Los Emo Kids by David Gimenez
At first sight, Valencia, located in the Spanish Mediterranean Coast, could give an impression of being a conservative city. But in Fallas, one of the most world popular Spanish festivities, everything changes, especially at night. The mixture of fireworks, typical costumes, food, chaos, friendship, religion, alcohol and drugs give a peculiar atmosphere to the city.
Walking along the crowded “Barrio del Carmen”, the beautiful old center of the city, you can find many interesting people.
One of those nights, I found a group of Emo kids. Fancy dressed teenagers, perfectly eye lined, and tight jeans.
You don’t need to ask them to take pictures of them, actually they will ask you. They love themselves, and for that reason they want to check which shoots are good or not for approval.
This is one of my selected pictures for the final slideshow of the Photo Workshop Fallas 2009, directed by David Alan Harvey, Anton Kusters and Luis Montolio. It’s the first one of a series called “moods” composed by several portraits looking the different moods at Fallas nights.
Website: www.davidgimenez.es
What a pity this isn’t an essay submission as I’d like to know more, especially when I am doing a project about youth culture myself. I’d like to see your slideshow, at some point however.
I don’t understand why you’ve chosen to use Black and White either, a subject like this should be in colour surely? I would hope the mood is better suited to being in colour.
Nice photograph David! I love the composition (so would a picture editor, he / she would probably use the left side for a caption or header in a magazine).
I, too, would have liked to have seen more photographs: that’s a lot of text to lay on one photograph. I see no evidence of alcohol or drugs in what you have shown here; just two young people having fun. And it could have been taken anywhere. Not a criticism of the photo David, more of the introduction.
Unlike Jonathanjk I have no problem with the photo in Black & White. You obviously shoot digitally (otherwise the kids couldn’t check for approval) so you had the choice and you chose Black & White: no problem, your choice.
Good photographs on your website, you are not afraid to play and have good use of focus / depth of field.
Thanks for sharing,
Mike.
Enhorabuena David! gran foto.
Pero lo mejor es que sé que tienes más fotos tan buenas como esta.
Un saludo.
Biel.
Hi David,
I like the pic as an image, the shutter drag, the DOF, the engagement with the people etc
As a story telling image it is a different issue, the image above gives us no clues of what you have written in your text, the drugs the alcohol, even that it is during Fallas or in the old town. As there is only one image, we as viewers have no gauge as to what the mood is, to me it looks like a couple of mates having a good time.
You also suggest in your text that these kids ask to have their pictures taken, which is great as it makes your job as a photographer easier (I hope you didn’t give them editorial control) and possibly an easy subject to focus on, I am not saying that all photography should be hard to make it good. I just feel that with the opportunity of Fallas unfolding infront of you there could have been so much more. Photographing people is difficult, you have a respect for the subject, there is a natural reserve to hold that camera up and point it directly (its like staring directly at a stranger) there are barriers to overcome you just have to do it.
I look forward to seeing further images to fill in the gaps.
This is not meant to diminish your enthusiasm but is my true and honest appraisal of your documentary picture.
Grainy, fuzzy, blurry, dark. Cliche. I just don’t understand the obsession with this stuff these days.
Jim
We might have some common ground. Just by making an image B/W grainy,blurry, dark doesn’t make it a documentary picture it makes it an image in the style of documentary, there still has to be the story telling in the image.
Agreeing with Jim (and having looked at the other images on David Gimenez’s website), the image content on its own doesn’t tell me anything, and the style takes the obscurity of the photo even further away from the text, which I find more interesting anyway.
I really like the photograph David. Show this to your subjects in a couple of decades hence and they will mourn for their lost youth.
Best wishes,
Mike.
