April 2004
In the last issue of the magazine "Photographer," a long reader letter was hosted, in which the reader complained about the magazine's low quality, while the response of the "Photographer's" director was also published. Defending his choices, he stated that the magazine is aimed at the many and not the few. Since both of them mentioned my name and because I believe that both are partly wrong, mainly in the kind of arguments they use, I will try to intervene in their disagreement.
One of the problems with photography is that there are many different kinds of photography, many varied applications, and as many directions, complicating the objectives of specialized publications. One solution is for each magazine to choose specific content for a specific audience, making it more consistent and reliable, but usually with fewer readers and advertisements. Another solution, which seems to have been adopted by the "Photographer" and the majority of photographic magazines worldwide, is to combine many different directions in the same publication, covering at least partially the demands of all. Something for amateurs and professionals alike. Plenty of digital but also some analog. Definitely colored, without forgetting black and white. Technical issues, but also artistic contemplations. Trade news, but also art news.
This recipe is not necessarily a harbinger of poor quality and low standard. And it probably does ensure a larger number of readers and advertisements. Problems begin when, within this variety, a low average quality is discerned, which, however, most often is not due to deliberate populism, but rather to the inherently low quality of the contributors and collaborators of the publications. And this is true for all magazines, not just photographic ones. Before one thinks that magazines have a low level because they target a broad audience, it is more logical and realistic to precede the thought that magazines have a low level because they reflect the level and aesthetics of their creators. Usually, there is not a sinister, greedy publisher blackmailing a multitude of pure and worthy collaborators, but rather a publisher and a few journalists whose aesthetic views and choices do not significantly depart from the publishing result.
The sympathetic correspondent of "Photographer" is fundamentally right to demand a better magazine. However, he is wrong to consider the current magazine as bad as he says. The relative evaluation can only be comparative. And there, the "Photographer" seems to fare rather well. Among European and American photographic magazines of varied content, the vast majority of which are in bad shape, the "Photographer" holds one of the better positions. In contrast, if we generally compare Greek magazines (political, artistic, general content, etc.) with their foreign counterparts, we must sadly admit that we claim one of the qualitatively lower positions. Something that, as mentioned, does not happen with the "Photographer." My presence in the magazine's pages, whether through more or fewer words, proves both my trust in the magazine and my hope for its improvement. Also, I do not believe that thick, glossy, and expensive paper is a necessary condition for a magazine's good quality. There are wonderful and very fine papers that allow the reproduction of photographs, and after all, a magazine is not a monograph or an art publication but more an "information tool." If the thin paper contributes to its survival, then it is rightly used. As for the graphic aesthetics of "Photographer," even I, who tend to reject the majority of graphic proposals in printed magazines as useless acrobatics, rank the graphic choices of "Photographer" among the rather milder ones.
However, here I stop defending the magazine and countering the reader's pessimism, to address the response of my dear director of "Photographer," with which I disagree in something trivial, but unfortunately also in something very substantial. The trivial refers to the reasons for discontinuing the publication of "Photo Space," which I had the initiative and responsibility for publishing. The readers and the few advertisements were enough to cover its financial needs. The readership was about one-fourth of that of "Photographer" before "Kathimerini." Not a bad performance for a magazine printed in one-fifth of "Photographer's" copies. The number of advertisements was stable, given that it was based on the goodwill of friendly representatives. And it should be noted that no serious effort was made to seek new advertisements or to aim for fuller distribution. The main reason for discontinuation was primarily my personal fatigue (since the publication was primarily based on my work) and possibly the gradual decrease in my initial enthusiasm.
What surprises me, and at the same time, I fundamentally disagree with the director's response, is the clear Manichaean (and may I dare say, a bit ironic?) distinction between five hundred intellectual ("patrician") readers, whom he opposes to eighty thousand more simplistic, and less demanding ("plebeian") readers, who, according to him, should monopolize the magazine's interest. The distinction is unfair to both categories. And ultimately unfair to the magazine itself, since the publisher's remarks about the ideal publication seem correct observations for any magazine ("in-depth analyses, nude but artistic, simple pagination, strict tests, politically correct language"). This unfortunate wording, obviously justified by the experienced director's anxiety to reconcile the many and various comments that may be addressed to him, paradoxically leads to the conclusion that the magazine includes shallow analyses, non-artistic nudity, baroque pagination, foot tests, and inappropriate language, and that these qualities are necessary to approach the eighty thousand readers. Obviously, this conclusion is not true.
Going even further, since the above large number refers to the readers of "Kathimerini," and the lone older "Photographer" did not have such resonance and large circulation, we must logically conclude that the readers of this respectable and reliable newspaper collectively belong to the intellectually "inferior" category of readers and that the magazine is designed and compiled not with quality in mind, but with the least common denominator of non-quality demands of a silent majority, always making sure to exclude themselves. I am absolutely sure that none of this is true.
And I am equally sure that the editors of the magazine do what they think is qualitatively better, and if sometimes they fail and fall short of their goals, this is more likely due to their wrong choices or even ignorance or inability, (something that can happen to all of us), rather than something that would constitute an insult to the readers: the deliberate reduction of quality to increase circulation, based on an arbitrary and dangerous argument that we know what others want, when we classify them (to control them) in a convenient intellectual ghetto.
For at least twenty years, I have been teaching seminars on artistic photography, and their content has been criticized by some as overly "intellectual" (something that, of course, is only considered derogatory in our country). Yet I always address a very broad audience that responds extremely positively with its dense attendance and complimentary comments. And this audience comes from the eighty thousand, not from the five hundred, because if the opposite were true, I would have long been led to a professional dead end. It would also be tragic if I believed that the rigor and quality required out of respect for art and teaching (photographic or otherwise) are privileges of a handful of marginal individuals.
On the contrary, I consider it a significant challenge for "Photographer," and for any other magazine, to attract readers through accessible but always tasteful content, while concurrently contributing to the improvement and education of this audience. If instead, we accept that we will attract more readers the more simplistic and naive, or provocative and impressive, the content we publish, then there is no end to this decline.
When I teach, or when I write an article for "Photographer," I don't have in mind neither the five hundred nor the eighty thousand. But that one, the unknown, who, coming from any of the above groups, is able to take a step towards higher quality. And I am convinced that these individuals are very numerous.
Plato Rivellis