Your response is inspiring. Thank you for pointing out these examples. I’m about to do my first gallery exhibit — nightlife photos that I shot mostly under contract from the promoters and artists involved in the shows. It will be my first time dipping my toes into the art market. I’m glad to hear stories of other photographers who have paved the way.

Editorial also has restrictions. If you are shooting for an established magazine there are storylines that need to be followed, layouts to follow a, publicists to negotiate with before, during and after the shoot(if you are shooting a celebrity),formulas to follow. When shooting cover for Marie Claire for example one of our photographers was told what color background to use as the boys upstairs have a chart that shows the covers with red backgrounds sell the most. “Red pops off the stand” and “big smiles with lots of teeth”. If you are shooting for Flaunt, POP, 10, etc. you are paying to be published and often your submission will be rejected.

Michael Kenna is a perfect example of an art photographer who’s has been hired to recreate his work for the commercial world http://www.michaelkenna.net/html/ads/index.html Michael was a very successful art photographer before he ever did a commercial assignment.

Others that come to mind are Jill Greenberg http://www.manipulator.com . Jill, whom we had the pleasure of representing, has a successful commercial career and well as a blossoming art career. Jill first shot a monkey for a Target ad and became obsesed with them. On her own dime and time she photographed monkeys, apes and primates. http://www.faheykleingallery.com/featured_artists/greenberg/pers_page/greenberg_frames.htm The result was a book that has sold well and many print sales. We were able to capitalize from the publicity as she was awarded jobs by ad agencies to shoot all sorts of animals.

Martin Schoeller, Larry Fink http://www.billcharles.com/fink/larryfink_1.htm , Bruce Gilden, Rodney Smith http://www.rodneysmith.com/portfolio.php , Howard Schatz http://www.howardschatz.com/ are a few other whom have done well in both markets.

In response to sinuhe

It would be nice to be able to open a gallery and display work and not be concerned about making sales. Of course this is a commercial endeavor. What business isn’t? I hope to be able to showcase work of young talent and artists whom have not exhibited. Nothing would please me more than an artists we represent at bond street gallery getting a commercial project to shoot in his or her style or to have one of my commercial artists get inspired to pick up their camera without out getting paid to do so.

Thanks,

Bruce

What follows is a generalization and of course does not apply to all gallerists or fine artists. My experience with the fine art scene, photo or otherwise, is that it is as commercial as the ad world but lacks the honesty and predictability of sound business practice.

Creative Directors and Art Directors know what they are looking for in a photographer when they call in books and then hire a photog. They have a certain taste, and if your work matches it, they let you shoot the pack shots of Huggies or the “woman using the ATM” shot for a BofA ad. In the best of circumstances, you work as a team and produce something stunning. The hallmark of the ad shoot is its intense honesty: the photo, while stylized, beautiful and impecable, is designed to sell clothes/Huggies or financial services.

Gallerists, on the otherhand, are stumped. They don’t trust their own taste but they need to fill those white walls so they can move product. There are too few great critics left that have the influence to guide photographers in their carreers and gallerists in their selections. Jen Bekman is so stumped she has a competition judged by ex dot com types and Jorg Colberg to choose for her. Alec Soth would still be in Minnasota listening to Purple Rain were it not for an influential critic, same with Shore, Eggelston et al. Now there are no great critics, no real centers of gravity in this poverty that is the Web 2.0 world. In other words, there are no upper echelon gate keepers, but meerly the individual gallerists trying to make a buck. Thus they let in what they think can sell, and as business people they look at comparable sales (comps). What sold last year? What images sell? This is why so much of the fine art photography in galleries seems so bloodless and familier, and why they look to sexy/slick editorial work to pay their rent. For example, I see the same stuff over and over again: The PoMo objective portrait is nice, but Katherine Opie was doing this in the 80’s, followed by Dykstra and hundreds of others (I’m sorry Jorg C., The PoMo objective portrait IS boring and the Cat Cahnning Avedon portrait IS a better portrait). The giant urban landscape/industrial digi print of modernist repitition and ruin? The Beckers were doing these things for way too long, and just because the shots are of Chinese cities and in color doesn’t really make them different. And Crewdson’s versions of Twin Peaks are laughable in their “psychoanalytical” shallowness, sort of the white suburban arty high school kid’s Phillip Lorca diCorcia. Its all nice work, but I’ve seen it all before.

All this is to say that commercial and editorial work in a gallery is just fine if not better than most of the crap coming out of SVA. I hope the gallery does well!

Lately I have been practicing the art of saying “no” to jobs that don’t fit my vision for self-expression. I have decided not to compromise my ideas about what sort of photographs I want to make in order to get one more paycheck. I’m lucky enough though that I have buyers waiting to license whatever photos I crank out. Many photographers are not in that position, so maybe it’s harder for them to say “no” to paying work.

On the other hand, after virtually pioneering the market for paying nightlife photography in Salt Lake City (I don’t know of anybody before me who has made a living here taking photos at raves and EDM nightlife events, but I know of many who tried and gave up), I am of the firm opinion that there are buyers out there for every niche.

I think the message for photographers is, do what you love, and then do what it takes to sell it, whether that means fine art prints, commercial work, stock sales… whatever allows you to follow your muse.

Why try and get complicated with it’s meaning?

This, I like !

I look forward to seeing the Feinstein work in March.