I think the picture is engaging, and paired with the text, leaves me wanting more. Love the black and white, the blur, the grain…gives it a tactile quality, like a fine grain sandpaper to the fingertips. Maybe these kids are trying to smooth out the edges…figure themselves out, and have a great time while doing it. I definitely get the “It’s all about me vibe” from the pic with the one face closer and the one eye in focus…they want us to know more, but it seems that they aren’t even sure what to tell, or how to tell it. There are secrets that they have yet to unearth, and this lies at the core of the complicated tryst in which they find themselves in with themselves… I love the composition to the right and the use of negative space and texture. Nice job.
I dont know anything here.
the writing has to tell me everything.
But the writing disagrees with the picture.
I hate that.
Why cant the picture tell me what i NEED to know and want to ask?
Or just present the picture on its own. As an image, as thats surely what it is. An impression of vague mood that We can all interpret how we will. i would be fine with that, and would enjoy this much more.
When I get TOLD what it is, I NEED it to then be that, only even more than the words that tell it.
Otherwise why?
And for me this is a bit of black and white impressionism [nothing wrong in that], without context.
let it just be that, or remake it into what you say it is.
John
i like the photograph.. something liquid about the movement and the swish of the right hand persons fringe.. they look emo and happy to be so.
as with others, it says little about the place – since kids like this are universal around the western world.. although i wonder if it needs to? can it not just be an interesting portrait which couples with words to illustrate more?
good technique and a surprising result, especially if the kids were hassling david to photograph them.. something i do not enjoy at all.
in conclusion i think it´s okay as a single.. as a portrait of young people.. i think it is publishable in youth culture magazines.. and with more context – photographs from differing distances, differing subject matter – it could be the base for an essay… certainly given the events nature.
with people having a problem with the style i would say this.. there are a great deal of every kind of photograph being looked at online and in magazines.. the over-riding amount being straight, clean and obviously crisp.. so why exert that there is too much of this kind of photograph when it is, obviously, still a style which exists in the minority?
:ø)
d
david, because to me it says, “I am frustrated with with the “reality” of photography limiting my vision. I want to be a painter.”
by virtue of creating work such as this though photography has been stretch, so there would be no need to become a painter..
paul strand said he painted what could not be photographed and photographed what painting could not represent.. or something like that.. so with this photograph, rather than being frustrated, perhaps the author has found a balance.. like our bob..
actually i have started to relate to work such as this through understanding and respecting bobs work..
having said that i do not think this kind of representation is anything particularly new.. i think it´s just easier to find online these days than it was when people produced it at collage in the darkroom.. painting with light and all that jazz..
i think it is a lucky photo, since without the fringe and the liquid feel i get from it perhaps it would not work for me.. it may be a little shallow, given the text, as a single image.. even so i think it does work.. for whatever reason.. for me :ø)
cheers jim.
d
stretched
There is a softness to this photo that I like..
and I don’t mean ‘soft’ technically speaking…
there is a tenderness about it..
the way the girls head is tilted..
the gentle smile..
innocence…
I agree with Carrie,
I too, get the feeling
they want us to know more,
but they’re not sure what to tell
or how to tell it…
**
Great, wish i’d shot it! (no time right now..am running, but wanted to give instant feedback and it’s all GOOD!)
very best
kat~
Jim..
As the famous painter Gerhard Richter once said (and i paraphrase), “Just because you can do something well doesn’t mean you have to do it”. The camera is a tool i use to interpret my world my way. Just because this tool (operative word ‘tool’, as opposed to ‘right wing dictator’ for example) is capable of shooting the wing tip of a fruit fly with a sharpness that cuts the retina doesn’t mean i have to shoot the wing-tip of a fruit fly, sharply or at all.
