Witkin, “The Kiss, New Mexico’, 1982

#somereallygoodones, #joelpeterwitkin, #thekiss

Taste is subjective. It is a combination of experience and instinct and intuition. Looking and seeing involve all the senses. It is revealing that the root of taste is the Latin for touch, tangere. It seems as much about what you physically touch as what psychically touches you.

Here is a joke. Two cannibals are eating a clown. One turns to the other and says “Does this taste funny to you?”

That is photographer Joel-Peter Witkin’s favorite. One could argue that Witkin’s work is indeed an acquired taste. It is rough and tough stuff.

I think it is valuable to have a sense of your own taste when it comes to looking at photographs. I also think it is important to challenge your taste. That will enhance your pleasure of looking by enlarging the investigation.

Taste is one of the senses along with sight, sound, smell and touch, but, in this conversation, it more broadly describes how we respond to images and whether we find them pleasing or not. I would describe my own visual taste as my being drawn to simple, often formal, uncrowded works with a strong vertical center. I know that because I’ve been looking for a long time and I figured it out. You can do the same.

Why? This will energize your looking; you’ll become even more responsive, stimulated by work you find exciting and articulate when sharing your ideas and feelings. This is not to say that your taste ought to be for the beautiful. I am drawn to difficult, dark and challenging work including Mr. Witkin’s. Like taste, beauty is relative.

Here is a classic Witkin, “The Kiss, New Mexico’, 1982. It is a portrait of two sides of the head of one man; the image is not manipulated. It is printed handsomely. And it hits you in the solar plexus. It even looks like a fist. Visceral impact is important to me. I like reacting strongly. It reminds me to see. “The Kiss” is a vignette. The pair of half faces looms out of darkness; it comes into focus in several ways — in your eye and in your mind. It challenges you.

It has beauty. It is a great photograph for me rather than a good one because it really does assail and assure my taste.

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