On the Web: July 2006 Archives
I wasn't much interested in seeing the Atta Kim show at ICP (or the concurrent show at Yossi Milo) until I read today's review in the NY Times.
Every day, hundreds of tourists snap photographs of a crowd- and car-jammed Times Square. The average picture takes — what? — 15 seconds to shoot? The same picture of the same place takes the Korean photographer Atta Kim eight hours. And his Times Square ends up with only an eerie trace of a human presence, like a deserted movie set.
Holland Cotter's above description applies to only one of Kim's projects. His variety of approaches is uncommon for a photographer working at his level. Once a photographer is identified with a particular style of approach, it's difficult to break out into another style. Consider the reaction Bob Dylan got when he went electric.
From today's Independent, "Click! The Art of the Camera", strangely posted to the"science and technology" section, covers the huge uptick in auction prices for photographs. The article (falsely, in my opinion) makes a distinction between traditional and digital photography, a distinction which doesn't really exist or isn't really applicable in auctionable work - yet.
"Daniel Newburg, a dealer and founder of Photo-London, Britain's first art photography fair, now in its third year, agrees. "The era of great art photography has reached an end. And now our culture is looking back and deciding what is significant."
On the one hand, I guess I should be grateful that someone is not fueling the speculation that drives cradle robbing at art schools, but to say "the era of great art photography has reached an end" when the artform is less than 200 years old stretches credulity. (To be fair, later in the article he back peddles on this.)