Furthermore, some, like me, with vision problems see our world quite often through a haze of blur or indistinct details. When I set out to capture my world it felt quite unnatural to me to suddenly see all these sharp edges that the camera told me comprised my environment. I became fascinated with blur. Not for its own sake. I don’t do contrived blur. I am not a pictorialist. Those guys DID try to emulate paintings. ICK. But when it occurred naturally, with charm and realism, there was a recognition that this was my world, not the other toasty-crisp-PS-sharpened-sizzle-edged one that others deemed superior to mine. Hence, Bones by Bob Black made much visual, intellectual and emotional sense to me and so does Los Amos Kids. Besides that, there is very little that we do see that is camera sharp. Our eye is constantly adjusting its focus between near and far, we are moving, things go by in a whir, and night time vision is a whole ‘nother thing. For me, this is reality, right here. And please don’t tell me that if i’d been sitting a foot away from this couple that i would have seen them sharply. Not so, not so. Besides that..crap, i hate getting into this when i could have gotten into the wonderfully tender, loving feeling of this photo, but that’s for another time. i am LATE!
Jim, your “painter” comment betrays your age. The stuffy “painter” slight was paid to photographers back when Ansel and Weston were shooting. Even earlier. And i KNOW you aren’t that old! As Panos says, this is 2009.
love ya anyway, gotta go
Kathie
hi wendy,
being uhh… female, i tend to be emotional about pictures but,
but btw, it is really because i dont know photography,
not at all gender based opinions (bleecchh!) just dont know anything about shooting at all…
i dont…hmmm… find this soft… gentle smile?
if you look closely,
that part of her smile in the shadows is a … a…
what the hell! a SMIRK!!!
which even punctuates the guy’s SMIRK!
this tells me ATTITUDE!!
is this what the kids are all about?
i looked at the title and then the picture… and then the title and then the picture…
and then what was written below it.
THIS entry (since i dont like the word submission)
works better for me as a part of an essay given the context it was published.
as a standalone, it’s a cool interesting in-the-moment capture but that’s all
but as PJ, as part of an essay it might blow my mind!!!
(wanting more…)
best,
gracie
I get the feeling that for some viewers, photos are simply empty vessels into which they read their own emotions, feelings, attitudes. I’m not interested in that. I know how I react to things, how I feel about things. I want photos that tell me what the photographer thought about what he was shooting. This photo fails to do that for me.
Another rock, another tree, another dark, fuzzy, grainy photo of teens. The technique gets in the way of whatever message the photographer is trying to convey.
Jim
“Grainy, fuzzy, blurry, dark. Cliche. I just don’t understand the obsession with this stuff these days.”
Jim there is a long tradition of grainy, fuzzy etc. I’m just looking at one of my books and there are many images by Stieglitz, Steichen, Imogen Cunningham and many others which fit right in to that description.
These photographs rely on their graphic content for their message. Indeed, some photographers of the time were told to deliberatly de-focus the camera to help reduce the image to a simpler state.
This technique has waxed and waned in popularity since then, but always been part of the language. There seem to be more people exploring the technique again. Digital imaging encourges such experimentation because the feedback is instant and you aren’t burning up money as you shoot.
I like Davids image a great deal. I have no problem with the text . The text tells me it is part of a larger series. The kids expressions are cocky and perfectly convey the mood intended.
Check out Davids site. He is using blur and movement to distil his images down to pure graphics. Content and mood is suggested rather than described in detail.
David, I think your vision is very sophisticated, and I like what you are doing. You have an awesome sense of composition. I’d love to see the whole project.
Gordon L.
dearest jim,
oh woww! you read me right… when i look at photos, i am sensitive to how it makes me feel.
i do not become the photographer, i do not feel what he wants to say…
i cannot dissect the photo because i might not be able to help, you know more than i do… therefore
many might find me useless here… BUT
i become the photo: the dying dinosaur, the tryst in the smelly hotel, the proud person stuck in a physically sick body, the tumbleweed burning from a random lightning strike, the gun,
once famous abandoned wall, the innocent son, the gossiper, the fly on a hapless baby
this is how i am. this is me.
hi GRACIE
I guess I’m responding to the dichotomy
between my perception of emus
and this photo…
I don’t see a smirk,
I see a smile and a light..
its not what I would expect..
it feels more gentle then I would have thought emus to be…
But what the fuck do I know?!?
the beautiful thing with photography,
there is no right
or wrong…
for me,
its what I feel
when I look at a photo,
that I respond to..
and then try oh so hard to articulate….
