Tate Modern’s new exhibition perhaps poses the question of whether in the age of the camera, we need artists, but there is no definitive answer, just more questions.
And Tate is not asking whether one is better than the other, but is showing the symbiotic relationship between the two.
Many of the 20th century’s finest artists are included and all with something to say about their connection with photography. Warhol used photographs perhaps more than a brush, and it may have been quite some time since Hockney and his camera last stood before an easel.
Yes, some iconic photos will catch a moment in time that says so much more than the actual image depicts, just as many paintings do. Dorothea Lange’s Migrant Mother became the face of every farmer and family ruined by weather and political decisions in 1930s America, while Lucian Freud’s paintings of unnamed people placed the human form front and centre, sometimes with just the artist’s tools between the sitter and the viewer to eliminate any chance of a backstory, but to show that this was a painting and nothing else.
Francis Bacon, and Pablo Picasso, on the other hand, tried to show their subjects from more than one angle in one painting, thereby making each piece of art more than a moment in time. Bacon does not hide the fact that his Three Studies for Portrait of Lucian Freud were done from photographs.
A photograph cannot reference historical facts or iconic like art does when you see artists’ influences in past Masters unless it has been studiously set out to tell a specific story. Jeff Wall’s rather fantastic A Sudden Gust of Wind is a well-planned tableau that gives the impression the photographer magically caught the scene by chance.
So, yes, there is very obviously a close relationship between contemporary art and photography, but the real question is if it was ever disputed.
Capturing the Moment seems to be a reason to get some great artwork together in one place, and I am all for that.
Tate Modern, Bankside, SE1 9TG until January 28th. Times: Open daily 10.00–18.00. Admission: £20, £19.
Booking: www.tate.org.uk
