Well despite their posts I remained cordial. I thought they took offence because I pointed out that Antony's posts about Vestal and also Fred Picker needed some context, neither have had work published or exhibited in the UK and predate the Internet, and Fred Picker's Zone VI products were never exported to Europe.
Only a few older UK photographers here who read some of the US magazines where Vestal & Picker had articles, and Zone VI advertised, wwould know who they were. Vestal was a better writer than his photographs portray, but to me they are as anti the traditions of AA, Minor White, the Weston, and others, as the later New Topographers.
The way iread the quote -
I prefer prints that show no effort to those that trumpet "difficult!" or "masterpiece!" at the viewer. Those are distractions. They are also good for sales to collectors - one reason for me to stay out of the print business. Many dealers, collectors, curators, and other dilettantes have a weakness for spectacular prints and can't see good prints that aren't noisy. If I worked to please them, I'd be falsifying and my work would be no good.
What you decide to do is up to you, of course; but anxiety to shine is a trap that catches too many talented people and leads them to accomplish less than they might. You deserve to be warned of this.*
Antony then mentioned Fay Godwin, she had a a quiet mastery of technique, as there is with John Blakemore, John Davies etc.
I agree with
@David M about the unrealism of some of AA images (it's only a few) Half Dome for instance with it's over-use of a red filter, and to me that's what Vestal is alluing to Moonrise as well.
Vestal is talking about technique not getting in the way of image making.
@David M and
@Alan Clark have both seen how John Blakemore works and like myself will have seen how simply he explains using the Zone System practically and how quickly people pick it up from him. I taught myself the ZS from AA's The Negative, and then that was re-inforced by a workshop with Peter Cattrel who's technique is.was the same as John Blakemore and also Fay Godwin.
Some make the Zone System mystical, others over technical, but in reality it's a technique taht goes back to the early days of photography - Expose for the shadows and Develop for the Highlight. All the Zone System does is allow fast meter readings to determing if you need to make chaes to exposure via EI and development time. It doesn't get in the way of image making
I think you have to see and compare the work of John Blakeore, John Davies, Thomas Joshua Cooper, Linda O'Connor, Olivia Parker, and Minor White, they all move on from the way Ansel Adams worked.
In musical term you can copy or move on, Gary Moore covered Peter Green's Fleetwood Mac sons note perfec and added nothing of himself and I found that a faining in a superb guitarist (I saw him live in Skid Row and Colessium 2), where as John Lee Hooker took Jimi Hendrix's Red House back to it's raw African roots with his ow excellent interpretation, there's plento of other examples but maybe the best is Ewan McColl - The First Time I Saw Her Face, written for Peggy Seeger, compare the original to the Whitney Houston version. It's similar to the way AA used the ZS to a more polished mastery of John Blakemore.
My point is we learn from our own and others experiences, so Antony claiming I was calling Ansel Adams a hack is to misunderstand that with some years of evolution and experience people like John Blakemore are using the Zone Systyem in ways Ansel Adams etc could not have imagined, building on a their legacy from the past.
I have to add that I was very fortunate to buy a copy of John Blakemore's book "Photographs 1955 - 2010" published by Dewi Lewis, it's superbly printed, I think it's still available at £75 + postage etc, mine's second hand but mint. I'm also lucky to have bought a couple of Blakemore's prints and he sent me a small one as a Christmas gift a few years ago.
Where Antony fell down was his lack of ability to go check for himself, and his lack of openess.
Ian