[monochrome]

Yes, shooting the photos in questions is creepy and breaks what some people consider "social propriety, and accepted norms of decency and expectations of privacy." That does not change the fact that technically it is not illegal.

Well, to soften my tone and to respond to the intent of the other posters, who have valid opinions (with which I clearly disagree), though I cited the controlling instance of a search warrant, what I believe is that if an agent of the government may not, I and we should not and I would not as a matter of personal character and choice. Since governments aren't people (yet they are made of people), we are compelled to offer agents discreet guidelines. Members of societies also are subject to social mores (Rules) and religious guidelines (much as we hate to discuss them - even if they are only the Four Noble Truths).

I believe this question falls under Social Mores, AKA Good Behavior.

IMHO I do indeed have an expectation that a person voluntarily will choose not look through my window though the drapes are open. I expect my neighbor will behave well, according to a commonly understood set of good and bad behaviors. If we don't have those we border on anarchy.

I think the point of the photographer's exercise is similar to the classic physics problem in which merely observing.the action of a particle alters the state of the particle. Asking permission of the subject to be photographed changes the subject's behavior and removes the natural (voyeuristic) benefit of the secret shot, spoiling the photograph's "capture." I also believe the photographer intends to titilate the viewer, intentionally violating, if you will, that commonly understood set of good behaviors.

That being the case, having thought of the concept, I would have hoped the photographer had simply decided to pass on the opportunity to actually take the photographs.

IMO, society is built on millions of decisions not to perform an action as much as it is built on actions themselves.

[monochrome]

Just my 0.02, I don't see any problem with what the photographer has done. I do think that if this building and it's residents were middle to lower class americans, we would have never heard about this. The bourgeois attitude emanating from the residents reeks.

Isn't that part of (maybe most of) the point of the exercise? - to say to the bourgeois 1%, "We're going to take away all the little priviledges you've reserved for yourselves - the expectation that no one can see in your fancy glass building and you can be private there - and expose you to all the travails of life in the 99%"? It isn't art so much as it is a vengeful taking.

Pretty much the same things my wife's grandparents did and thought in the 20's and 30's in London (Bloomsbury) and Paris (Left Bank), as they lived on income from their trust funds and writings, and practiced a sybaritic lifestyle totally free of conventional social norms imposed on the middle and lower classes by society. Except the imposition has come full-circle now - the lower and middle classes are imposing thier lack of social norms on the bourgois.

Been there. Done that. In the end it didn't work.

And my wife has the photographs to prove it.

[em-tx]

Just for arguments sake, let's say someone lived in a very rural place with no close neighbors, and felt no need for curtains, would it be OK to hide in a forest or on a ridge top and take photos of them inside their house with a 500mm lens? Or do they have a more reasonable expectation of privacy than someone in NYC?

I think if you you live in remote countryside in your own house having blinds open you have a very little risk that someone pulls the glass and make photographs of you inside. I think the message is, that you want to be alone - enjoy privacy. That's why you live there.

If you live in middle of mega - city (this one even serving as symbol of freedom and liberalism), which anyway mean sharing the space and views by default and place yourself living in glass cube by will - since that places cost a bit of money -you are by default showing your private life and making into public affair.

If someone makes art and social statement out of it, I think its a good think. If it cause controversy, that's great, casue it makes people think and revaluate. That's what fuels evolution of human kind.

[tclausen]

The important thing when you go by the law here in Sweden is that it is from your physical position. It doesn't matter how long the lens is, the same if you set it up on remote.

In short:
- If you shoot from your location the lens specs doesn't matter, it's legal in most cases.
- If you set it up on the remote, without being on the location without a permit the lens specs doesn't matter, it's illegal in most cases.

As shown earlier in the thread even photographers like Henri Cartier-Bresson took pics of people sleeping, children playing, through windows and other "private" moments people here and at other places now call immoral to take pics of. Isn't that hypocritical? Why are they okay then?
Don't forget that those pics have been seen by millions so it's not the quick spreading of "internet world" that's the problem, I doubt that 1 000 000 people visits my Facebook page.

