Topic: rant: Photo exhibit quality-how low can people go

[Francois]

Yes, it's that time again where I get the urge to spill words on the screen to rant about something.
I went to a photo exhibit this afternoon and got a heavy dose of disappointment.
Some would say that this is to be expected nowadays but still...
I had received an invite to go see the exhibit and I thought it would be nice to go to the inauguration. So I got out some nice clothes to avoid looking like a slob in summer shorts and t-shirt. I drove to the neighboring city. Got to their exhibition hall where I was greeted by a whole bunch of big prints. So far so good. I walk up to the first print, the thing must have been at least a 16x20, only to be stunned by what I saw. There were a few branches in the pictures that were staircase shaped! Branches don't normally do that in nature... and I thought jaggies were something that had disappeared in the early 2000's. So I moved to the next picture. There it was, a beautiful leaf in the snow... with some clearly visible JPEG compression artifacts around it! I just couldn't believe my eyes. Then I moved to another print. This one looked pretty good from a distance until I got closer. It was a beautiful cold tone B&W... only thing is the cold tone was clearly digital noise!
Now, I was really disappointed and on the way out I spotted a bunch of prints where there was a visible moire that was strong enough to give a headache! I looked closely and noticed that the photographer had taken a photo of the television and the scan lines of the screen and the camera were interfering with one another in a bad way...

Now I can appreciate when there is an artistic statement done but this clearly was just the case of an incompetent photographer... Heck, it's not that hard to at the very least desaturate the images if you want them to be in B&W!

And this brings me to something that is sort of a question: how low can quality get before you deem it unpresentable?
Have people become so numb to quality that they just can't see the difference between the good, the bad and the ugly?

Now, I got some steam to let out... I'm going to re-organize my books...

[kentish cob]

Ah, splendid... It's time for a bloody good rant... I feel I should've saved this for my 100th post, but the pressure was just too much..!

Sadly, some people seem to believe that there's some sort of "wow factor" in a big print that blinds them to any and all shortcomings in said print, be they technical (objective) or artistic (subjective). I know... I get asked to frame poor quality but big prints all the time, usually over-enlarged phone photos snapped to be posted on face-space or whatever antisocial media is fashionable at the time, and I grit my teeth and do the best I can to "polish the turd". 
 
Thanks to the so-called "digital democratisation" of (art) photography, anyone with a phone can present themselves as an "artist" whether they posess any discernable visual talent or not.
Even if you thought the art/photography world elitist and in need of a damn good shake up, in the cold light of day of the brave new world, where attendance is more celebrated than acheivement, "digital democratisation" (I feel slightly queasy just typing that) is looking more like digital dumbing down.

And now I'm in full flow, here's my personal exhibition bug-bear...
I have an unseemly amount of ire to direct at those who choose to exhibit poorly presented work.
A nice frame is not going to make a bad picture good, so guess what putting a crap frame around a bad picture is gonna do?
And if it's beyond your capability to produce a nice straight bevelled mount (mat - for our American cousins) without huge overcuts on the corners, then please, get someone who can to do it for you.

Spleen vented... calm returns... where's my whisky.
Enjoy the rest of your day. 

[Late Developer]

I can't help but agree.  You can't polish a turd - but you can roll it in glitter 

My "big print disappointment" was actually at the Salgado "Genesis" exhibition where I came to the conclusion that the prints were a bit over-processed. Please understand that this is not a comment on the quality of the photography. 

Salgado is one of my all-time favourites.  However, he started the Genesis project whilst shooting film and finished it years later when he'd started shooting digital.  Rather than just process the film and digital shots to their strengths, it appeared to me as if some slightly heavy-handed post-processing had been done to create a uniform "look" - possibly because 200+ of these wonderful photographs were going to hang together as one statement in some of the world's biggest art spaces.

The photos are stunning representations of a world relatively untouched from ancient times and it's a great exhibition on that level.  I will still probably buy the book - for the photography and the subject matter - but I really wish they'd been presented differently to avoid the slightly "HDR" type look. 

[Francois]

So its not just me. Glad to see that.
I have a feeling that the people who currate those places feel obligated to have a certain "photography quota" filled and are willing to accept anything as long as it fits a very shallow description of the medium. And that most of those curators come from an administration background and just land the job by accident since those places want people who can manage a budget first, actually art knowledge is second or even further down the line.

[Terry]

This is precisely why I don't go to the movies much anymore.  IMHO, the 'digital revolution' has only lowered the bar.

[Francois]

But still... I just don't get it.

[Terry]

I think the fondest desires of the manufacturers of digital imaging devices have begun to come true: the general public (read "unwashed hordes" if you prefer) just doesn't see the stair-stepping, trailing-edge tearout, oversaturation, "edge enhancement" and lateral-motion artifacts that drive some of the rest of us crazy.  The market has truly and rather successfully been dumbed-down.

[Francois]

That's pretty much what I'm afraid of...
But the problem is that those of us who put in an effort to makes something exceptionally good will in the end simply be dismissed as "just another photographer".
Try explaining how a nice print is better than a sloppy one to people who find the sloppy one beautiful?

I have the feeling that the world has become like our schools in the province. The government decided to put in a project to lower the dropout rate... they decided that even if you flunk a class you can move to the next grade without taking some summer classes to get back up to speed. And when you reach the final year of that grade, if you flunk you still get your diploma. And this goes on all the way to university for the undergraduates diplomas. The students get admitted and the complain that the classes are too hard and now the universities are looking into what they can do about this to help them (because people not registering for the second year would mean big financial losses... but they don't talk about stuff like that)... That's what I call a very bright and smart future...

[Terry]

It is depressing but occasionally you run across someone who sees the differences and appreciates them.  They may be a minority but I still get students who understand that well exposed and lit footage is better.  And I still teach film in my cinematography class because the students insist on it.  There is hope, Francois!

[scapevision]

World is fcuked. I can't even go to photography exhibits on any level anymore, it just disappoints. And the bigger the venue (not size wise) the worse the content. I may have gone too old. I still appreciate whenever old masters are being shown in rather modest sizes. Latest Andre Kertesz was a nice breath of fresh air.

[Terry]

Kertesz was a genius.  (As I get older, I prefer black & white to color.)

[zapsnaps]

Does size matter? YES!  Went to the Francesca Woodman exhibition in Stockholm last week - the prints were about 150x150mm. They were so intimate, you felt an enhanced connection, not only with the pictures, and her art, but with the photography, who took her own life at a very young age (23, I think).

After the Stockholm run, the exhibition goes on to Amsterdam, Paris & Malmo & is well worth a visit. I shall certainly revisit it on my next trip to Stockholm

[moominsean]

I also blame the printer who just takes the money and prints the photo and doesn't really care if it looks good or bad. When I had my show a few years ago, I blew up three polaroids to like 3 feet wide. I scanned the files to the size I wanted them printed, and the guy who printed them did test prints so we could make sure the colors were accurate and the images looked nice, since we were blowing them up like 500X the original size. There is not one bit of artifacting on my prints, and they look great. I think most people take a jpeg from a digital camera, and then head out to office depot or kinkos and get that blown up. The printer doesn't care, and the photographer likely doesn't know any better.

[Kayos]

As a rule I avoid exhibits, unless it's something I'm interested in other than photography, like the local area

However I used to do some pretty extreme things with cars, 99% of people wouldn't notice or care, but the 1% who do notice it from 30 feet away