~of course I respond to more than just my feelings when viewing an image, but it’s my starting point…~
**
JIM
photos as
empty vessels?
read emotions..
no interest…
whoa!!
wow,
you continue to amaze me..
theres a big world out there~
feel it..
lovely tones and feeling, god bless robert frank
@ Wendy, I’m holding my hand up again and stating that I agree with Jim. I also feel nothing for this photo because there is nothing there to feel, and my current project is about exactly the same thing, I can sympathise and relate (with the text) but there is nothing within that image that makes it any more interesting for me.
I still disagree with the Black and White, and the blurry technique doesn’t bother me much, I like it occasionally, but beyond all that, it this image doesn’t amount to much considering it is a final image. I’m sure there are better ones from the project.
wonderful! thanks for this
Jim, I think it all has to do with intent, if the idea was to shoot a well lighted sharp photo then that did not happen. If the idea was to capture a fleeting emotion then it works. I call this style “shaky/blurry.” I do like this image.
Wendy, here we are with the populace thing again. I don’t know many people – even photographers – who spend much time probing the depths of their emotions when they look at photos. I understand that these photos are intended for “sophisticated” viewers, not the proletariat. Another trend that getting kind of old.
Thank you for good editing. No story necessary, either. I’m a lover not a writer, too. ;) And color would have ruined it for me…but i’m biased (like everyone else) – in this case b&w fuses the duo together into one mosaic of curvilinear tiles, though I will say it is important to me that the kids are looking directly at the camera.
May I ask what gear you used?
Jim wrote: “I get the feeling that for some viewers, photos are simply empty vessels into which they read their own emotions, feelings, attitudes.”
This is reader-response criticism:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reader-Response_Criticism
And it has a long history. I happen not to care for it, but it is one of the many interpretive tools available when considering a work of art.
It’s funny how, here on Burn, the debates about photography tend to move — innocently, naively — among well established schools of critical thought and aesthetics, some of which were formulated by Aristotle. But people aren’t really aware of them. There is a rich, complex, and important history of criticism, in art, literature, and philosophy, that has a direct bearing on photography and is worthy of one’s passing attention, especially when learning how to respond critically to photography (and, perhaps, to inform one’s own work).
My point is not that one needs to be a professor or autodidact (like Bob Black or Sidney Atkins), but criticism is a useful tool. And the photographers we all admire tend to know that they are working in a tradition informed by this criticism. Though it is late in arriving, photography is part of a conversation that goes back millennia.
Hmmm!
It’s funny, too, how every single time there is a photo or essay posted which incorporates blur or motion or, really, anything that doesn’t look like it’s from the f64 Group, Jim chimes in about not liking it… does nothing for him… cliche… blah blah… why jim WHY can’t photography convey motion and emotion without being shot in bright light at f16? You are a curmudgeon of the highest order, it’s consistent and unbelievable… the world looks like this jim, it does, people see this way, it’s valid, please please break the shackles which you’ve tightened on that brain of yours.
Grainy/sharp/blurry…
http://www.fullframeimages.com/ffi07.html
I like it. I can see it in a magazine.
Patricia, where are you?
Mike.
David: I enjoy the esthetics of this. Good use of negative space and proportion. Maybe lighten his eye to make it more captivating, and darken (some would clone) her button because it distracts a bit. Dodge and burn–something that is completely valid I think.
I agree with others that it leaves one curious or wanting more. It would, therefore, I think, make a good teaser for a series. And in that light the text certainly does reinforce the expectation. Without the text is becomes simply another very well composed picture. So good that one will recognize it years hence if seen again, but will perhaps not recall off-hand.
If it became part of a powerful series, people would likely be inclined to favor it more and even want it as a stand-alone because it “belongs” to something grander and has enough esthetics to be liked. I am speculating. This is as far as my comments directly to you go concerning this image. What continues may interest you as part of a larger discussion that your picture evokes in others.
