Michael Fried's modernist theory of photography

Vered Maimon*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalReview articlepeer-review

10 Scopus citations

Abstract

This essay critically analyses Michael Fried's book Why Photography Matters as Art as Never Before. It examines the relevance of Fried's categories of absorption and theatricality to contemporary photography and his assumption that photography is an inherently modernist art. In his book Fried explains the shift to large-scale colour photographs in the 1980s as signalling a return to problems of beholding, which dominated painting since the 1750s and 1760s. In contrast, this essay argues that this shift reveals the importance of the legacy of conceptualism and minimalism to recent photography and, in particular, the role of the conceptual 'document' within contemporary artistic practices.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)387-395
Number of pages9
JournalHistory of Photography
Volume34
Issue number4
DOIs
StatePublished - Nov 2010

Keywords

  • Jeff Wall (1946-)
  • Medium specificity
  • Michael Fried (1939-)
  • Photography theory
  • Roland Barthes (1915-80)
  • Theatricality
  • Thomas Ruff (1958-)

Fingerprint

Dive into the research topics of 'Michael Fried's modernist theory of photography'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

Cite this