Really?

[jordanstarr]

i never used the word sellout, if that's where all the negative conotations are coming from. all i'm saying is that the work you do for others you arn't doing it for yourself. you can still call it "art" if you wish, but it's not authentic (authentic as "uninfluenced by the market"). so if leonardo did work for other people on commission and produced art for them for money and did what they wanted him to do, it wasn't authentic.

if you keep your art lying around for years that is uninfluenced by the market and people buy it there is no way you can "sell out" as the work was produced before market influence.

of course art is influence by external elements. if you thought that's what i was getting at, you read my entire premise all wrong. all elements of social life influence who a person becomes, so why would art be any different. what i'm talking about as "authenticity" is doing art without the intension of making money off of it. if we want to be technical, nothing is authentic. everything is a product of some other influence. unless we're blank slates walking around, authenticity doesn't really exist. i just assumed you knew when i was talking about authenticity i was talking about the market's role on art.

as well, when i talk about "taking criticism" i mean taking it litterally. i mean taking what the person says seriously (a certain angle, colour hue, contrast level) and incorporating their views in order to be more "marketable". obviously listening to someone say "i don't like the high contrast in that photo" and you turn around and say "i like it and i'm going to keep doing it if i feel it's true to my nature" then who cares? nothing has changed. this is obvious.

what i ask is to take my scenario seriously about the duplicate other producing within the market and the one outside of it. will they be the same? NO. that's all i'm saying. the market influences people's work away from what they would have authentically produced (with the outside elements of the world -upbringing, beliefs, ideals, concepts of beauty). it changes everything for better or for worse. i'm not saying you're not an "artist" or that you work isn't "good". all i'm saying is that the market changes the outcome of the art. if you don't, please just argue that the market doesn't influence your work and illustrate some points instead of altering the meanings of my argument (maybe i should be more precise, it could be my fault).

[TheFlyingCamera]

I take umbrage at your use of the term "authentic" or "inauthentic" in relation to personal work we choose to market. For me, the work comes first. I don't take or print a single image that is not reflective of my personal, individual preconception. If the work sells, wonderful. I can't show a work I don't feel strongly about, and THAT commitment to the image itself comes before any market consideration.

I sure as hell don't do beaches and sunsets, or cute kittens and puppies - taking those photos because I know they'll sell when I'd rather be photographing Cambodian temples or naked men, THAT is inauthentic.

[jstraw]

i never used the word sellout, if that's where all the negative conotations are coming from...

...you might not totally sell out, but unless you can filter out...(blah blah blah)

You're quibbling about a space?

[Moopheus]

You're quibbling about a space?

Arguably, sellout is a noun and sell out is a verb, so there is a difference.

[bjorke]

WTF is "authenticity"?

[jstraw]

WTF is "authenticity"?

Not a bad question.

[Videbaek]

The good thing about authenticity is that it is so incredibly rare in every field of human expression. My wife is a publisher, constantly on the look-out for interesting manuscripts (fiction) coming from all over the world. Publishing is a business, so she looks for manuscripts that have commercial potential -- meaning content that would be of interest to a sufficiently large body of people to make publishing a money-making proposition. Also, the work has to have something different, something unique and interesting, something authentic. I find this so instructive (I've read many of the raw manuscripts coming through the house). Everything but everything is a business, including art. The great painters of history produced pictures to make a living: almost everything they did was a commission, or made with a particular patron or buyer in mind. They tried to satisfy their customers but they also managed to satisfy themselves. This is the "art within the art": how to satisfy the customer's requirements while remaining true to one's own artistic temperament and vision? Very few achieve this. There are plenty of examples of "sell-outs": all the technically proficient landscape and portrait painters who have churned out pictures throughout history, undistinguished and unremarkable, and contentedly so. And the preceding has nothing to do with "commercial art", all the advertising, graphic design, interior design, corporate and communication picture-making that makes up the bulk of our man-made visual world. Personally, I have the greatest admiration and respect for many "commercial artists" who have worked within a genre and technical constraints to create important and intelligent work. By definition they are "sell-outs", and yet they transcend this and make it irrelevant. It can be done but it's very, very difficult and takes great talent and intelligence. We all have to make a living, artists too.

[TheFlyingCamera]

The good thing about authenticity is that it is so incredibly rare in every field of human expression. My wife is a publisher, constantly on the look-out for interesting manuscripts (fiction) coming from all over the world. Publishing is a business, so she looks for manuscripts that have commercial potential -- meaning content that would be of interest to a sufficiently large body of people to make publishing a money-making proposition. Also, the work has to have something different, something unique and interesting, something authentic. I find this so instructive (I've read many of the raw manuscripts coming through the house). Everything but everything is a business, including art. The great painters of history produced pictures to make a living: almost everything they did was a commission, or made with a particular patron or buyer in mind. They tried to satisfy their customers but they also managed to satisfy themselves. This is the "art within the art": how to satisfy the customer's requirements while remaining true to one's own artistic temperament and vision? Very few achieve this. There are plenty of examples of "sell-outs": all the technically proficient landscape and portrait painters who have churned out pictures throughout history, undistinguished and unremarkable, and contentedly so. And the preceding has nothing to do with "commercial art", all the advertising, graphic design, interior design, corporate and communication picture-making that makes up the bulk of our man-made visual world. Personally, I have the greatest admiration and respect for many "commercial artists" who have worked within a genre and technical constraints to create important and intelligent work. By definition they are "sell-outs", and yet they transcend this and make it irrelevant. It can be done but it's very, very difficult and takes great talent and intelligence. We all have to make a living, artists too.

Two perfect examples of what you speak of above: Thomas Kincade and Anne Geddes. They both bring tremendous talent to bear on the most horrendously kitschy subject matter, in the most conservative of manners, and in the end produce meaningless schlock with high technical execution. The worst exemplars of art harnessed to commerce to the detriment of both.

[my_lonely_eye]

You only lose your authenticity when your photographs lose soul.

[John McCallum]

Aaaah FC so if an artist finds a formula that is exceptionally appealing to buyers, then it is not authentic (WETF that is). Perhaps Geddes style of images are as pure a sense of self-expression to herself as oh say Mapplethorpe's to himself for example.

The serious question I have is On what basis do we (as photographers or armchair art critics) judge this to be so?

How on earth can the leap be made to say something like

...so if leonardo did work for other people on commission and produced art for them for money and did what they wanted him to do, it wasn't authentic.

if you...

?