17 July 2010

Dude... this is weird

Finally Just Rosalie (Daughter, Girlfriend, Wife, Mother, Grandmother)

There's a recent aesthetic trend that I can't put my finger on but it is driving me wild (in a good way).


I don't care that its a documentary photo about a wild fire, it's gorgeous. Unlike most documentary photography, it doesn't depend on the event or the action in the photo to provide an interesting image.  In fact I liked the photo before I realized that it was about a wild fire.  It kinda makes you think, maybe he's baiting us. like Milton in Paradise Lost.  Except I highly doubt that this photo's attractiveness is a brilliantly thought-out trap to make you realize that you have always been a sinner because a talented photographer can make you find fire beautiful.  It can be.  Yes, yes, I know: "To create. is greater than created to destroy."  But if God is beautiful, and God is/created everything, then everything must be beautiful (to a point/ if you think about it the right way).  But I don't want to start going on about the fact that the fires are probably started by humans or about our imperialist and destructive way of dealing with anything non-human.  It's a great photo.

The more I think about it, it's the weird stuff that gets me.  I guess I'm just a sucker for surrealism.  Susan Sontag said that all photography is essentially surrealist, but when she said it she meant it as a bad thing.  I really don't see it that way.  Maybe I'm using the word wrong, but I don't know another word for the use of unconventional words or images to achieve a higher level of expression.

Here's another good one:

Strange things just have so much more potential for expression.  That does not make every weird thing good art or even interesting.  But if you're entirely comfortable with it, it probably isn't good art.  I don't completely understand why or how, but I know it's true.  

My posts have been getting a little long so I'll keep it short this time and not go on and on about the definition of surrealism.  Keep it weird, but not random.

Here's a song.  Don't dismiss it just because it doesn't initially make sense.

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