Richard Gordon

Muse at the Manor 2000, Vancouver BC, Canada
FotoFest 2000, Houston TX, USA
FotoFest 2004, Houston TX USA

When Is It Art?



Art has been defined as “selective emphasis for the purpose of communicating ideas, thoughts and feelings.” For me, art is about action. Art is in the doing. It’s a combination of conscious and unconscious choices. Capturing the raw image itself is more of an instinctive preference, but the editing process is a series of deliberate selections. They say you find your movie on the cutting room floor. Since my photos are developed to CD, I discover my pictures on the computer screen as I manipulate the elements of that initial impression to complete my vision. That’s art as action. Art as verb.

But almost everyone takes photos and, obviously, we wouldn’t call all of them works of art. So if we’re asking, ‘When can a specific photo be designated as Art?’ … well, that’s Art as a label. Art as noun. And that involves more than just the artist.

Art is a creative communication process. When I present my photographs this interactive process continues as the audience responds to what they observe. I love listening to people who are looking at my pictures, hearing the stories they conceive inspired by what they are seeing. It’s rarely anything that I have consciously positioned in my work, but it stirs their imagination and they find themselves responding to and, in a sense, completing the piece in their own mind. My photography becomes Art when it stimulates the creativity that resides in each member of the audience - when they begin to see reality in a new way - when they bring this new reality to my work. ‘Art’ as a label is the result of public consensus, but ‘art’ as a communication process happens for me each time one of my photographs inspires creativity in an individual.

When I’m really in the groove, I’m seeing pictures everywhere. I’m seeing them in tiny crooks and alleys. And that’s where I really love to acquire images. I love to discover them in little alcoves that you normally just ignore and go on by. But there’s structure and beauty and art in all these places. There’s light and shadow and line and form. Truth can be provided in a moment; beauty can be found in a tiny corner of a room. That’s what I try to capture … the beauty of small moments, the play of light and shadow. All you have to do is see it. So, if I’m an artist in any way, it’s in the ability to see those opportunities. Then the real pleasure is in sharing what I see with others, touching the creativity inherent within them, and thereby completing my work in a unique way.


Richard Gordon