A New York Times review by Virginia Heffernan comments on the development of a so-called Flickr aesthetic.
There is something to this, for better or for worse. Clearly, certain types of photographs that “work” on photographic social networking sites like Flickr (often images that work well in thumbnail-sized electronic version, presented by photographers who are adept at the social networking business) are often quite different from images that might work as prints in a gallery or other venue.
I found one interesting irony in the article. The author seems to describe the Flickr photography in somewhat condescending terms, often suggesting – and not always without reason – that the photographers are naive. The irony is that, for all of the author’s knowledge of artistic issues, she seems equally naive about several aspects of the Flickr phenomenon, digital photography and post-processing, and other more modern developments.
