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Tag Archives: personal aesthetics

the personal aesthetic

Monday, March 12, 2007

does one learn aesthetics or does aesthetics learn you? meaning: is aesthetics a panoply of ideas and concerns one encounters in a ripe and meaningful fashion, something to add to an artistic arsenal that will further give shape and weight to work made–or is it a different kind of encounter, a shocking familiarity, when you realize that a fully articulated way of thinking about something is one that you have always had and always carried with you, unawares. until that moment of encounter.

Filed in aesthetics, bill brandt, japanese photography, masao yamamoto, wabi-sabi | Also tagged , , , | Comments (5)

the limits of photographic character: images you thought never existed

Wednesday, September 27, 2006

beyond my first flush of shock and thinking that this is a photograph i’d never imagined she’d make, i have come instead to see that this image is really a prelude to all the other photographs that i have come to know as arbus’s–touching, vulnerable, a little skewed–as if she made this one imprint of herself before she went out seeking the same in the world over the next twenty-odd years.

arbus is 22. pregnant with her first child, doon. her husband is in military service in india. it is 1945, and she is living with her parents. this will be one of a series of images that she will make and send to her absent spouse, and one of the only self-portraits of diane arbus that i’ve ever known.

Filed in art trips, diane arbus, other people | Also tagged , , | Comments (5)