Rattling cages........

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It appears that my last post has rattled a few cages in the camera club world. Apparently some folks in certain clubs have had apoplectic fits even though I was making general comments and no particular club was mentioned. A case, I suppose of - if the lens cap fits... I probably need to emphasise that when I refer to camera clubs, I am inevitably referring to British clubs, as my experience in speaking to and undertaking masterclasses for photographic organisations and associations in other countries is of a vastly different order to that in the UK. The members of organisations in other countries are primarily interested in improving their photographic understanding  and skill in order to make relevant and significant images and bodies of work. As I outlined in my last post, most members of UK camera clubs seem only interested in collecting pointless competition trophies for single images in spurious and irrelevant 'categories' dreamt up by so-called and self-appointed 'judges'. I don't actually blame, at least initially, the members themselves, as I'm sure many joined a club in the hope that they might gain from the experience. However, the brainwashing and stifling of any notion of contemporary ideas by those who run the clubs and who's own knowledge is severely limited I find disturbing and many club members are consequently, very badly let down. 

'Cynara', a new book in production

As an educator as well as a photographer, I feel a duty and a responsibility to encourage and maintain as high a standard as I can with those that I come into contact with regarding photography. Anything less would be doing a disservice to photography and also to those for whom you may have some responsibility for advising or nurturing. This is why I feel compelled to speak out. No-one with any grain of conscience or sense of caring for photography or education, would seek to 'dumb down' what they impart to others as a way of disguising their own lack of knowledge. Yet sadly, this is exactly what goes on in the majority of British camera clubs. Their refusal to even acknowledge the contemporary world of photography but to try to cling on desperately, like the souls on the 'Raft of the Medusa' to ideas and notions that have long since sunk to the bottom. In my last post I said that their ideas were a generation or two out of date when I was fifteen nearly sixty years ago. It seems that I may have been underestimating this.

'Globe Artichoke No. 44' 2020, from 'Cynara'

Among my large collection of photography books I have 'British Journal of Photography' almanacs from over 100 years ago. They are full of stilted images with flowery and contrived titles and the expressions 'monochrome', pictorial' and 'composition' are littered throughout. I find it quite extraordinary that these outdated ideas still persist in the face of all the many places and opportunities there are to see, experience and understand the world of contemporary photography. An analogy might be like science being taught and judged by a group of flat-earthers and creationists, forcing their views on to individuals with the promise of tawdry prizes in the face of all the contemporary evidence to the contrary. Clearly intimidated by the depth and breadth of photographic knowledge of young educated photographers over their own shallow understanding, they seek to smother anything that they cannot comprehend. 

'Globe artichoke No. 15' 2020, from 'Cynara'

Camera club competitions, in addition to being totally irrelevant to any notion of contemporary photography are not devised to improve or educate, but to temporarily inflate the egos of the recipients and to facilitate the organisers and amateur 'judges' continued stifling and dumbing down of ideas in order to disguise their own lack of knowledge and understanding. As a photographer and educator I find this distasteful. 

The Return of the Curse of the Photography Competition

 Just when you thought that the antics of British camera clubs couldn't get any more ridiculous, information about a competition came across my studio desk recently, which just emphasised how nonsensical the world of the British camera club is. Also how remote it is from the world of contemporary photography. 

Splott, Cardiff, 1969. From a series for a forthcoming book

Amateur photography competitions have always been a bit of a farce but the various categories and 'rules' that accompanied this particular club's annual outing were risible and in contemporary photographic terms, completely irrelevant. The 'prizes' were a series of rather pompously named trophies and fake silver cups, plates and bowls. In addition, laughably, were various tankards, shields and vases! A pair of vases no less, more appropriate for a flower arranging competition I would have thought. All these awarded for the different categories. I kid you not. Now, quite what a photographer is supposed to do with all those is anyone's guess. Although a full tankard of something alcoholic might be an aid to inspiration. Rather like the Poet Laureate receives an annual stipend of a butt of sack to stimulate the muse. However, my guess is that boringly, the camera club tankard will be presented empty. There are also apparently, 'impact trophies'. Now whether these are meant to impart impact themselves, in which case they may be a bit battered by now, or whether they are awarded for 'impact', I couldn't quite figure out. 