Jim, Kat, Jonathan, et al:
Why Jim and his like don’t relate to this? Why is blurry, grainy considered intellectual and trendy?
Jim’s opinion is terribly important to understand because it indeed represents the proletariat, and it is often to the “proletariat” (Jim’s word, not mine) that we entrust directly or indirectly the acceptance and therefore success of our images. It is unlikely this type of image would sell well in certain communities, particularly the smaller and less culturally diverse they are. This may sound condescending but it is an empirically made comment. I will likely get under Jim’s skin for saying this but, it is therefore very important to deconstruct and analyze this type of psyche.
Jim is correct in observing that this type of image is likely more present today than before. The reasons are many. The most obvious one is the prevalence of forums, web, etc. that facilitate individuals who do not pander to the proletariat’s taste to show their work and overcome the prejudice of the proletariat. (Love ya Jim, you give me the perfect excuse to relish the use of the word…you tempt me to dismiss any poor soul that labels my imagery as too artsy or intellectual as an unfortunate proletarian.) But I sense there are two underlying social currents emerging with greater strength, particularly in Western (and mostly US) society.
The most immediate trend is one of doubting photography. Generation Y is thoroughly cynical of pictures, and a good deal of Generation X is as well. They know that what is presented is not necessarily true. They believe the President will distort the facts to justify war. They are bombarded and saturated with news that is really disguised editorial. On one level this means that photography must incorporate more than documentation to retain its legitimacy, and this opens the door to more ephemeral representations of reality. On another level there, and likely because of the overwhelming presence of video and news, one realizes that the issues at stake (i.e. 9/11, War in Iraq, China friend or torturer, etc.) that dominate these mediums are issues that are not easily represented in black and white lines. Sharp, matter of fact photography is often too inflexible and incorporating elements such as blur, grain, etc. insert the vagueness that we already have in our minds but that the media does not generally acknowledge. In the same regard this is in many ways a simplification of photography. The use of b&w is an example of simplifying the elements in the image to an essence that reinforces the vagueness.
The second trend is the proliferation of point-and-shoots. Jim says, ” I understand that these photos are intended for “sophisticated” viewers, not the proletariat. Another trend that [is] getting kind of old.” It is actually the proletariat that is pushing the trend, and the sophisticated viewer is simply on the vanguard of this movement (another evolution and exploration is the use of new media). In this sense the masses have nobody to blame but themselves for buying millions of point-and-shoots. They simply over-saturated themselves with a lack of esthetics—rather like a culture that no longer knows what fresh orange juice tastes like. Would you dismiss somebody who drinks fresh squeezed orange juice as an pretentious person? For them a photograph is something anybody can present and is the standard accompaniment to the local and national parochial news stories–which incidentally go hand in hand with pasteurized orange juice. For a photograph to become more–to return to a form of art and expression–it needs to break away from this. Although anecdotal, I get evidence of this every time I shoot in a bar, almost always somebody will remark that I am not using a flash, and to them that is the sign of knowledge and mastery and magic that a “pro” has (if only they knew the truth…). Another growing sign of this is the increased use and acceptance of cel-phone cameras. The limitations of them are such that “the proletariat” (who gave them the right to have phones?!?) are now posting millions of fuzzy, dark, grainy (actually noisy) pictures–the difference being that they are also mostly BAD pictures. But you know why they insist on doing this? Because it is their personal expression, and this is evidence of how they legitimately relate to the individualism that such elements introduce to an image.
