Is Photography Art?

Sometimes I think a monkey would do a better job with a camera. But on the other hand I think, people should open their minds a little more to appreciate true art. What is art? Is it something that kindles some kind of emotion in others? What if it brings joy to others?

The other day we found this gorgeous field stretching out for a few miles carpeted with yellow flowers. My heart whooped with joy and I insisted on getting there on the week-end for a picture shoot.
“I will put this up on Facebook!” I cried. Thrilled at my unique idea, we went there for our picture shoot. Saturday morning, I found the place jam-packed with Facebook-profile-picture-takers. People I tell you! Tut! Tut!

When the daughter was much younger, I used to swing her around me really fast. We have a beautiful picture on the Hawaiian coasts doing this.I wanted a similar one of me throwing my son up in the air and catching him. I had to throw and catch a few times before we got this picture. But I totally loved it, and promptly made it my profile pic on Faceb.

The daughter is tall for her age and has outgrown the swinging-by-mother stage, but believes that her father, the hero, can still catch her as she jumps in the air. I tried telling her that she is too old for that, to which she says, “But appa is really strong, and I can jump! He doesn’t have to throw me.” Put something like that out to the husband and he can’t resist. He summons up his imaginary biceps and steps forth gallantly to make her jump and catch her. I gingerly took the camera, aware that I can’t take the same number of chances he took to get a good picture.

I suppose this happens to wildlife photographers all the time. They lie waiting for the lion to jump, and the lion roars and skips instead. My feelings were similar. What is my lioness skipped?

I focussed and refocused yelling “1-2-3” loud enough for horses in neighboring fields to jump. They did a marvelous job and she jumped- much higher than I expected and got this picture.

I totally blame it on her. I mean I had my camera focussed for where I thought she was going to jump and she shot past it. Whose fault is that really?

My school did a good job on me with its motto: “Never Give In”. So what if I got one bad picture? I plowed on. This time the strong man wanted a portrait. I attempted to truly give him the picture of a lifetime. I’ve always wondered why photographers show off about blurring certain objects and making others sharper. How hard can it be? See?

Like the daughter kindly pointed out, even the houses in the far background are sharp. I challenged the husband to take a picture of me like that and he couldn’t. I believe I took the harder picture. He was a bit upset initially, but the bad pictures had all of us laughing (quite heartily I might add) at my expense – so that is true art in my opinion. Go on…’Like’ my pictures please.