“Is Photography Over?”
Posted on | May 8, 2010 | 2 Comments
Notes on the recent symposium at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art are available online. It’s always disappointing with broad discussions like this that there are no African-American curators, writers, or photographers represented (granted, I do not know who George Baker is), though hardly surprising, especially in San Francisco. The exclusion can’t help but reinforce the notion that we aren’t part of the discussion.
Photography has almost always been in crisis. In the beginning, the terms of this crisis were cast as dichotomies: is photography science or art? Nature or technology? Representation or truth? This questioning has intensified and become more complicated over the intervening years. At times, the issues have required a profound rethinking of what photography is, does, and means. This is one of those times. Given the nature of contemporary art practice, the condition of visual culture, the advent of new technologies, and many other factors, what is at stake today in seeing something as a photograph? What is the value of continuing to speak of photography as a specific practice or discipline? Is photography over?
SFMOMA has invited a range of major thinkers and practitioners to write brief responses to this question and then to convene for a two-day summit on the state of the medium. Participants include Vince Aletti, George Baker, Walead Beshty, Jennifer Blessing, Charlotte Cotton, Philip-Lorca diCorcia, Geoff Dyer, Peter Galassi, Corey Keller, Douglas Nickel, Trevor Paglen, Blake Stimson, and Joel Snyder.
Their texts will be used to kick off a panel discussion Thursday night. The 13 participants will continue the conversation Friday morning in closed-door sessions and will report back in a public session Friday afternoon.
Read the participants’ responses to the question “Is Photography Over?” here. Additional responses to the question and reports on the two days of the symposium can be found on our blog, Open Space.
Tags: Blake Stimson > Charlotte Cotton > Corey Keller > Douglas Nickel > Geoff Dyer > George Baker > Jennifer Blessing > Joel Snyder > Peter Galassi > Philip-Lorca diCorcia > San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA) > Trevor Paglen > Vince Aletti > Walead Beshty
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May 10th, 2010 @ 10:01 am
It reminds me of an argument from college about whether the novel as a form is over – I think there are many photos yet to be taken and it is arrogant to think all of the possible perspectives have been covered.
May 10th, 2010 @ 10:08 am
[...] by kasalina on May 10, 2010 I noticed this debate on the sites of Owerko on April 22nd and Carla Williams today based on a panel discussion held by the San Francisco MOMA on April 22nd, 2010. In my [...]