Splott, Cardiff, 1969

A gallery technician was hanging one of my framed prints in a gallery in Kilkenny, Ireland some years ago and it slipped off the rather precarious hanging system the gallery used. The frame slid down the wall and crashed to the floor. The frame fell apart, the glass shattered into a hundred shards but the mounted and matted print remained upright against the wall and undamaged. Now that made quite an impact when it hit the ground, would I get the trophy I wonder?

What was going on in British camera clubs was already a generation or two out of touch with contemporary photographic reality when I began work as a photographer aged 15. In the intervening sixty years they haven't changed one iota but photographic ideas and practice have moved on apace and become even more vibrant, exciting and relevant to today's world. 

The concepts and expressions that camera clubs still use are rooted in the 19th.century. They still waffle on about 'monochrome', 'pictorial' and 'composition'. They also award prizes for 'large' prints and 'small' prints. Really? You get a prize according to size? Sounds more like a vegetable show. Biggest parsnip etc. What is designated 'large' anyway and who decides this? My 'Wildwood' prints exhibited in the USA and European galleries were five feet by four. Is that 'large'? Not compared with my 'Village and Memorial Halls' series which were eight feet wide. Maybe that's 'large'? Well certainly not by comparison with Thomas Struth's (b.1954) work from his 'New Pictures from Paradise' series that I saw in the Metropolitan Museum of art in New York. They were at least fifteen feet wide. 

Splott, Cardiff, 1969

The sad reality is that the so-called, self-appointed' 'judges' that set these totally arbitrary and nonsensical categories have probably never been to a contemporary photographic exhibition and never set foot in a photography gallery. They only get away with their ignorant bluffing by the fact that it is they who dictate the terms of these competitions that are themselves totally irrelevant to improving standards. In fact, they are designed to suppress innovation and progress in order to make themselves appear clever. In the same way these 'judges' and those who run British camera clubs keep these farcical antics in place to discourage young educated photographers from joining and intimidating them with their knowledge, skills and contemporary ideas. A deliberate suppression of progress.

Splott, Cardiff, 1969

While one can laugh off the ridiculous and irrelevant categories and ludicrous prizes, it is totally unforgivable for amateur 'judges' and the camera club hierarchy to deliberately set out to deny other members the opportunity to advance their own work and be informed about contemporary ideas. If, due to  these folks total lack of understanding, they are intimidated by contemporary ideas and are not up to dealing with them, then maybe they should step aside and allow others with the relevant skills and knowledge to support and encourage the other club members to make the quantum leap from the 19th. into the 21st. century. 

https://www.pete-davis-photography.com/

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Lockdown Books

With a major exhibition postponed until after the lockdown and my teaching the postgraduate students at Aberystwyth University School of Art confined to virtual tutorials and getting about to photograph restricted, I had to do something. Periodically I like to shuffle through my mountains of contact sheets to review older stuff to see if there is anything I have passed over that may be of interest.

One aspect of my work that hasn't been seen a great deal is the urban documentary work that I make when I am travelling about on other projects. I began to assemble, edit and sequence these photographs made over quite a few years and put them together in book form. 'Innocence of Eye' resulted from this. 

https://www.pete-davis-photography.com/innocence-of-eye

A large format 11" x 13" hardback book with approximately 50 images made in several countries. They reflect my fascination with the everyday and sometimes prosaic moments that evolve around us every day. 

Machynlleth, Powys, 1976

 It, along with the other two books will be published when the planned exhibition opens at Ffotogaleri y Gofeb. 

