Art And Photography

Walk through any art museum in Toronto, and you may notice something interesting

about the sudden transformation that art underwent at the turn of the last century. The difference is not subtle. Older art, especially paintings, strives for realism: Portraits are as identical to their subjects as the artists skills and manners would allow, and landscapes do their best to capture the beauty and awe of a natural plane that most viewers will never see. Then, abruptly, art became abstract. Artists no longer struggled to paint the world the way it was. In fact, they suddenly demonstrated a jarring disregard for color, texture, or any effort to make their work look like the real thing. Why is this?

It is important to remember when looking at earlier art, that it did not just exist to be beautiful. That was one of its major purposes, of course, but art had deeper applications. It was used to tell stories, and sometimes these stories were about real people. Without photography, the wealthy turned to painters to have their portraits made. Wealthy socialites in Toronto commissioned painters for portraits of themselves and their families. Then, just before the turn of the century, they stopped, favoring photographers with their business instead.

It may not at first be obvious as to why photography changed art in such a drastic way. After all, realistic art still has an aesthetic appeal that some people appreciate over the abstract. However, artists found themselves freed from the responsibility of creating visual documentation of the world for the first time. This left some at a loss. Others fully embraced the opportunities that photography opened up. When the world wars happened, leaving people despondent and cynical, abstract art exploded as a movement. This is where we get what we think of as modern or contemporary art.

Photography picked up where art had left off. Instead of canvas and paint, people captured the world on film. Photography had improved enough that it was now feasible to take portraits and landscapes with film instead of paint. During the American Civil War, it was a photographer and not an artist who followed President Lincoln around and captured photographs of the war. In the Victorian era, people sought out photography for their family portraits. Photography provided reliable documentation of people, places, and events in a way that painting never could.

Today, we see the lingering impact of photography in art. Artists are still free to be abstract, now that they are unconfined by the task of documenting the world as it is. Photography as a medium can be found in Toronto photography and art galleries, as well, but it now carries the burden previously held by artists. At important events, it will be the photographers capturing images to share with the world. When a new person is elected into the government, a new species is discovered or a baby is born, photography will ultimately be chosen to immortalize them.

by: Molly larzelere

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