Just by looking at the photo without noticing its title, it may seem confusing or difficult to appreciate the piece as a piece of art. The edges of the photo are scattered with bits and pieces of leaves and cars, the main subject of the photo is unclear where the person is blurry and small while the tree is partially blocked by the person, the photo overall is black and white and lacks color while also being blurry simultaneously. In short, there are many wrong things about the piece.
But once the title, “WRONG”, is noticed, things start to change. Before, the opinion on the photo is that the many wrong places were not seen by the photographer and they were mistakes that only the audiences spotted, it wasn’t intended. However, the title suggests the opposite. It suggests that the author knows that the photo is wrong, but still decided to show it to the audiences, it was intended. Now, instead of OBSERVING “mistakes” of the author, the audiences THINK of what the photographer is trying to communicate. Perhaps the photographer is trying to create a template for wrong use elements so that the audiences can avoid them. Perhaps the photographer is trying to emphasize that understanding what to avoid is important in photography and even in life.
Overall, context is crucial in photography and other forms of art too, it gives us the basic information of what the photographer/artist is trying to communicate. After all, if all the mistakes in a photo is completely intended by the photographer, our analysis of the photo would change completely. Therefore, context is a very common way for a “bad” photo to become “good”, as the audiences now understand that the mistakes in the photo are also given meaning and thought.
Furthermore, there is also other ways that a photo can be “good” when it is “bad”, this can be because of the different opinions of people, where some might believe that a photo is “bad” because of unclean edges, while others belive that it is “good” and gives a sense of imperfect beauty. It depends on aesthetics.
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