Artistic Philosophy

Many artists will vehemently protest that photography is not art.  “Any monkey can pick up a camera and press a button.”  They say.

While the previous statement is true, it is equally as true that any monkey can pick up a brush and paint.  Don’t believe me?  Below are two paintings, one is by legendary painter Jackson Pollock and the other is a painting by Congo the chimpanzee.  See if you can connect the correct painting to its respective artist.  It’s okay, I can way.

If you guessed that number one was Jackson Pollock, you’d be wrong; that would be a work by Congo.  Apes aren’t the only animal painters, we have

Jojo the elephant.

Maggie the sea lion.

Pinto the miniature pig.

And, Cholla the horse.

Did you notice something, none of the last four even had hands, yet they created paintings which sell for hundreds or thousands of dollars.

Let’s see one of them hold a camera and press the shutter button.

Now I am not trying to start a war between artists, quite the contrary.  I just want artists in other disiplines to recognize that photographers can be artist.   But even I can admit that there is a clear difference between a family vacation photo,

and

Art.