I knew HCB was obsessed with geometry (something i personally only get part of the time), but his reference to sensuality was a surprise. Glad you enjoyed the article.
A well curated selection Pierre! I enjoyed reading your thoughts on quotes and the strangeness of how they are passed around and repurposed for every individual's narrative which may or may not reflect the values of the original author.
Common as well that a lot of "famous" quotes turn out to be a fabrication that was then propagated repeatedly till it was accepted as fact.
I had some first hand experience like that of a quote I penned in the early Internet days that was somewhat well published, but mis-attributed to an actor with the same name. Because one or two quote aggregator sites had the wrong attribution, it was then repeated downstream on many other sites that copied their data from the big ones.
I eventually got one of them to correct it, but it was not so easy. I think we will have it 50x worse with AI. One incorrect AI "fact" will be passed around and around before it is mostly accepted as truth. Its not a huge problem for major verifiable things, but there will be thousands of little realities that get lost in the cracks of mis-attribution.
I think that, while the internet has multiplied the occasions for mis-use, mis-understanding or manipulation of information, it has also multiplied the opportunities for individuals to verify things for themselves — but how many take that initiative?
I've not used AI much, a couple of times to gather ideas when i had no idea how to start a text, but i was shocked how the results (texts) were hyper stereotypical, in addition to a number of factual mistakes. Agree with you. Much vigilance is needed to avoid the perils of the AI slippery slope.
Really well written. I also had somewhat of a conflicted relation with his presence, being so unavoidably present everywhere you go photography-wise. Then, when you go deeper and deeper is just insane to see how his influence was EVEN LARGER than it seemed in the first place. At that point I just started to wonder "why", and after seeing most of his work I was converted into a "Bressoniano". He is also photographic father of my favorite photographer, so in a sense, we can say his the root of the matter... What a guy... I recently his book "The photographer's eye" by Aperture, and I liked it a lot. Have you read it?
Thank you — I like the word 'Bressoniano' :-) I have a couple of collections of HCB's photographs, a collection of interviews in the press, and the biography by Pierre Assouline, all great read, but i don't know this Aperture book, i'll check it out — thanks for the tip.
Il n’y a rien à dire. Il faut regarder. On n’apprend pas aux gens à regarder. C’est tellement difficile de regarder.... I actually have never seen this quote before. I love it!
So many of the quotes reflect the mindset, which is the harder to develop than the technical skills required to produce consistently good photographs. It is the stuff that makes the pursuit of the images a lifelong pursuit and joy.
Hilarious : A little more than a dentist and a little less than a psychoanalyst
:):)
had to include it 😂
That was hilarious haha
Nice piece Pierre. I loved the quote about the geometry piece and the hard on. That’s creating in a nutshell for me. Finding something so pleasing.
It seems a very un-Bresson quote but I love it.
I knew HCB was obsessed with geometry (something i personally only get part of the time), but his reference to sensuality was a surprise. Glad you enjoyed the article.
A well curated selection Pierre! I enjoyed reading your thoughts on quotes and the strangeness of how they are passed around and repurposed for every individual's narrative which may or may not reflect the values of the original author.
Common as well that a lot of "famous" quotes turn out to be a fabrication that was then propagated repeatedly till it was accepted as fact.
I had some first hand experience like that of a quote I penned in the early Internet days that was somewhat well published, but mis-attributed to an actor with the same name. Because one or two quote aggregator sites had the wrong attribution, it was then repeated downstream on many other sites that copied their data from the big ones.
I eventually got one of them to correct it, but it was not so easy. I think we will have it 50x worse with AI. One incorrect AI "fact" will be passed around and around before it is mostly accepted as truth. Its not a huge problem for major verifiable things, but there will be thousands of little realities that get lost in the cracks of mis-attribution.
Thank you. Glad you enjoyed the article.
I think that, while the internet has multiplied the occasions for mis-use, mis-understanding or manipulation of information, it has also multiplied the opportunities for individuals to verify things for themselves — but how many take that initiative?
I've not used AI much, a couple of times to gather ideas when i had no idea how to start a text, but i was shocked how the results (texts) were hyper stereotypical, in addition to a number of factual mistakes. Agree with you. Much vigilance is needed to avoid the perils of the AI slippery slope.
Really well written. I also had somewhat of a conflicted relation with his presence, being so unavoidably present everywhere you go photography-wise. Then, when you go deeper and deeper is just insane to see how his influence was EVEN LARGER than it seemed in the first place. At that point I just started to wonder "why", and after seeing most of his work I was converted into a "Bressoniano". He is also photographic father of my favorite photographer, so in a sense, we can say his the root of the matter... What a guy... I recently his book "The photographer's eye" by Aperture, and I liked it a lot. Have you read it?
Thank you — I like the word 'Bressoniano' :-) I have a couple of collections of HCB's photographs, a collection of interviews in the press, and the biography by Pierre Assouline, all great read, but i don't know this Aperture book, i'll check it out — thanks for the tip.
Nice! I think you will most likely enjoy it a lot! Also, I won't play cool and try to shamelessly steal a term coined by the one-and-only Ferdinando Scianna tho :) https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2022/jul/26/photographer-ferdinando-scianna-interview-sicily-magnum
Il n’y a rien à dire. Il faut regarder. On n’apprend pas aux gens à regarder. C’est tellement difficile de regarder.... I actually have never seen this quote before. I love it!
Glad you've found a nugget in here, Juliette :-)
So many of the quotes reflect the mindset, which is the harder to develop than the technical skills required to produce consistently good photographs. It is the stuff that makes the pursuit of the images a lifelong pursuit and joy.
it makes me think of one i did not include: "sharpness is a bourgeois concept."
Terrific, Pierre! My favorite is: To photograph is to bring the head, the eye and the heart into the same line of vision. It's a way of life.
it is a way of life! Thank you Alex!