Rating:
(6 reviews)
Author: Visit Amazon's James Elkins Page
ISBN : 0415977827
New from $117.90
Format: PDF
Direct download links available Photography Theory (The Art Seminar) Hardcover Free Download from mediafire, rapishare, and mirror link
About the Author
James Elkins is E.C. Chadbourne Chair in the Department of Art History, Theory, and Criticism at the Art Institute of Chicago, and Head of History of Art at the University College Cork, Ireland. He is author of Pictures and Tears, How to Use Your Eyes, and What Painting Is, and, most recently, The Strange Place of Religion in Contemporary Art and Master Narratives and Their Discontents, all published by Routledge.
Direct download links available for Photography Theory Free Download
- Series: The Art Seminar
- Hardcover: 128 pages
- Publisher: Routledge (December 13, 2006)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0415977827
- ISBN-13: 978-0415977821
- Product Dimensions: 1.1 x 5.6 x 8.4 inches
- Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
Photography Theory Free Download
Photography Theory is the second in a projected seven volume series called The Art Seminar, edited by James Elkins and sponsored by University College Cork and the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, among other institutions. I have only read this volume, but all evidently have, or will have, the same basic format:
(1) Introduction - an overview survey article commissioned for the book
(2) Starting Points - a small collection of papers on specific topics intended to stimulate discussion.
(3) The Art Seminar proper - the transcript of an extended panel discussion on the subject of the book involving 8-12 participants and gently moderated by Elkins.
(4) Assessments - twenty-five to thirty mostly one-page responses to the panel discussion by qualified people, primarily (exclusively?) academics, including a luminary or two. In this volume those who contributed responses were all different(with one special exception I'll return to below) from those who participated in the panel discussion, but it doesn't seem to be a requirement of the series.
(5) Afterwards - a small number of papers commissioned for the book that discuss the subject with reference (but not necessarily very much reference) to the papers, the panel discussion and the responses.
While not necessarily the most valuable part of the book, the panel discussion is clearly the heart of it. And in the case of Photography Theory it is a faltering one. The participants themselves seem unhappy with the results they achieve, or rather fail to achieve, and acknowledge more or less directly the following shortfalls, among others.
(a) They cannot agree on "the index", a specific theoretical conception, derived from the philosophical work of C.S.
Even though I've studied philosophy and semiotics extensively I consider myself a photographer rather than a philosopher or semiologist. Yet I believe that photography, or at least art photography, should have meaning. Photography theory as a field has seemed to work at the intersection of philosophy, semiotics and art history. I've thought that it might provide insight into the way that photographs demonstrate meaning and that it might help me to be a better photographer and viewer of photographs. Over the years I've read the important works in photographic theory by authors like Walter Benjamin, Roland Barthes, and Susan Sontag, and more recently, Michael Fried. Although I often found photographic theory interesting as an intellectual and sociological exercise, nothing in photographic theory seemed to bear any relevance to either my own image making or my appreciation of images of others. Even though its utility to a photographer was suspect, I wanted to test whether my general impression was correct by reading the 2007 "Photography Theory".
This book centers around a seminar of photographic theory academicians held at the University College Cork. The book begins with several introductory essays that were meant to lay the groundwork for the seminar, followed by a transcript of the actual seminar. This is followed by a twenty-seven so-called assessments meant to address the points raised in the seminar, and then two essays meant to wrap up the subject.
The seminar itself dealt with a number of subjects that most photographers would find esoteric. The base question was, "what is photography?", and in attempting to answer that question a number of issues were raised.
-
Download Link 2