Furthermore, “the proletariat” that Jim refers to is an American one (as in USA). It is a mass of people that is capable of reading and performing a high degree of mathematical applications (computers, grocery shopping, understanding CC interest rates, miles per hour, etc)—hence a comparatively high level of education. Like societies any where in the world it does not care much for what happens beyond the front porch. But unlike other societies that have 80% of the population at or under the poverty line, it can read, sum, and access an enormous amount of information if it so wishes. Like societies any where else, it likes to gossip and naturally the information it most wants to access are about people around it. One peculiarity (if you call the proletariat peculiar would it translate to “before-letter sheepish behavior” therefor implying farmers and not the labor class?…hmm need to brush up on my etymology) of American society is that this interplay with the community embraces of all things wholesome and good. Like apple pie, honest Abe, hot dogs on the 4th of July, and turkey thanksgivings, and pictures of my cat, and of a sunset, and, oh another sunset, and look my baby’s face (isn’t he cutter than Gerber), or, hey look! a cute squirrel eating Cheetos (sorry Jim) because all of this reminds us of the comfort of our community.
But for the other 80% in the 90% of the world? They tend to relate to emotions in another sense, with another logic. I won’t indulge as to how the societies I’ve lived in each express this, but I can say from personal experience only, that they enjoy the abstractness of images as photographs once were nearly a century ago. Pictures are representations of who they are, not so much where they live, and these people, whether in Mauritania, Bolivia, Mozambique are in awe with the magic of a picture…and only the picture. Have you ever given a polaroid out, or shown your digital screen to them? If you have, you know what i mean. They are not interested in the caption or the earnestness of the photograph. They take it for what it means to them. So in this sense, I find irony that this type of emotive photography is labled too gimicky, false and catering to intellectuals, and casts aside the proletariat. I believe it goes deeper, it casts aside the filter of media and speaks to the individual regardless of class and condition.
It may not resonate as strongly (although I indicated why this was changing) with the American proletariat, as per Jim’s interpretation of it, but I believe it does so with the larger huddled masses who don’t have a camera. (Admittedly, cel phone proliferation is making this a debatable issue, but still, there remains the issue of printing those images, and the pictures held hostage to the life of the phone). Having a camera by this greater sense of measure makes any such owner an intellectual.
Jan, i’m not even going to try to respond, i’m too busy reflecting and rethinking.
This is the second delivery of yours that has really blasted my paradigms and helped me to understand the blurry part of what i sorta thought to understand.
You create words about photography that are just as exciting as exploring photography. Bravo!
MORE MORE MORE!!!!
Calling a photograph cliche is in itself cliche.
Photography is cliche. Straight. Loose. Blurry. Sharp. B&W. Color. Action. Still life. Documentary. Artsy. Gritty. Magnum. VII. Nat Geo.
It’s all cliche. Why even get out of the bed in the morning? But we do anyway. Why? Because, acting like Brian Wilson would be cliche! ;^}
I think banning the words “cliche” and “derivative” from these discussion threads would be a noble thing.
@David Gimenez…
Groovy picture, dude!
Jan, I do agree with you that the proliferation of forums like this strongly drive certain kinds of images. Street photographers in general and those who like the kind of dark, grainy, fuzzy, zero DOF photos we’re are talking about here, now have many places to gather and create their own little sub-world to talk to each other. It’s not, I think, that there is a growing interest in this stuff, it’s just that those with interest in it have now congregated in the same places and it “seems” the interest is large.
One non-image example of that is the various forums dedicated to those who love rangefinder cameras. Rangefinder camera users (and I use several along with DSLR’s) are a tiny part of a tiny part of the photo world. Yet, you see threads all the time advocating that Nikon or Canon could really clean up financially if they would just start making rangefinders again! Nonsense. They have lost perspective in their tiny world. The RF was effectively killed off in the 1970′s. (Well, except for some holdouts like DAH :)
Outside the world of forums, I don’t really see that folks are very interested in these kinds of photos. I think it’s an illusion created by the connectedness of the Internet.
Mental Note to Self:
If Burn goes to print, beg, i mean get on my hands and knees and beg David to use Jan’s commment as the introdution to the book, it’s the only explaination needed to justify why all the images that follows will be any thing but ‘average’ or anything but ‘for the masses’.
