The merit of photographs: where does it lie?

If we accept that the merit of a photograph is directly proportional to its transcendence, that is to say, its capacity to transmit more meaning than the one that comes up during the first view of the image, we must ask ourselves questions about the merit of certain practices in photography. Questions that concern the photograph that is self proclaimed transcendent, or the one that intends to be artistic, as well as the author’s photograph and the one that is presumed to be irrelevant, so much so that it doesn’t deserve more than a brief passage through facebook, or to become an attachment to an email.

At present, the merit and transcendence of the so called author’s photograph isn’t established by its intrinsic function - which is to reveal the truth of that which exists - but by mediators and agents: museums, galleries, fairs, administrators of public funds, etc. They are the ones who say what is worth seeing, and what to look at to perceive meanings. The link with the market is evident and defining; this is a recent phenomenon, from the last thirty or forty years, about which we have already referred to in other editorials of 1:1. We shall only remind here that, in art photography, the valorization through the market has made the relevance of photographers and critics opinions disappear (Magnum is an exception, almost a relic to venerate, as it preserves the judgment of its peers to accept new members). And so, the world of photography has lost autonomy and with it, its most valuable contribution. The transcendence of these images comes, thus, from outside.

The issue now, in this equation between transcendence and merit, is what happens with the photography that doesn’t enter the art circles. For example, publicity or fashion photography that isn´t done by photographers who are consecrated “artists” by the agents of the art market; the photography by graphic reporters of magazines and newspapers; or family photographs, those taken by unprofessional photographers, those on cell phones and infinite digital cameras, more accessible and of a better quality each day.