and in doing so, he helped demonstrate photography’s firm place in the fine arts.
After Stieglitz came photographers like Ansel Adams and Robert Frank
who manipulated the elements and principles of design and how they framed their shots
to powerfully express the world around them.
And then as you get into the 70s and 80s, you see artists like Cindy Sherman who used
photography as a medium to explore conceptual ideas around perception and identity.
And so you see how photography opens up so much for the artist, and to be honest, the
more I study it, the more I appreciate the uniqueness of this art form, it’s potential
to capture and communicate things in a way that other media cannot.
And so I think it’s going be interesting to see how this art form continues to transform
and be transformed by culture.
Well that’s all for our intro to photography.
Enjoy taking pictures!