Professor Shelley Rice

 

email: shelley.rice@nyu.edu

 

AESTHETIC HISTORY OF PHOTO


 

The History of Photography, Part II, will be a survey of “art" photography-- but it will also be a lesson about "history." Part I (the Social History of Photography) emphasized non-artistic uses of the medium, and focused on the ways in which the popular uses of photography have altered our cultural and perceptual patterns: it was a study of modern visual culture, and photography’s role within it. The course was structured thematically, and as a result we discussed a number of interrelated aspects of photographic history without following a linear "time line."

Part II, by contrast, will be structured primarily chronologically, and will provide a totally different historical perspective. We will be focusing on the development of art photography, which is ONE of many photographic traditions, and examining the evolution of that singular tradition – in the West, and elsewhere -- over the past 150 years. We will read a cross-section of photographic criticism and theory, but we will also look closely at a number of individual artists in order to ascertain how they felt about their medium, how they defined "art," and how they related to other, more established visual traditions. I want students to understand how artists learn from and respond to their peers, and how this interchange has shaped a separate, self-conscious and highly elitist tradition within the history of a democratic medium.

I've attached a reading list, which consists of selections from Trachtenberg's Classic Essays on Photography (out of stock at the publisher, but available on Amazon), Goldberg's Photography in Print and a packet of Xeroxes that have been placed on reserve in The Art History Department Library (Silver Center, 3rd Floor) and that are also available for purchase (in digital and print versions) at the NYU Bookstore (726 Broadway). These essays must be supplemented by independent readings in Frizot’s New History of Photography (which is on reserve in the Art History library too, along with other basic photo history books by Rosenblum, Newhall or Marien. Feel free to read (and/or purchase whichever one you like best, and/or can find inexpensively). You will be responsible for one exam and two short papers that will test your understanding of both images and ideas. Studying for these will be made much easier if you use the class web site: www.nyu.edu/classes/finearts/photo. To enter the site you need the ID and the password. Then all you have to do is enjoy the panoramic overview of photo’s lovely history!
Syllabus and Reading Assignments:

I. Some Philosophic Musings, and the Invention of Photography

Readings: Niepce, “Memoire on the Heliograph,” Classic Essays On Photography (hereafter referred to CEP), pp. 5-10
Daguerre, “Daguerreotype,” CEP, pp. 11-14
Arago, “Report,” CEP, pp. 15-26
Talbot, “A Brief Historical Sketch of the Invention of the Art,” CEP, pp. 27-36

Recommended: chapters about the invention in Frizot, New History of Photography and G. Batchen, Burning with Desire (on reserve)

II. The Early Years: Parts 1 and 2

Readings: Eastlake, “Photography,” CEP, pp. 39-68
Ivins, “New Reports and New Visions,” CEP 217-36
Rice, “Parisian Views,” from Multiple Views
Solomon-Godeau, “The Legs of the Countess,” October 1986*
Recommended: essays by G. Batchen and M.W. Marien from
Singular Images (on reserve)

III. Photography as Art

Readings: Baudelaire, “The Modern Public and Photography,” CEP pp.83-90 and “The Painter of Modern Life,” *
Robinson, “Idealism, Realism, Expressionism,” CEP, p.91-98
Rejlander, “An Apology for Art Photography,” Photography in Print (hereafter PIP), pp.190-198
Cameron, “Annals of My Glass House,” PIP, pp. 180-187
Varnedoe, “The Artifice of Candor” from Art in America, 1980*

IV. Realism: The Question of Truth in Art and Photography

Readings: Emerson, “Naturalistic Photography” and “The Death of Naturalistic Photography,” PIP, pp.190-198
Orvell,“ Almost Nature” from Multiple Views*
Rice, “Parallel Universes” from Pictorial Effect/Naturalistic Vision*

V. Pictorial Photography

Readings: Valery, “The Centenary of Photography,”CEP, 191-98
Stieglitz, “Pictorial Photography,” CEP, 115-124
Shaw, “On the London Exhibitions,” PIP, 223-232
Hartmann, “A Visit to Steichen’s Studio,” PIP, pp. 233-237

VI. Stieglitz...and the Concept of Equivalence

Readings: Stieglitz, “The Hand Camera -- Its Present Importance,” PIP, pp. 214-217
Norman, “Alfred Stieglitz: An American Seer,” PIP, pp. 271-272
Minor White, “The Light Sensitive Mirage,” PIP, pp. 394-397
H.H.Smith, “New Figures in a Classical Tradition,” PIP, pp. 422-430

VII. Modernism in Art and American Photography

Readings: DeZayas, “Photography” and “Photography and Artistic Photography,” CEP, pp. 125-132
Anonymous, “Is Photography a New Art?” CEP, pp. 133-140
Coburn, “The Relation of Time to Art,” from Camera Work *
Strand, “Photography,” and “Photography and the New God,” CEP,
pp. 141-151

VIII European Modernism Between the Wars

Readings: W. Benjamin, “A Short History of Photography,” CEP, pp. 199-216
Solomon-Godeau, “The Armed Vision Disarmed,” from Afterimage*
Moholy-Nagy,”From Pigment to Light,” PIP 303-314
Man Ray, “The Age of Light, CEP pp. 167-168
Simmel, “The Metropolis and Mental Life” (Xerox)*

IX. Weston, Mortensen and Photographic Purism

Readings: Weston, “Seeing Photographically,” CEP 169-175
Rice, “The Daybooks of Edward Weston,” from
Art Journal *
Coleman, “Disappearing Act: Photographs by W.
Mortenson,” (Xerox on reserve) and “The Directorial Mode,” PIP, pp. 480-491
Recommended: Chris Phillips, “The Judgment Seat of Photography,” from October (on reserve)

X. The Decisive Moment and the Snapshot Aesthetic

Readings: Westerbeck, ”Night Light: Brassai and WeeGee, PIP, pp. 404-419
Cartier-Bresson, “The Decisive Moment,” PIP, pp. 384-386
Frank, “Statement,” PIP, pp. 400-401
Rubinfien, “The Man in the Crowd,” PIP pp.492-498

XI. Landscape: Natural, Social...

Readings: Ansel Adams, “A Personal Credo,” PIP pp.377-380
Robert Adams, “Truth and Landscape,” from
Beauty in Photography*
Leslie Katz, “Interview with Walker Evans,” PIP pp.359-369
Morris, “In Our Image,” PIP, pp. 534-545

XII. ...and Virtual: Postmodernism and Image-making at the End of the Millenium

Readings: Sekula, “On the Invention of Photographic Meaning, PIP pp. 452-473
Krauss, “A Note on Photography and the Simulacra,”from Overexposed*
O. Enwezor, “The Postcolonial Constellation” (External link on Blackboard to Research in African Literatures)
L. Manovich, “Introduction to Info-Aesthetics,” from Antimonies of Art and Culture*