Monday, September 2, 2013

Reading 1 Summary


The first part of the introduction to “The Photograph As Contemporary Art” is concerned with describing each individual chapter’s purpose, which lies in the artists’ inspirations for the photos as opposed to the subject itself. Next, the author delineates the reasons behind choosing which artists and which pieces to include in the chapters, which is mainly because the author wished to highlight contemporary photographers and their works that most closely represented their careers as a whole. Cotton then goes on to outline a brief history of contemporary photography, especially in regard to William Eggleston and his influence on modern artists. Cotton also writes in depth about photographers such as Stephen Shore; Bernd and Hilla Becher; and Ralph Eugene Meatyard (among others) in the introduction. These examples all do well to emphasize the fact that some photographers don’t gain much critical attention until, perhaps decades down the road, an educator, magazine editor, museum curator or otherwise interested individual rediscovers these gems and shares them with others.

No comments:

Post a Comment