A review of photographic realism

Realism appeared in 1970s, which seems to be contrary to abstract minimalist art and unwilling to let conceptual art dominate the world. It has a distinct pop art face, but it is not keen on advertising effect. With meticulous patience, the painter is immersed in rich details, and accurate, clear and faithful images are the greatest characteristics of this painting school. Therefore, it also has another name, surrealism surrealism. Although it has not received special attention from critics and museums, it is greatly favored by private collections and has considerable competitiveness in the art market. Photographic realism, as its name implies, is to draw photos, which is a way that many painters have been attracted and avoided since the birth of photography. However, the realistic photographer openly admits that photography is the basis of painting, which does not mean that he recreates according to the photos, but is completely loyal to the scenes recorded by the camera lens. Usually, painters choose ordinary snapshots, mostly urban street scenes, shop windows, advertising signs and daily necessities, rather than artistic photos or photographers' masterpieces. Occasionally, there will be photos in the family photo album and identity photos on the driver's license. The difference is that most of these paintings are huge, at least dozens of times larger than the original ones, so the paintings and photos have lost the sense of scale of the original scene. No matter how big the picture frame is, the painter describes every detail objectively and accurately, and carefully handles every part of the picture with the same meticulous spirit. The way they treat their works is very close to that of pop artists. They are calm and detached from the object of painting, try not to leave personal brushstrokes and traces on the screen, and carefully hide behind the works. Because the painter's calm and restrained statements, even the most gorgeous and brilliant street scenes, once described in great detail, have been dissolved and carefully neutralized. Like pop artists, photographic realists choose narrative themes, but there is no narrative process and explanation. But towards the extremely accurate photographic truth. The question is, is the truth of photography the truth of life? The painters gave consistent answers in their own different ways. By directly transferring the images of photos to the canvas, they show the audience the bright and brilliant face of contemporary life, but at the same time they seem to question this face.

Photographic realistic painting appeared in 1970s, as if it played a nihilistic joke on modernist art, just like the wheel turned once and returned to its original place. A century ago, when the camera just came out, it triggered a real painting revolution. /kloc-European artists in the second half of the 0/9th century believed that the appearance of cameras could record all the truth and details on developing paper, which even the most careful painter could not do. They naively think that photos are better than the realism of painting, so they give up trying to imitate nature and truth. This is also one of the main reasons why western modern painting gradually moves away from objective nature, towards subjective deformation, towards personal expression, towards inner world and finally towards abstract painting. Western modernist painters give up realism because they don't want to imitate machines, and they don't want to become machines. Because they believe that individual creativity is the soul of art, they would rather give up what they already have and explore strange and unknown worlds. However, by the end of the 20th century, photographic realists returned to realism. This time, they chose photos, and the content followed the camera, relishing all the conveniences and defects brought by technology, including ironic wit.