Vernacular photography

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The term vernacular photography is used in several related senses. Each is in one way or another meant to contrast with received notions of fine-art photography. The term originated among academics and curators, but has moved into wider usage.

Current thinking about vernacular photography was anticipated as early as 1964 by John Szarkowski, director of photography at the Museum of Modern Art in New York from 1962 until 1991. Szarkowski proposed to recognize what he called “functional photography” alongside the traditional category of fine-art photography; his point was that all photography could possess the merits he sought. Examples in Szarkowski's book The Photographer’s Eye[1] and the exhibition it was based on[2] included ordinary snapshots, magazine photos, studio portraiture, and specialized documentary work by anonymous professionals. The idea was ahead of its time and did not gain much traction.

In 2000, the art historian Geoffrey Batchen touched off the current wave of interest by using the term vernacular photography to refer to “what has always been excluded from photography’s history: ordinary photographs, the ones made or bought (or sometimes bought and then made over) by everyday folk from 1839 until now, the photographs that preoccupy the home and the heart but rarely the museum or the academy.” Batchen had in mind a wide range of photographies made by or for ordinary people: daguerreotypes, ambrotypes, snapshots and snapshot albums, “panoramas of church groups, wedding pictures, formal portraits of the family dog. . . . To these examples could be added a multitude of equally neglected indigenous genres and practices, from gilt Indian albumen prints, to American painted and framed tintypes, to Mexican fotoescultura, to Nigerian ibeji images.”[3] For Batchen, then, vernacular photography can be made by professionals in certain cases and is often intentional art. The key is its marginalized and overlooked status. Where Szarkowski proposed to recognize “functional photography” for the purposes of formal comparison and appreciation, Batchen was interested in elevating “vernacular photography” in order to remedy its official neglect.

The Museum of Modern Art currently distinguishes vernacular photography from both fine-art photography and professional photography, singling out snapshots in particular: it defines the term vernacular photography as “[i]mages by amateur photographers of everyday life and subjects, commonly in the form of snapshots. The term is often used to distinguish everyday photography from fine art photography.”[4] The intention is to exclude all name photography: as worded, this “vernacular photography” would not cover a professional portraitist of “everyday life and subjects” like Mike Disfarmer or an artist of “everyday life and subjects” like Miroslav Tichý. Nor would the definition include class photos, ID photos, photobooths or much else other than snapshots.

However, the term is used so inconsistently that elsewhere the same museum reverts to a definition resembling Szarkowski’s “functional photography,” allowing vernacular photography to include all manner of non-art photographs made “for a huge range of purposes, including commercial, scientific, forensic, governmental, and personal.”[5] This definition would cover a Disfarmer but not a Tichý.

Though variably understood, “vernacular photography” has caught on as a term since Batchen used it because he has also influenced critical and curatorial thinking about the underlying photographic material. The term was devised by analogy with the terms “vernacular music” and “vernacular architecture”: under all interpretations, “vernacular photography” is intended not only to direct attention to forms that until now have been ignored by “the museum or the academy,” but also to put the focus on the social contexts in which the photos were originally made. At least in critical and curatorial use, the term largely supersedes the earlier “found photography,” which was most concerned with the eye of the finder. “Found photos” were aesthetic recontextualizations or reinterpretations by artists; both the term and the idea were modeled on the objets trouvés of Marcel Duchamp. By contrast, the current “vernacular photos” are not being taken out of context or reinterpreted in any way, and in most cases they claim no aesthetic value. They simply document some presumably overlooked aspect of social or photo history.

Vernacular photography is also to be distinguished from amateur photography. While vernacular photography is generally situated outside received art categories (though where the lines are drawn may vary), amateur photography is opposed to professional photography: it is work done for pleasure, not for profit (see Photographer).

Museums in the United States have been exhibiting snapshots since 1998.[6] Snapshots and related genres are now almost always billed and discussed as vernacular photography (John Foster’s Accidental Mysteries[7] is one of the few exceptions). Curators rarely define the term, but the core idea is clear: a formerly neglected stratum of popular photography is being considered in its original context.

The American collector Peter J. Cohen[8] currently dominates vernacular photography in U.S. museums.[9][10][11] Although European collecting has become a force in recent years, ambitious museum shows have not yet been mounted in Europe. It is not yet clear if European curators will conceptualize snapshots and related categories as vernacular photography, found photos, or something else.

