Smiley smiles :) :)

The other night I spoke with Maansi, a girl from my dorm who I met during welcome week.  She said I should check out an article in the Style section of last Wednesday's New York Times because it was about Patrick McMullan, a photographer whose work reminded her of photos I showed her at the beginning of last semester. 

If I remember, I first showed her some of the work I made at various parties in my final year of high school. 

© Jonno Rattman

© Jonno Rattman

She seemed genuinely interested so I mentioned that I study photography with Larry Fink and pulled out my copy of "Social Graces."  We leafed through the book; we talked; she left.  We made only chitchat on the occasions when we ran into each other--until our conversation last Thursday night.

When I got back to my room I immediately dove into the article she referenced.  But I was struck by the distance I felt from McMullan's work.  It elicits superficial smiles rather than introspection.

©Patrick McMullan

Like any number of contemporary photographers, McMullan professes disdain for technical prowess.  (I understand the spurn: who really needs to know their camera if they can produce compelling images without that knowledge?)  In an interview with the Times he said, “I could be a better photographer, but I’ve also gotten caught in running a business, and almost, if you can get this as a joke, being Patrick McMullan and all that means.”  As a graduate from the business school at NYU, McMullan is a good businessman; one who understands that his audience does not care about compelling images.  He serves an audience that pays to be seen; one that pays for generic blondes smiling at the camera. 

© Patrick McMullan

McMullan sets up photo opportunities rather than being an opportunistic paparazzo (the second category of party photographer the article outlines).  But this limited and categorical approach reveals only McMullan's bowdlerized view of one specific, artificial social dynamic.  It removes the possibility of finding and capturing nuanced dramas.  In contrast, Fink's work highlights the sly smile and the hand's caress that may transport us into an exploratory realm where we recognize the essences of human interaction. 

© Larry Fink

© Larry Fink

In an article recently published in Ag, The International Quarterly Journal
of Photographic Art & Practice, Bill Lowenburg (one of my dearest mentors) allows us to glean an insider's view into Fink's visual exploration of a "Night at the Met."  We find that Fink consistently eschews the practices of photographers like McMullan; he does not direct his subjects, instead he is intuitively drawn to off-the-cuff, natural arrangements. 

© Larry Fink

Lowenburg writes, "Some of the guests beg him to take their picture, grabbing one another, grinning and posing.  He refuses.  Deflated, they seek out the other photographers in attendance, both pro and amateur, who seem happy to oblige."

It is precisely McCullan's grinning and posing subjects that deter our engagement with the photograph; their pearly whites are impassible palisades which prevent us from probing into their personhood.  By contrast Fink slips in with sub rosa ease, making a picture before his subject can ham it up for the camera.

© Larry Fink

"'Come on, take the real picture now,' a 20-something redhead giggles, clutching the arm of her crew-cut date after Larry has popped his flash into the middle of their whispered conversation.

'I just did,' he replies, and rolls on."