Dead Pigeon's Society.

Image copyright Mark Page

This is a follow on from the last 3 posts, and it goes like so.

I'll be looking through a photographers portfolio, traditional documentary work usually about something "urban" by fantastic artists, powerful thought provoking work, original takes on gritty realism and then dunk like one bum note struck by an otherwise flawless Halle Orchestra an image of a dead pigeon appears. Why are photographers of our inner cities so prone to drop in an image of the poor dead birdy? Is it because in our sanitised society it's our only experience of raw death? Is it because it's an easy metaphor for so much that's wrong, of rot, filth etc?

And so it's there, another big screaming (or perhaps cooing) photo cliche,

But wait just a mo, this one is different than the 3 previous listings. This is one born out of accident out of not enough thought, out of taking your eye off the ball, at worst out of laziness.

It's different than the other cliches below and here. They are born out of cynicism, out of a desire to produce what the art establishment tells folk is good and therefore sells. Nothing more than pointless copies that have nothing to say and that end up devaluing the work of the artist who had the original thought, and in turn the art of photography as a whole.

So I accept that there maybe "no such thing as an original thought" we can all have "Dead pigeon" moments but as far as the Cliche crew and purveyor's of taste go, you're just fucking knobs.....