david allio

It was an honor to speak at the 2nd Annual @PhotoGuild Dinner earlier tonight on the topic of “Is Your Photography Art?” My sincere “Thank you” goes out to the membership for the Golden Camera Award – it is a real camera! – now sitting at the forefront of a growing collection of special memories.

Here is a very brief outline of the 20-minute speech prompted by and based upon materials from the Vermont College of Fine Arts @VCFA recommended reading list, including “But Is It Art?” edited by Nina Felshin and “Photography” edited by Liz Wells.

Photography’s acceptance as a viable and legitimate element of the art community is recent and has at its roots the political and social activism of the 1960s. By the 1970s, the visual artist adopted photography as an additional tool for the establishment and distribution of the artist’s message.

Consider these questions: Is your photography art? If a photograph gets a reaction does that make it art? Otherwise, is it just a pretty picture without artistic merit?

Legendary photojournalist W. Eugene Smith said in an interview with the New York Times in the 1950s, “I don’t think that a picture just for the sake of a picture is justified.”

The documentation of history has changed since the chemical-based photography of Smith’s 1950s. The increasing popularity of still photography and video in digital format has made it possible for nearly everyone to become a citizen journalist. But, is the resulting imagery just a collection of pictures or is any of it Art?

Moreover, have staged events and photo ops been used as performance art to subvert true visual arts activism in the modern political and social arenas?

Finally, has the history of film photography affected our perception of a color image as more artsy and black-and-white as more historically accurate?

Now, given these conditions and considerations, you must ask yourself: Is your photography art?