Contemporary Photography vs. the Photographer's Eye Essay

    I read the essay The Photographer's Eye by John Szarkowski. Published in 1966, it explained a bit of the history of photography and how it adapted. The essay discussed the vantage point, detail, time, frame, and the thing itself. I'll be honest, it still do not understand what the essay was trying to explain. I was excepting a basic explanation of those topics, not an artistic opinion of them. I had to take photos that demonstrated each topic, although I do not know if I succeeded. Here are my pictures.

Detail

The Thing Itself

Time

Frame

Vantage Point

For the photographers, they all time photos of nature. There are some that I can see what the essay is trying to explain and then there are some others which I'm not too sure about. They are:

Korea by Michael Kenna (Frame)

Dia Monde by Roksolyana Hilevych (Time)

Autumn Thunder by Rob Visser (Vantage Point)

Isle of Skye by Christine Jackson (The Thing Itself)

Magic in the horizon by Isabella Tabacchi (Detail)

Overall, I believe the essay made decent points from what I could understand. Photography today versus then is that, photography is very much more accessible today, then is was a hundred years ago. The essay tried to explain how beginners didn't understand the concepts noted above the same way experts did. And while everyone learns these concepts eventually, it is much harder to understand in the beginning.

- Kelsey ✌