Answer length for this essay should be four or more paragraphs in length (a paragraph consists of 6/7 sentences) and include a discussion of two digital artists. You will need to provide one photographic example for each digital artist and discuss how it fits into the discussion. Just mentioning an image/photograph is not enough, you must name, describe, and explain how and why the particular image relates to the point you are making.
Question:
Photography in the Digital Age
Thinking about photography since the beginning of the digital era (mid 1950’s to present day), how have new technologies emboldened artists in their creative work? The digital era began in the late 50s and really took root in the later part of the twentieth century. Choose two digital artists discussed in this course only. Discuss one photographic work from each photographer and be sure to illustrate how your chosen photographer and his/her work reveals the shifts from formalism to more conceptual approaches. This answer should only come from the last few chapters (Ch. 16, 17 and 18) of the YouTube Lecture videos or Weekly Video Assignments, as long at the artist is digital. For example, Steichen and Lange are not considered digital.
Paragraph one should introduce and discuss the topic of how new technologies emboldened artists their creative work.
Paragraph two should discuss the first digital artist and one work specifically. How does the work and artist reveal the shift.
Paragraph three should discuss the second digital artist and one work specifically. How does the work and artist reveal the shift.
Paragraph four should wrap up the discussion with an informed conclusion.
Study Guide Questions
The conceptual approach to art
John Baldessari’s art and philosophy
Nam Jun Paik and his Electronic Superhighway
Kara Walker and her cutouts
The veracity of photography in the digital age
Noam Chomsky and extrapolating meaning
Diane Arbus’ subject matter
Robert Rauschenberg’s philosophy behind the photo titled Retroactive I, 1964
Bruce Davidson’s subject matter
Postmodern art
The halftone process
What is collage?
What is a photogram?
Alfred Stieglitz philosophy, tool of preferences, belief about the darkroom, 291 Gallery, how the Armory Show influenced him, interest in pictorialism and straight photography
Stieglitz and the philosophy behind Equivalents and the Steerage
Characteristics of pictorialist photography
Movements that influences modern photography
Marcel Duchamp’s Mona Lisa as satire
Recreators of the photogram
The influence of Edward Steichen’s 1929 work titled Shoes
Ansel Adams’ philosophy in terms of a search for moral authority
Ansel Adams goal for photographing the American West
Edward Weston’s philosophy/goal in terms of photographing Charis and the Green Pepper
Jacob Riis’ philosophy about crime
Horatio Alger Jr. messaging in the Ragged Dick series of books
Lewis Hine and the Empire State Building
Lewis Hine and his work titled Human Junk
Bill Brandt’s philosophy and Eaton Place photo
Photographers and the use of color film
The emergence of color photography in 60s and 70s
Cartier-Bresson’s philosophy behind taking a photograph
What is the power of photography?
Alfred Eisenstaedt and Life Magazine
Lee Miller’s World War II works
The Family of Man exhibit
Hockney’s Multifaceted view
National Geographic’s inception
Dorothea Lange and the FSA/RA
Henry Luce magazine philosophy
Edward Sheriff Curtis and his subject matter
Citizen photography
Cindy Sherman’s goals of her photographic works
Barbara Kruger’s belief about photographs
Describe what Roland Barthe meant by studium and punctum in his essay Camera Lucida
In his essay Understanding a Photograph, what did John Berger believe set photography apart from the other visual arts
