Alfred Stieglitz in Late Life - Last Photographs

[trailkeeper]

A painter is given artistic freedom, so why not a photographer too.

[ZoneIII]

@trailkeeper As far as I know, photographers always have had artistic freedom with the exception of journalistic photographers to an extent. Photography has been accepted as an art form at least since the early 1900s and it was used for artistic expression long before that. It's a well-established and accepted art form.

[trailkeeper]

@ZoneIII Ok, thats what made him different I guess, rather than just photograph the facts, he photographed both the art of the facts in search of a beauty about the whole thing, and perhaps how the camera can be used to capture and create some beauty in a photo.

[ZoneIII]

@trailkeeper Stieglitz supported of the Photo Secession but photography had long been accepted as a creative art form. Later, photographers such as Adams, Weston, and even Stieglitz himself rejected the attempt to simulate paintings in their photography but that didn't mean that creativity wasn't involved. It was just that photography then became more concerned with reality. I actually hope that the pendulum again. I would like to see the pendulum swing away from endless Photoshopped images.

[ZoneIII]

@trailkeeper My response didn't show up. I won't repeat it except to say that your original question, "Why not a photographer too" is a bit baffling because, as far as I know, there was never any real question involved. Photography has always been creative. From the pre-Photo Secession, to Photo Secession, to post-Photo Secession, photography has always been a creative pursuit. There really is no question about "why" a photographer can't be creative. They always have been./

[muskiejack]

@trailkeeper I think what Zone is saying is that the question that you posed in your first post implied that photographers were not given artistic freedom. I don't know of any period of photography where artistic expression in photography was a question. In other words, your question assumes an attitude towards photography that never actually existed. Whether photographers simulated painting or expressed natural (real) beauty, it was always artistic. There never was such a question.