Basic introduction of conceptual photography

Conceptual photography is not new. It has been formed since the day photography was born, and countless photographers have explored its mystery. However, there was no clear genre in the early stage because of advocating simplicity. Long before photography, conceptual art has been explored by countless artists for hundreds or even thousands of years. The appearance of photography only adds a medium and means to the conceptual art. I don't want to list examples in the history of western photography here, so as not to be accused of "following the trend" by the west. In fact, in the mid-1980s of China's reform and opening-up, some young pioneers of insight made a lot of efforts to explore conceptual photography, but there was no relatively relaxed atmosphere at that time, and these explorations could only become the swan song in the history of modern photography in China. China photography, which entered the 2 1 century, said that conceptual photography has new development space, and I think it is time.

First of all, we must clarify a question. Can photography express ideas? In fact, photography and expressing ideas have never been contradictory, which is not what Mr. Li Shaobai said in his article: "No matter how much subjective treatment there is, artistic photography still cannot express ideas well". Because as a rational idea, no matter what kind of media is used, it is difficult to express it completely and accurately. Even in words, it is still a mystery how many ideas are clearly expressed in Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit. Why else did so many philosophers explain this book again and again? Therefore, the expression of ideas, its interest is in the process of continuous improvement and discussion, rather than relying on one or several media to convey clearly. The more difficult the concept is, the more diverse and complex the space is, and the more it needs the all-round interpretation of the media, so that it can gradually move towards a higher realm in the mileage of human thought. The involvement of photography in conceptual art is also one of them.

The next question is, how many ideas can photography express, and what depth and breadth can it achieve? In fact, for the expression space of photography, it is always inseparable from the intervention of ideas, but some are deeper and some are shallower, some point to a single, and some pictures are more complicated. For example, when shooting scenery, some photographers shoot whatever they see, and some people find another way to find a morning or a dusk, waiting for a form of light and shadow that is ignored by others to complete a beautiful picture. In fact, it also expresses an idea, an idea-only such a relatively elegant idea or idea can be easily accepted, and then it can be easily imitated, and the result will soon be disappointing. As mentioned earlier, the "f/64 group" with Adams and others as the core is a group that pursues the ultimate goal of photography-objective documentary, rather than a landscape photographer who unilaterally pursues light and shadow. These creators named after "Pure Shadow School" or "Direct Photography" try to accurately show the charm of nature in as many details as possible through the physical and chemical action of the camera, thus conveying their reverence for nature, which is driven by "concept".

As for real conceptual photography, it does not mean to express a very complete concept through photography, for the reasons mentioned above. The significance of conceptual photography lies in a certain concept conveyed through photography, which is an exploration process to get rid of shallow and meaningless entanglement. It tries to show the analysis of human living conditions through photography, put forward some meaningful topics, and trigger more and deeper thinking. Therefore, conceptual photography often does not give an answer, but there are many possibilities for the audience to realize themselves. From the perspective of reception aesthetics, it also meets the needs of aesthetics. If a photo or a group of photos makes everything clear, the audience's participation will become empty talk, and the artistic charm of photos will disappear. Ling Fei's interpretation of his works is only a possibility. If the audience can read more different meanings, this is the success of photography. If you are "confused", you might as well give more room for understanding, which will do more good than harm to the progress of photography. In other words, for many viewers, it is always more interesting than panorama!

In the history of modern art, there are often thirty levels of understanding of art: elegant art, avant-garde art and Kemp. Susan sontag pointed out: elegant art is basically about morality; Pioneer art explores the tension between beauty and morality through extreme love; The third kind of art "Kemp" is completely aesthetic, that is, style is above content, aesthetics is above morality, and satire is above tragedy. Kemp bypassed rational judgment and chose the game. Now there are many "Kemps" in photography, which is a "game" state. Seek stability, familiarity, repetition and conformity, so as to find a sense of security in the ontology of modern people. But this is often an irresponsible attitude, which is unfavorable to the development of photography.

Furthermore, modern art has entered 2 1 century, and it is impossible to decipher its various phenomena only by relying on visual art. The blending and combination of photography and art, installation, behavior and other multimedia has been marginalized, which has become the general trend of art development in the whole world. You can hold a plane photo with incomparable light and shadow and enjoy a world-famous reputation, but you have no reason to ignore the general trend of artistic development. From surrealism in the early 20th century to the wide application of pop art in the 1960s, vision is just one of the bridges, and many such bridges have emerged, trying to lead the audience to the other side of the way of thinking. How beautiful a bridge is is not the main purpose, but the ultimate goal is to connect the thinking modes on the other side and achieve the overall effect of the work.