Most Expensive Photograph Ever

[JAS_Photo]

The $6.5m canyon: it's the most expensive photograph ever (http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/jonathanjonesblog/2014/dec/10/most-expensive-photograph-ever-hackneyed-tasteless)

Anyone have a comment over this article?

[theantiquetiger]

It appears the writer is a moron (based on the opening sentence).

[Marko]

Writer doesn't know dick about photography - that's for sure.

It's a ludicrous price for an image.... That same image (colour version) WAS his best selling image selling at a million dollars a piece for a while. That too was a nutty price....this is 6.5 times nuttier.

I do not know of a better marketer of photography than Peter Lik and his team. I find the work overpriced of course but it is of extremely high quality.

[Michaelaw]

Where I come from "It is a technology." isn't a sentence. Maybe Mr. Jones should place his trusty ipad out in wonderland for a week, retrieve it, then see how many gorgeous views it captured! Where this guy goes wrong in my book is in calling Photography a technology because the same can be said about oil painting with regards to the paint and brush. Yes there are millions of photographic devices out there, one visit to Flickr will tell you that much but the problem is there are not millions of so called gorgeous views to look at...Indeed there are but a handful. Choosing when to take a shot, what time of day, the play of light, angle, subject matter etc, etc, etc are what make photography an art form period. How would Mr. Jones know that though, he's still tackling written communication as a form of expression!

[JAS_Photo]

I posted this meaning to comment a bit later but then the forum was down for me until now. I went back and read some of Mr. Jones other critiques and it seems likely he is only interested in creating controversy as previous columns completely contradict what he says here in regards to photography as art. And some of his comments on traditional fine art are just as outrageous. And I quote, "Today, this deliberate use of an outmoded style can only be nostalgic and affected, an “arty” special effect. We’ve all got that option in our photography software. Yeah, my pics of the Parthenon this summer looked really awesome in monochrome."

That sentence makes me completely apoplectic. When did B&W fine art prints become outmoded? A well made print whether B&W or colour is as far a departure from your iPhone snap with a "filter" added as a Rembrandt is from the paint by numbers your Aunt Betty made and hung in her kitchen.

I totally agree with Stan rose's response here:

https://profile.theguardian.com/user/id/14164594

An Excerpt from his rant:

"But as I was just discussing and agreeing with a fellow photographer friend of mine (who is nationally known as well) Lik's success is a good thing for photography and photographers. To claim his work isn't art is just as ridiculous as saying a J Pollock painting isn't art, it just demonstrates a profound ignorance of the creative process. I just spent three days in the canyonlands waiting for the perfect light for a photo I had visualized in my head for years. If you had told me I was not creating art as I was camping in 20 degree weather the other night, waiting through 16 hors of darkness for that illusive moment that may not even come, I would hqe punched you in the face. And you would have deserved it. That photo (which I successfully grabbed) involved just as much skill and artistic ability as any painting or piece of music I've ever produced, despite the use of that horrible technology you decry. It's just a different form of art,one that you clearly don't care to understand. I say bravo to Lik. End o' rant."

[Marko]

I'm guessing that this tabloid style of writing works...

(It's only job is to get us to share the link and comment - so that when we go to the site we have juicy ads based on our browsing histories).

Good content is just too difficult. Provocative content is so much easier and the return on the investment is far greater.

The content is just about meaningless.... For a millisecond I was surprised that the content came from a 'reputable' source.
But every channel in every medium seems to be churning out (mostly) crap these days.

[Runmonty]

Here is a lighter take on the article

Photography Declared Not an Art, Photographers Breathe Sigh of Relief | New Camera News (http://newcameranews.com/2014/12/12/photography-declared-not-an-art-photographers-breathe-sigh-of-relief/)

[JAS_Photo]

Another tongue in cheek reply:
http://petapixel.com/2014/12/13/just-peter-liks-record-breaking-photo-sale-may-constitute-torture/:cool:

[ericmark]

I think it's a great photo but not really worth that sort of cash.

As to art and photography well one has to define art. My father was an engine room artificer and my point is it's hard to separate the technical skills and the beholding skills.

It does not matter if a sculpture carved with some other persons skill or a scene from nature carved out by mother nature the photographers skill is to isolate that beauty and capture it so others may share it.

There are exceptions like still life where the photographer has first created the subject but in the main we can only capture what has been made by others. The idea of taking a picture of a painting does however seem to be taking it a little too far as it was a portable two dimensional image to start with.

Walk into an art gallery and stand next to a painting 20 foot tall and 30 foot long is stunning and often you need to step back again to appreciate it. We tend not to think of resolution with a painting but some of the large examples one does need to advance to a point where you can't see the whole image to see the fine work of one section.

The same is true with photography to produce a 3.5 foot by 5 foot image the resolution has to be really good. OK printing on canvas can hide some imperfections but it still has to be an extremely good image to start with. It does not say what size the image was but clearly far bigger than I can see on the computer screen.

When I submit a photo into a competition as a DPI it has to be reduced to 1400 x 1050 pixels that's the club rules, as a print 400 mm x 500 mm is the limit well in fact less as that's maximum for mount. We have lectures from professional photographers who take pictures with large format cameras and have had those images printed onto wall paper which then covers the whole wall of a doctors surgery which is a far cry from the 6 x 4 printed from an Ipad.

When one hears about the planning and how allowance was made for the chairs which would hide part of the photo and sizing it to fit the wall one realises the difference between professional and amateur. 32 inch TV is largest I will view my photos on. OK at the club they use a projector but still 1400 x 1050 pixels so don't have to be that good.

As to most expensive that can't be correct. There are a few where the photographer lost their life to get the image these were clearly more expensive. I look back at items around in 1900 and it is hard to conceive what they would cost today. Often they could not be done today like the painting on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel pornography laws alone would stop it.