NY Times: Obama's People (Portraits by Nadav Kander)

Andy

So, did you see these in this weekend's NY Times Magazine?

Link to slideshow.

I've talked about these with lots of folks... most (including me) seem to have a love/hate relationship with Kander's work here.

One I liked a lot:


Two I absolutely hate:





In many, the double catchlights from the softboxes in some of the shots just is downright creepy. The Clinton and Browner shots above, are so unflattering - Browner in particular looks like she needs a toilet - fast. Neither of these portraits to me, shows who they are.

The audio is really nice, worth a few minutes to listen to it.

What do you think? Like them? Why? Hate them? Why? Tell us! :ear

ian408

His premise was good but poorly executed making these shots average at best.

Most of them look hurried and the lighting sucks. Bad.

wildviper

Here is my constructive criticism: Utter Crap!

Shootin1st

Some humanity in the first.

3 is horrendous.

Andy

Shootin1st wrote:

Some humanity in the first.

3 is horrendous.

There are many more on the NY Times site - I only skitched 3.

pathfinder

These look like mug shots, of very uncomfortable people. Some of them look guilty, looking out of the frame away from the viewers eye. Most of these images are very unflattering to these people (who deserve better in my opinion, anyway).

Standing them directly in front of a white wall, which captures the shadow of the silhouette, seems like a particularly bad (or devious) choice to me. The light is cold, and clinical, like a hospital operating room light. I am sure they could have found a nice warm window light, or created one with their lighting.

I'll bet the photographer doesn't get invited back again. If I were one of the subjects I would not sit for them again anyway!

wildviper

Forget the photographer, doesn't NY Times' Editors have taste??? They could have chosen to ditch the whole effort. By putting this online and printing?, they show no class.

No one from their organization could have the "balls" and say, hey, this sucks! no one?

Now, I am no flaming hot photographer(in fact, I am currently producing things like this while learning lighting), but I have seen tons of photos(especially here) that are miles above this stuff.

Art for Art's sake can lead to a path you don't want to be on necessarily. At that point, its ok to drop it.

BradfordBenn

When I first saw these I thought they were for ID Badges. I gotta make time to watch/listen to the back story.

Tango

someone was paid for these?....

TexPhotog

Andy wrote:

Wow...

If this guy is working at the NY Times... there is hope for me...

This totally means that I can be crappy... and get paid...

My dreams are coming true...

The first one I can kind of see where he was trying to go... but he got off the subway way too early or way too late...

Hillary's pic looks like the old passport photos... to the side... unblocked view of the ear...

And the last lady looks like a bad mannequin about to be trashed by Barney's...

Just my 2 cents...

ChrisJ

Small aside... when Reggie played basketball at Duke, one of his teammates was a walk-on named Sweet. So in the rare instances they were on the court together, Duke opponents were treated to some Sweet Love!

The photo of Carol Browner is attrocious.

Andy

wildviper wrote:

No one from their organization could have the "balls" and say, hey, this sucks! no one?

I say it sucks, really bad. I don't work for the NYT but you're right, they should be lambasted for publishing such dreck.

Andy

TexPhotog wrote:

Wow...

If this guy is working at the NY Times...

:nono He does not work for the NY Times.
http://www.nadavkander.com/#

TexPhotog

Andy wrote:

:nono He does not work for the NY Times.
http://www.nadavkander.com/#

Blah... I can't access hit site from work... or the slideshow for that matter... but it seems to me then that the photos were published in the "magazine" section of the NY Times... right Andy???

I'll guesstimate that he must've shot this for someone within the Obama team... and whomever approved them should let me shoot for them

Thanks for the correction Andy

They are still sucky...

angevin1

? and the Imperials~

How many of you took the time to listen to the verbiage recorded about what the photographer was trying to do here?

When you go to the Sideshow and listen and watch, I think your feelings may change.

cheers, tom

Ps: And yes, listening to what it was all about makes a huge F'ing difference for me! Theres a story to be had here and this posts has taken it out of context. Altho credit to Andy mentioning the nice audio~

TexPhotog

angevin1 wrote:

? and the Imperials~

How many of you took the time to listen to the verbiage recorded about what the photographer was trying to do here?

When you go to the Sideshow and listen and watch, I think your feelings may change.

cheers, tom

Ps: And yes, listening to what it was all about makes a huge F'ing difference for me! Theres a story to be had here and this posts has taken it out of context. Altho credit to Andy mentioning the nice audio~

I'll have to wait til I get home to get the whole story... Although, you can't tell me that the Hillary photo doesn't look like a wax statue from Madame Tussaud...

angevin1

TexPhotog wrote:

I'll have to wait til I get home to get the whole story... Although, you can't tell me that the Hillary photo doesn't look like a wax statue from Madame Tussaud...

Agreed, in this forum, looks like sh__t and the other gal, as someone said, like she needs a bathroom: Quick!...but when I listened to the photographers explanation, made lots more sense and placed it all in context for me....which I then found intriguing!

tom

BradfordBenn

The audio while helping to explain the reasoning doesn't really make me like the pictures any more compelling. The pictures for the most part look like they are for ID Badges or book illustrations where call outs will be added to the image saying such things as "In the right hand is the Blackberry that can be used to communicate with other members of the herd". Just not quite right.

The shadows also look oddly out of place, almost like they were placed in afterward.

Not my cup of tea.

wildviper

angevin1 wrote:

? and the Imperials~

How many of you took the time to listen to the verbiage recorded about what the photographer was trying to do here?