With this exhibition in mind, which will consist of a selection of black and white landscape work from several bodies of work spanning three decades I envisaged a book to accompany this. While there have been exhibition catalogues for almost all of my exhibitions, a substantial collection of this work has not been seen together.

'The Expressive Land' is a large format, 11" x 13" book with approximately 100 images from my work in Wales, England, Ireland and Sardinia. While the flavour of each of those regions is different, the book explores and juxtaposes many of the common themes that occur in my work. Many of the images in the book will feature in the exhibition when it opens. 

https://www.pete-davis-photography.com/the-expressive-land

Another aspect of my work that hasn't been seen much but has been there, in the background for many years is the ongoing series of still life images of plant forms. All the specimens are gathered from my garden at different times of the year as seems appropriate and then either photographed in black and white or colour also as appropriate.

These images have been building up for many years and again, this period gave an opportunity to review, edit and assemble into a large format 12" x 12" hard back book with over fifty images, both black and white and colour. The images reflect both the beauty and the imperfections of nature on a smaller scale than we usually observe in the wider landscape. 

https://www.pete-davis-photography.com/silentium

The Curse of the Photo Competition

My posts about the ludicrous antics of the typical British amateur camera club have been well received. Possibly one of their 'activities' that has caused the greatest stifling of any improvement in the quality of the work they produce, (I'm not talking about technique but about ideas and contemporary imagery) is the cult of the competition. I have always loathed photo competitions of any sort as they serve no useful purpose other than providing sponsors with cheap advertising, (demanding the copyright of entries for tawdry prizes) and hoodwinking the gullible competitors that winning somehow equates to you being a good photographer. An artificially, temporarily inflated ego does not equate to an improvement in your work. 

'Innocence of Eye' a new book by Pete Davis

You only have to look at the ridiculous divisions, sub divisions and sub, sub divisions of the typical camera club competition list to see that they are existing in a photographic world that, thankfully, passed on in the real world generations ago. 'Best large monochrome pictorial print - with impact'. Yes, unbelievably, they still talk about 'monochrome' and 'pictorial' and what on earth is 'impact?'. Come to think of it, what's a 'pictorial' photograph? The opposite of a non pictorial photograph I suppose. The very term is a throwback to victorian terminologies that have long since been extinct in the real world of photography but they linger on in the Jurassic wildernesses of the British amateur camera club. Presumably then you have the  'Best small monochrome pictorial print - with impact'. and the  'Best large monochrome pictorial print - without impact' etc. etc. At least that way I suppose everyone wins a prize - usually a much coveted (by camera club members) but extremely silly and meaningless  tiny silver cup. Well, not real silver of course.

Narberth, Pembrokeshire, Wales, 2019

That anyone thinks that this ludicrous charade has anything to do with contemporary photography is laughable. At the same time, British camera clubs wonder why young, educated and visually sophisticated young people stay away from them in their droves. The only glimmer of hope is that in another generation maybe the camera clubs, if they continue to operate as they do today will die out completely. 

We also need to examine the folks who sit in judgement in these competitions, who are they and what are their credentials? Even if we think, and we don't, that there is any value in them. Sadly, some are just opinionated older camera club members who have self-appointed themselves to this role. Their notions of 'good' photography hark back to traditions that died out in the real photography world aeons ago but they still waffle on about things like 'pictorial' and 'composition'. Possibly worse are those who, having bought a few worthless, so-called 'distinctions' from the RPS actually believe in their authority.

Leon, Spain, 2018

Collectively, what British amateur camera club judges know about contemporary photography can be written on the point of a pin. 

The saddest part of all this is not necessarily the pointless antics themselves but the long-term effects. These have been the smothering of any spark or glimmer of hope that anyone in a UK camera club might produce any work of merit within the contemporary photographic world. This would have been stifled by the outdated, narrow and now irrelevant ideas that linger on in British camera clubs. The embarrassing and irrelevant competition culture only serves to perpetuate this sad state of affairs.