Museum exhibitions[edit]

Museum exhibitions highlighting vernacular photography have included:

References[edit]

  1. ^ Szarkowski, John (1966), The Photographer’s Eye, New York: Museum of Modern Art, ISBN 978-0870705250
  2. ^ "The Photographer's Eye". Museum of Modern Art. 1964. Retrieved May 7, 2021.
  3. ^ Batchen, Geoffrey (2000), Each Wild Idea: Writing, Photography, History, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, p. 57, ISBN 978-0-262-26789-2
  4. ^ "MoMA Learning". Museum of Modern Art. Retrieved May 7, 2021.
  5. ^ "Vernacular Photography". Museum of Modern Art. Retrieved May 7, 2021.
  6. ^ "Snapshots: The Photography of Everyday Life". San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. Retrieved May 7, 2021.
  7. ^ "Exhibitions". Accidental Mysteries. Retrieved May 7, 2021.
  8. ^ "Peter J. Cohen Collection". Peter J. Cohen Collection. Retrieved May 7, 2021.
  9. ^ "Who Are the World's 12 Most Influential Photography Collectors?". June 15, 2015. Retrieved May 7, 2021.
  10. ^ Reyburn, Scott (January 9, 2019). "Finding New Value in the Work of Anonymous Shutterbugs". The New York Times. Retrieved May 7, 2021.
  11. ^ "Exhibitions". Peter J. Cohen Collection. Retrieved May 7, 2021.
  12. ^ "Exhibition: Snapshots: The Photography of Everyday Life". www.sfmoma.org. Retrieved May 5, 2021.
  13. ^ "Other Pictures: Vernacular Photographs from the Thomas Walther Collection". www.metmuseum.org. Retrieved May 3, 2021.
  14. ^ "Press Release: The Art of the American Snapshot, 1888-1978: From the Collection of Robert E. Jackson". www.nga.gov. Retrieved May 5, 2021.
  15. ^ "Exhibition: Unfinished Stories: Snapshots from the Peter J. Cohen Collection". www.mfa.org. Retrieved May 5, 2021.
  16. ^ "Representing: Vernacular Photographs of, by, and for African Americans". portlandartmuseum.us. Retrieved 2021-03-05.
  17. ^ "Press Release: Saint Louis Art Museum presents 'Poetics of the Everyday: Amateur Photography, 1890-1970.'". Saint Louis Art Museum. Retrieved 2021-03-05.
  18. ^ "Lost and Found: Stories for Vernacular Photographs". Ackland Art Museum. Retrieved 2021-03-05.

External links[edit]

Bibliography[edit]

  • Batchen, Geoffrey. Each Wild Idea: Writing, Photography, History. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2002.
  • Batchen, Geoffrey. Forget Me Not: Photography and Remembrance. New York: Princeton Architectural Press, 2004.
  • Cutshaw, Stacey McCarroll. In the Vernacular: Photography of the Everyday. Boston: Boston University Art Gallery, 2008.
  • Goranin, Näkki. American Photobooth. New York: W.W. Norton, 2008.
  • Greenough, Sarah et al. The Art of the American Snapshot, 1888–1978: From the Collection of Robert E. Jackson. Washington, DC: National Gallery of Art, 2007.
  • Hinde, John & Martin Parr (ed.). Our True Intent Is All For Your Delight: The John Hinde Butlin's Photographs. London: Chris Boot, 2003.
  • Hines, Babette. Photobooth. New York: Princeton Architectural Press, 2002.
  • Levine, Barbara. Snapshot Chronicles: Inventing the American Photo Album. New York: Princeton Architectural Press, 2006.
  • Michaelson, Mark, & Steven Kasher (eds.). Least Wanted: A Century of American Mugshots. Göttingen: Steidl & New York: Steven Kasher Gallery, 2006.
  • Morgan, Hal. Prairie Fires and Paper Moons: The American Photographic Postcard, 1900–1920. Boston: D.R. Godine, 1981.
  • Parr, Martin (ed.). Boring Postcards. London: Phaidon, 1999. (Followed by Boring Postcards USA, 2000; and Langweilige Postkarten, 2001, of Germany.)
  • Stricherz, Guy. Americans in Kodachrome. Santa Fe: Twin Palms, 2002.
  • Wolff, Letitia (ed.). Real Photo Postcards: Unbelievable Images from the Collection of Harvey Tulcensky. New York: Princeton Architectural Press, 2005.

See also[edit]


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