The Audience Will Come from Doc League on Vimeo.

I just came across this documentary about Tod Papageorge. I’d heard the name before, and had seen some of his photographs, but I didn’t really know much about him. I really enjoyed the video (it’s largely him speaking to an unseen/unheard interviewer).

A couple of scenes caught my attention:

About 17 minutes in he tells a charming story about his encounter with a dapper man, who turns out to be French, in Central Park. He attempts to strike up a conversation and through a little trickery eventually manages to do so. Towards the end of the conversation he says (in French) to the man: “Because of you I’m a photographer”. It was Henri Cartier-Bresson who Papageorge clearly admires saying “But Cartier-Bresson was one of the supreme beings. A totally realized human being. He was beyond most people in his capabilities. So that’s the level he was operating at I believe.”

Papageorge says this right at the end of the documentary:

None of my pictures are in any sense about the viewer. I never think about the viewer. I don’t care about the viewer. I’m really only interested in myself exploring the process of making what I consider to be a challenging, complex or simply interesting photograph. There’s never an audience – never an audience, which may be why, one reason why my career was in the shadows for a couple of decades. Because I never had that concern. I know you don’t believe me, but its true. The audience will come.

Well said Mr. Papageorge!

Source: The 50 Most Influential Photographers of the Past 10 Years.

Without a doubt, photography has helped to shape our experience. It captures our joys, desires, accomplishments just as it does our problems, fears and failures. This list aims to mention many of the photographers affecting the way we see the world we live in—from the isolated forests of a far off land, to fashion models, to your kitchen sink. 

via The 50 Most Influential Photographers of the Past 10 Years | Complex UK.

Interesting list. I’d heard of only 10 or 11 of them – mostly amongst those in the top 20. This shows just how woeful my knowledge of contemporary photography is. I’ll have to do some more research, reading etc. My opinion on this list? I started to write something about my take on contemporary photography, but then realized that this contradicted my earlier comment saying I was not familiar with many of the photographers. I’d better keep my mouth shut until I have a better understanding than I do at the moment.

As final parting shot let me quote Maris at the Analog Photography Users Group (APUG) whose view echoes my own preliminary thoughts (although I’m not sure that I’d go along with the use use of the word ‘indictment’):

I’d suggest the list is an indictment of modern critical and curatorial thought that confuses photographs of great things (installation, tableaux, performance, assemblage, …) with great photographs of things.