Photograph by Michael Poster
...Not so much this single image but the whole set, called circus school, which can be viewed on Michael's new website along with several other sets of work.
Not naming any names, but sometimes art museums actually make me a tiny bit angry with what passes for "photography" in some cases. Photography to me is about life, the world, and truth. "Photographs" with zero percent of any of those three things in them sometimes seem like a waste to me. I get...impatient.
Michael Poster is a documentary photographer of considerable seriousness. His work has a lot of those three things in it.
Mike
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Original contents copyright 2012 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved.
Featured Comment by David Adam Edelstein: "Holy cow, yes. This one especially tells a lot of truth about circus: As an aerialist friend once told me, 'leotards are there to hide the bruises from practice.'"
I'd be curious to see an example of a photograph that doesn't show life, the world, or truth. I can't think of one.
Posted by: David Bostedo | Thursday, 05 April 2012 at 03:19 PM
Interesting that you selected "Circus School" out of the sets on the web site! I thing "We Still Make Stuff Here" is much superior (maybe I just like machines -- I definitely like the contrast of machines with people) and I like several of the other sets more!
It takes all kinds to make a world, doesn't it?
Posted by: Andrew Molitor | Thursday, 05 April 2012 at 03:29 PM
Mike, for the most part I've always lived where you live with life, world and truth holding sway in the photographs I like and the photos I make. But artists like Jeff Wall have added a layer or two for me, and no, I don't like many of his pieces.
Posted by: Karl | Thursday, 05 April 2012 at 03:47 PM
David,
You're not thinking hard enough. I'm not going to give examples because I don't think it's fair to single out specific practitioners to illustrate general criticisms.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Johnston | Thursday, 05 April 2012 at 03:51 PM
Andrew,
Where did I say I liked one set better than the others? I didn't. I'm suggesting people visit the site and look at the work, that's all.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Johnston | Thursday, 05 April 2012 at 03:56 PM
Mike, I'm curious. Could you give us an example of what type of photograph makes you, "impatient"?
Steve
Posted by: Steven Palmer | Thursday, 05 April 2012 at 04:59 PM
An interesting bit of documentary work here. Well done Michael Poster. Of course there have been many bodies of circus docs produced in the past 60+ years. Training attention on the backwater of acrobatic training is a bit unique but completely in-line with the new style of today's circuses.
"...sometimes art museums actually make me a tiny bit angry with what passes for "photography" in some cases." Me too. But I don't think this belongs in a major museum.
Posted by: Kenneth Tanaka | Thursday, 05 April 2012 at 05:25 PM
Thank you for this. This is the type of photography to which I aspire. This is the photography that I relate to and that speaks to me. Michael's work best exemplifies why I shoot, why I am interested in photography. I do not have his skills, but this gives me something to aim for, something to have in mind as a milestone and source of inspiration. I'm not knocking the type of art gallery photography which you mention. I admire that approach a great deal, but it is not me, and I sometimes feel a million miles away when I compare that type of work with my own, very alienated, like I don't measure up. There is an honesty Michael's work, a simplicity that reveals truth...not an easy thing to accomplish, especially when so many others seem interested in adding layers to their work (photoshop or otherwise). Thanks again.
Posted by: Carlo Santin | Thursday, 05 April 2012 at 05:27 PM
Many thumbs up. Thanks for the link. I particularly like the picture you posted and the one two places after it (upside down lady in rectangular frame).
Posted by: expiring_frog | Thursday, 05 April 2012 at 05:44 PM
(And the juggler with the three coloured balls.)
Posted by: expiring_frog | Thursday, 05 April 2012 at 05:46 PM
"Photography to me is about life, the world, and truth."
We all like what we like and likely aspire to creating photographs of a particular and personal style, subject matter etc, but I gotta say the above is a pretty narrow view for a site that is ostensibly about photography. In literature, it's often fiction that conveys more truths and says more about the human condition than biography. The same with most art forms. From its earliest days photography has been a pretty broad church ... to me its diversity and gamut of expression is its main attraction.
Posted by: Stephen Best | Thursday, 05 April 2012 at 08:18 PM
"Photography to me is about life, the world, and truth."
That's a gem, Mike.
Perhaps it could serve as your creed, and be placed somewhere prominent on TOP as a means of orienting readers to your approach to photography.
Posted by: Rod S. | Thursday, 05 April 2012 at 09:30 PM
A small point, but in noticing how Michael laid out the vertical images with the horizontal images, I was reminded again how there's a tyranny of the landscape format over monitors and other screens that I really don't like. I suppose there's no hope of it ever changing. At least we can have square books.
Posted by: latent_image | Friday, 06 April 2012 at 08:12 AM
I didn't say you liked it better, Mike! Just that you "selected" it. I'm probably just logic-chopping at this point.
Thank you for pointing us to this work, as always, you are a reliable source.
Posted by: Andrew Molitor | Friday, 06 April 2012 at 10:09 AM
Beautiful photos and a refreshingly simple and elegant website. I wish more photographers' websites were that clean and easy to use, including mine... (heads off to re-design website)
Posted by: Jed | Friday, 06 April 2012 at 05:29 PM
Mike -- how about, for an example, something from your own oeuvre which people liked for the wrong reasons?
Posted by: Ben Rosengart | Saturday, 07 April 2012 at 01:06 PM
Thanks Mike. Michael's site is now bookmarked.
Mike
Posted by: Mike | Wednesday, 11 April 2012 at 06:28 PM