I will miss Bob Black alot. I know bob in person, long before Burn or road trip. I am happy than Jan has stepped in and offered a terrific perspective. I know that when bob brought to bare long comments with philosophical or sociological perspective, often he was dismissed (including by Joe, how ironic). I am happy that Jan has contributed a great philosophical perspective and hope he takes off where bob left off (Jan, did you read bob’s analysis of your picture?)…
the question: where is the person to bring to bare both poetry and philosophy now?…
How do i know this? some of what I learned about photography was from meeting him 3 years ago and reading some of his essays at an online magazine he wrote for (i cant remember the name). I used to also teach at the same school. I wish he were here to add his imput, but he has said, today was it.
yup, groovy pic. did you do this for David’s workshop?
i love what michael kircher wrote too….but that is cliche ;-)
one of the unwashed mass
One Question Jim. A Simple One.
Since most of the people that create this kind of photography that you find ‘less’ appealing can actually create the kind of photography that you ‘do’ find appealing (it’s pretty average really), then why is it that these same people move past that type of photography and strive for this less appealing photography?
They certainly don’t start here, why do they end up here Jim?
@Jan, I’m not one of Jim’s ‘like,’ I will make a point when I disagree with Jim, this time I agree with Jim. Second, I don’t mind the blur, nor mind the desaturation (though I prefer some colour as I mentioned before), it is the content I have an issue with, the image says nothing to me, and betrays the accompanying text.
@anonymous proletarian reader.
Don’t worry Bob will be back. I used to be worried Bob was too sensitive, so I would bite my tongue when he really stuck his chin out for a haymaker.
I’ve learned that it’s not that he’s too sensitive, quite the opposite, Bob is too resilient. He will shake it off and come back; tabula rasa? Who knows, but no more kid’s gloves from me.
WTF?! Bob is dropping out? I read his analysis to me and it struck deep. It was only then that I found (hunted) out Bones and his words made even more sense.
I’ll shut up now and let David Gimenez have his due place. David, aun no he visto to sitio web en detalle. Te mando un correo despues.
With all of this talk of the proletariat, it seems we are engaged in Marxist criticism. ;>)
Jim,
You do bring up a good point and i find myself siding with you on this if this is what you are saying:
there is a bit of a cult following for a kind of photography that is just ‘harder to do’ photography, maybe for you rangefinders fits this (i don’t agree with this example, but never mind) but yes, cult following for hard-to-do photography (maybe using expired film with a holga?) does seem a little bit senseless at times.
but as far as the dreamy painteresque images like this, they are not the same as the product of ‘hard-to-do’ photography. This is beautiful and desirable to look at regardless of how it was constructed, even if it was done with an easy to use camera.
i took in a beautiful exhibit of equally painteresque images at a very reputable location in London called the Photographer’s Gallery. I was elbow to elbow with others that had an equal admiration of the work and i don’t think they learned to like these images from the internet Jim, and I don’t think they were all just a bunch of perverts (it’s just not the place for that)
Anyways, here’s more dreamy paintersque pleasing to look at and ‘think about’ images (that you might dismiss with your acceptance critera Jim), but maybe the name behind these will make them more reputable Antoine D’Agata
David Gimenez i can only tell you that i find it very peasing to look at your image and your site is filled with a string of additional images i like to look at, please do more!
I really like this image, and for some reason it reminds more me of 1960′s imagery. Why? I can’t quite put my finger on it yet. However I do feel it would sit better as part of an essay rather than a stand alone image.
To me, it doesn’t say “Emo” but it does say “Fancy dressed teenagers, perfectly eye lined, and tight jeans”. But that is probably because here in New Zealand, Emo is more Goth-like or should I say “Goth-lite!!” :-))
I don’t think the grainy quality is out of place at all for this image. It enhances rather than detracts.
Jim, Jim, Jim, “I don’t like – not for me – arty stuff” etc. Why do we care what Jim thinks?
Because it’s so short-sighted, that’s why. We want the old fart (one old fart to another) to spread his wings; to fly!!!!!
Someone throw a shoe at Jim. A big shoe.
Grimacing Jim, grimacing.
What’s your newspaper called, Jim?
Mike.