The tradition of portrait painting, to embellish or idealize the subject, remains the aim of everyday and of commercial photography, but it has had a much more limited career in photography considered as art. Generally speaking, the honors have gone to the Cordelias.
About this quote
- What does it mean?
- Commercial photography aims to idealize subjects like traditional portrait painting, but art photography prioritizes realism over embellishment.
- In plain terms
- Art photography values truth over making subjects look better, unlike commercial or traditional portraits.
- What can you take from it?
- Artistic photography succeeds when it captures reality rather than idealizing it.
Where it applies
Putting it to work
Questions to consider
- Is idealization ever valid in art?
- Does commercial photography lack artistic value?
Another view
The statement overlooks that some art photography also idealizes subjects intentionally.
More from Susan Sontag
So successful has been the camera's role in beautifying the world that photographs, rather than the world, have become the standard of the beautiful.
Permalink to quote #51 The destiny of photography has taken it far beyond the role to which it was originally thought to be limited: to give more accurate reports on reality (includi…
Permalink to quote #53 The camera makes everyone a tourist in other people's reality, and eventually in one's own.
Permalink to quote #50
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