Well, truth be told, HCBs photos - for all the value they have artistically - really do have an amazing amount creepy-peeper shots that, yes, I consider if not immoral then at least inappropriate.

[em-tx]

I assume that you can take a candid photo and put it in a frame on your wall at home, without any problem.

As I am given to understand it, though, if you want to use the candid in a newspaper, or sell it as art, or you want to put it on (say) the window still so that it can be seen from the outside of the house, and IF the people in the picture can be recognized, then you /will/ need to stop and ask for legal consent.

In French media, you will see photos (and film, for TV) with faces and license plates blurred all the time. That's when they've not been able (or, not bothered) to ask for legal consent.

I'm not French....and there's a lot of the French legal stuff that's pure BS to me. But, frankly, I like that law/principle: if somebody is to make money off of my image, or otherwise benefit from it, it should be ME. Just as it also should be me to decide if /my/ image is used in one way or another.



And, your point with the above paragraph is what, exactly?

Its a little too much of assumptions and bit of offense on your side. I do not shoot candits first of all.

I think if someone makes money of your face - or recogniseably and unmistaklly you, you should be rewarded. If someone makes a picture of your hand - normal hand and make art of it, you can just feel lucky that is your hand. Its not about you at all, mate.

Last paragraph is actually to remind that some of this presumptions and assumptions you quoted are actually very same totalitarian regimes extensively use or at least they promote suspicions, mistrust rather than promoting coexistence and open society. I suppose that one was simple to guess. I know tragedies and fatalities it produced.

Here is something about photography I found on Ken Rockwell site, whom I respect much and I think he has a point.

"It's not about the subject
Here's another secret: in photographic art, it's never about the subject.
It's always about the underlying compositional structure. Subjects that may be there are chosen because they support or create a structure, not the other way around."
...
"The actual subject doesn't matter. Your choice of a subject should be made to give a strong underlying design to the image. What that subject is or does consciously is irrelevant. As far as photographers are concerned, photos subjects are used purely as big colors and shapes, exactly as you'd cut these colors and shapes out of construction paper to make a composition."
What Makes a Great Photograph

Composition in art is about relation - that what communicates in art, that what makes people to discover, to understand something ...something about themselves and how they see life.

[Mehlsack]

and it is absoluty necessary that there are only photos made of woman, because they are so much better at involuntary "posing" then men ?!

yeap not creepy voyeurism at all

[vonBaloney]

and it is absoluty necessary that there are only photos made of woman, because they are so much better at involuntary "posing" then men ?!

yeap not creepy voyeurism at all

There are several of men. One with a dog. Nothing remotely sexual about any of them. (If we are still talking about the exhibition that is the main topic of this thread.)

[wildman]

in photographic art, it's never about the subject.
It's always about the underlying compositional structure.

"Never" and "always" are good words to avoid when discussing art and love.

[em-tx]

"Never" and "always" are good words to avoid when discussing art and love.

I can agree on this in terms of forum. It might not help for discussion or tends to create discussion barrier.

As matter of fact this is quote of at least very good photographer which makes comments on basics. I think you need to start with rules somewhere. Life modulates infinitely, but generally talking, apples are not potatoes.

For my professional experience - in art world you use them freely and since we tends to be tolerant folks, we know what to do with it. Especially in terms of basic or particular issues. I lecture and teach a lot. Can not help myself, preaching of tolerance - excluding this words is a lot of sign of tolerance where you can hide lack of ...from creativity to craft.
I think, if you make an art work there is an objective. There is thousands of ways, but your objective is selecting one part of them and your personality another part, so you have one or very few left. That's setting boundaries or "nevers".

But in terms of forum, yes I agree. I just did not like the witch hunt with fairly aggressive and sometimes vulgar approach, so I pushed.