When you go to the Sideshow and listen and watch, I think your feelings may change.

cheers, tom

Ps: And yes, listening to what it was all about makes a huge F'ing difference for me! Theres a story to be had here and this posts has taken it out of context. Altho credit to Andy mentioning the nice audio~

Actually I did listen to it. In fact, I just listened again in case I missed something that you had caught.

My revisited opinion: You can put a lipstick on a pig, but it still is a PIG!!!!

Oh, here is something she says, not verbatim: "It was amazing energy we felt from all these Obama people and who they are."

Looking at these pictures, they all look tired, don't want to be there, are lost or grumpy and so on.

Is that the "energy" we are supposed to see and feel?

Angelo

amazingly bad especially considering his past commercial accomplishments. I'll allow that he was attempting a narrowly defined, specific thematic thread running through this series but I think he just failed miserably.

I'd like to see if the series is panned universally or if the cultural elite of the art establishment will praise him as a genius.

Sam

I am absolutely stunned! While I am just in the process of trying to learn how to take better people, and portrait photos, if this was my finished product, I would be forced to admit failure, and return the clients money.

OK, let me correct this, if one of you were my client I would return all the money, as for the politicians, well I think I would tell them it's hight art, and double my fees, they deserve nothing less.

The best laid plans of mice, and men mean nothing if the result is utter dismal failure.

Sam

slenius

I wouldn't want Kander to photograph me
I looked carefully at the photos in the Times magazine. I was stunned. Was it just me that didn't get it? What did other people think? I'm glad I found this thread--it's not just me.

The lighting is raw, awful and unflattering. The poses are awkward. The subjects look uncomfortable. And there are photo stylists credited at the back of the magazine, but what did they do? Nothing, as far as I can tell. Hair is messy, clothes are wrinkled and ill-fitting.

These portraits remind me of Diane Arbus' photography--except I like her stuff, and I don't like these. Out of curiosity, I visited Kander's own website. I really like some of his other photography--if he's photographing inanimate objects, he's great. But he's absolutely brutal to human subjects.

These portraits also remind me of a Calvin Klein campaign from a few years ago that featured what looked like underage models photographed in their underwear on green shag carpeting against cheap wood paneling and lit by overhead fluorescent shoplights. And this was supposed to sell stuff.

Taking the suggestion of a prior post, I listened to the backstory. It didn't help. I have worked with photographers who could have turned out much more pleasing portraits under the same conditions and in the same time frame. But maybe "pleasing portraits" wasn't what the photographer, or the Times, had in mind.

angevin1

As Andy said: Folks seem to have either a love or hate response to these.

For me, obviously its love. I love the premise. When I open the SS and listen about the economy of gesture and purposely putting them on a white background omitting context of environment and the photographer feeling like He was able to connect personally and with the camera. As well as The photography directors expression of exhilaration at the seeing the differences of how each person occupied that stage.

And I think this is the inherent problem.

This kind of statement is just oh so subjective cloaked as an objective. And that certainly could be the downfall here: Allowing ones intra-personal experience to color an interpersonal end product....its akin to asking others to have faith, now that YOU"VE just seen THE light!

But what I interpret here in this forum is He didn't pull it off: the connection with the camera.

In this case I think only with words does the overall theme work. Without the words...


Note to self: don't think for a minute a bunch of words will save photo! Take better photo! Or keep to self!

cheers, tom

saurora

After looking at the gallery 4 times (for some kind of redeeming quality) and listening to the background commentary a couple of times, I moved on to his website. After pouring over gallery after gallery I began to wonder who is more awkward and uncomfortable - the subjects or the photographer? He even manages to make children look unemotional. Aside from all the technical cons (lighting, posing, processing, etc.) my biggest disappointment in his work is that I am unable to connect on any level, visual or emotional. I found very few portraits I cared for on his site, and most of those I did not linger over. That is really unusual for me!

pathfinder

Angelo wrote:

amazingly bad especially considering his past commercial accomplishments. I'll allow that he was attempting a narrowly defined, specific thematic thread running through this series but I think he just failed miserably.

I'd like to see if the series is panned universally or if the cultural elite of the art establishment will praise him as a genius.

I'll bet the art establishment will love these Angelo. As for our opinions, it will just prove to them how unwashed we all are, and that we just don't get it!

I actually thought the photos Andy posted were the better ones; there were many on the link that were much worse in my opinion.

These pictures just seem like a cruel joke pulled on some unwary politicians. I wonder if they will think it is funny too.

elizabeth_Luna

I do not understand, was all the baggage they carried necessary? example lady holding her glasses - scarf around the personal lawyer? bags phones etc. He must of had no time to tell them to drop there personal items?

But yah geez they should NO emotion what so ever? not a friendly photography maybe?

koush

I am certainly no great photographer and I certainly do not have access
to resources this photographer would have....these are very bad.

I am just a newbie here but I would say anyone of the grinners here could produce work lightyears beyond this.

I agree..art for art's sake??

and to the editor who accepted these what were you thinking??

Andy

elizabeth_Luna wrote:

I do not understand, was all the baggage they carried necessary?

You must not have listened to the commentary about why the photographer did this.

angevin1

koush wrote:

I am certainly no great photographer and I certainly do not have access
to resources this photographer would have....these are very bad.

I am just a newbie here but I would say anyone of the grinners here could produce work lightyears beyond this.

I agree..art for art's sake??

and to the editor who accepted these what were you thinking??

Read my post 6 Posts above to see what she was thinking...

ian408

angevin1 wrote:

Read my post 6 Posts above to see what she was thinking...

Regardless of what they were thinking, these images are crap. In my opinion at least.

Andy

ian408 wrote:

these images are crap.

The Old Grey Lady fails miserably. :puke