Photographic artists don’t conform

I listened to a podcast yesterday where the host was talking about photographers, especially fine art photographers, conforming to social media likes. We all enjoy being liked. We enjoy having our work liked by others but does that mean we have to conform as an artist to the standards set by social media or the world at large? I’d like to think no, we should not conform.

I’ll admit, that I have started to conform to the common standards of the photographic community, again. Do we conform to what others believe just to get others to like our work? Do we conform to what others believe to generate interest or hope others will buy our work? Do you create the photographic art you want and to hell with what others think? These are rhetorical questions for me and I hope they get you to think about whether you’re conforming just because.

There was a time I used to do all sorts of effects on photographs, but I stopped. Some of the reasons I stopped is that the work was often met with many negative responses talking about overprocessing, non-realistic, and more. I was being forced to conform to the standards of the photographic “experts”. I will admit some of the early pieces, most of which I no longer have in a file.

I’ve thought about this topic before. We’re taught to conform from childhood. Stand in line, walk correctly, and color inside the lines. There are some things we should conform to societal standards as a matter of rule such as we can’t just walk outside naked or we can’t just walk to the front of the line, but in terms of creativity conforming to the standards, especially in the photographic community, hampers creativity. We are told to emulate Chase Jarvis, Annie Leibovitz, Zack Arias, and others. We are rarely told to emulate the styles of Jerry Uelsmann or other surrealist photographers. Should we even work to emulate the style of others or just create? Can’t we do both? Create some work and then follow the lead of other more traditional photographers. I’m still pondering the answer but I’m more inclined to say I’m going to do the latter. Create what I feel with some things and then work in a more traditional style on other things. I’m going to become a nonconformist in my art.