室長週報 58 技術服務內容 by Walker Evans

上週共讀會看到美國攝影名家 Walker Evans 的專訪文，內容有一段談及攝影技術的段落，我覺得講得很精確，在這邊翻譯給大家（原文置底）：

「Ansel Adams 以及 Paul Stand 都是非常出色的技術人員，他們有時展現自己的方式，有點『太出色了』。

他們用相機做出完美的事情，我們看了之後會說『哦！』和『啊，拍太好了吧！』然而，我們卻無法清楚地理解他們照片想表達的內容。

就像在排版和印刷一樣，技術不應該束縛拿著相機的人，應該透過相機傳達出一些信息，而不是僅僅通過技術本身。你的攝影技術，都該為了表達情感、訊息和觀點鎖服務。

於此，相機應是僕人的角色，而這需要技巧、知識和技術能力，才能讓人欣賞作品時，發現你要傳遞的內容，而不是看見『技術很好』的部分。」

Walker Evans 的意思是：別讓人發現你技術高超，讓人被你的觀點吸引！

這本 1981 年出版的《Photography in Print: Writings from 1816 to the Present》出乎意料的顛覆了很多我對攝影名家的刻板印象，甚至補足了非常多攝影史沒有記載、但非常有意義的軼事。

這本是逛 Amazon 發現的寶藏書，目前只能從美國訂實體書，或是從網路資源看電子掃描版（請見第二個連結）。

Excerpt:

For example, both Ansel Adams and Paul Strand are really great technicians. They sometimes show they're too great. They do the perfect thing with the camera, and you say ohh and ahh, how perfect.

Then you don't get their content clearly enough, however. As in typography and printing, technique shouldn't arrest you. Something should be said through it, not by it. Your mood and message and point have to come through as well as possible. Your technique should be made to serve that, kept in place, as a servant to that purpose. That does require skill, knowledge and technical ability, and you have to have done the work in order to make it not show. --- Leslie Katz, An interview with Walker Evans, 1971