Fashion photography by Irving Penn, February 1951
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The big picture: a wild night out by Jessica Craig Martin
Jessica Craig-Martin has been taking her distinctive, definitive party pictures for the New Yorker and Vanity Fair and Vogue for three decades. She took this one at a Frieze magazine party at the old MI5 building in London in the early 1990s. Some photographers, she has suggested, have been interested in capturing where gold is mined; she focuses her lens on the places – the gala balls, the extravagant gallery openings, the fashion launches – where it ends up. She is not interested in faces so much as flesh; her eye is drawn to tragi-comic detail. In this picture, part of her Standard Excess series, the mystery is simple, she says: “Where is the other leg?”
Experience has taught her short cuts to the essence of an event. “I check to see what the salmon is wearing,” she told me last week. “You can tell a lot about a party from the sartorial choices of the fish.” Other than that, it is always shoes. “This is why yacht parties are so hard to photograph,” she says, “apart from the fact they are mostly hideous. I have a theory that the same person who has made sneakers so ugly has also been designing the yachts.”
Craig-Martin tends to work on that frontline between every party’s warring factions: anticipation and reality. “I like,” she says, “to locate the moment when both desire and disappointment are tangible. That creates drama in the photograph. No one wants to see a picture of a well-balanced person having a reasonable night out.” New year exacerbates those tensions, happily. “There is a heightened sense of time passing, which gives the night an apocalyptic edge. Then there is enormous pressure to reform and renew; to miraculously manifest a better self overnight. It’s a perfect recipe for emotional devastation.”
6 golden rules: How to navigate the art market and avoid purchasing fake art
Seasoned collectors advise extra caution when buying works by well-known artists whose work already commands a high price in Indian and global art markets. Examples from India include MF Husain, SH Raza, VS Gaitonde, Ram Kumar, Krishen Khanna. (Images via Wikimedia Commons)
Not many know what Puneet Bhatia, the India head of TPG Capital, was thinking when he first laid eyes on the painting ‘Krishna with the Cows’ by artist Manjit Bawa. But everyone is aware of the police complaint he filed against solicitor Vishwang Desai and art dealer Rajesh Rajpal for selling him the fake painting. Apart from this painting, Bhatia purchased 10 more paintings – the sellers told him they were made by S.H. Raza and F.N. Souza, among other well-known artists – for a whopping sum of Rs 17.9 crores; all of which turned out to be fake.
Much like Bhatia, numerous art enthusiasts aspire to build their art collections featuring renowned contemporary and modern artists. As with most investments with potential for a large upside, the art market is plagued by counterfeits. Letters of authentication and seemingly unassailable provenance have been tempered with before.
To navigate these waters, we sought advice from artists, an art historian, and a seasoned artist-collector, to put together a set of golden rules for prospective art buyers. Here’s a list of what you should know before buying an artwork.
1. Delving into the artist’s work: Bengaluru-based artist Rekha Rao, who is the daughter of acclaimed artist and educator KK Hebbar, remembers Manjit Bawa’s style of working. “He never used a ruler or any geometrical instrument when doing circles and so on,” she says. “It takes a very experienced eye to spot the Manjit Bawa’s fakes.”
Most artists change their style over the years as they evolve from one series to the other. Sometimes they even change their signature. “My father changed the way he signed his name over the years, sometimes he would sign in both Hindi and English. As his daughter, I can corroborate the signature with the period of his work. This kind of knowledge one must have when studying the works of the artist they wish to buy.”
A deep academic knowledge of the artist’s oeuvre is needed when buying high-value art.
2. Due diligence and provenance scrutiny: Lawyer Ganesh Shivaswamy, a collector of Raja Ravi Varma chromolithographs and author of the six-volume series on Ravi Varma titled The Everlasting Imprint of which the first book The Shaping of the Artist was recently released, has experience in conducting art litigation.
“There is a big difference in the way people buy art to the way they buy immovable property,” he comments. “While an artwork could cost more than the immovable property, there is no due diligence done.”
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Shivaswamy has observed a peculiar inconsistency in the Indian art market. “The authenticity and provenance (the artwork’s history of ownership) are usually inversely related,” he says.
Generally, families who possess invaluable paintings sell the original works in secret using sketchy provenance. “Someone said they had ‘found’ the painting in the rubbish. One of them actually told me that he found the painting on a floating ship! In these cases, the paintings were original. When the provenance is grand and bombastic, it usually implies that they are not selling the painting but the provenance.”
Go through the provenance and do the due diligence which means going by the scientific way. “I would rely only on that.”
3. Utilizing scientific tools for art authentication: Technology is best at proving something is fake, but it is harder to declare something is the original. Still, it is the best way to verify and conclude the authenticity of a work.
Shivaswamy remembers a case where the painting in litigation was proven to be a fake Ravi Varma because of technology. One can look at the painting through X-Ray. “An examination via X-ray can tell the portions of a painting that have been retouched, the new portions of the painting and so on. It can also tell us about the materials used. For instance, Ravi Varma used lead white which will appear white under X-ray. The painting in litigation showed the presence of titanium white that was introduced in 1924. Since Ravi Varma died in 1904, it was conclusively proven as a fake.”
The other way to look at a painting is under UV light. From infrared reflectography to UV fluorescence, an expert uses these tools to detect discrepancy in the sketch done before the painting, forgery of signature and so on. A significant scientific tool is the surgical sampling which uses about 4-5 colours in paint samples (blue, green, yellow, crimson and white) to detect fakery.
“A fake Ravi Varma painting will be fully light or dark green in such a sampling.”
The problem that arises in this methodology is that some of the fakes have the same materials as the original. Shivaswamy notes that nowadays the fakes of Ravi Varma paintings are getting harder to tell. “People are selling unsigned works of artists like Sekhara Warrier as works by Ravi Varma. Since Warrier used the same materials as Ravi Varma, it gets harder to authenticate.”
4. Caution regarding renowned names: Prof R.H. Kulkarni, art historian and professor at College of Fine Arts, Karnataka Chitrakala Parishath, has been associated with the ASI Appeal Committee for the past 11 years to evaluate artworks. His rule for those buying art is simple: Be wary of buying works of those artists whose works command good market value even after their demise.
“Works of artists like MF Husain, SH Raza, FN Souza, or VS Gaitonde command great value in the art market,” he says. “Naturally, fake paintings of these artists abound in the market. I have so far not come across a fake of Abanindranath Tagore painting because there is not much demand.”
Kulkarni believes that dealers who sell fakes in the black market convince the buyer that they are buying a real work. The buyer then resells the painting in white because they believe the work is original. Fake paintings infiltrate the white market in this manner.
As an aside, Kulkarni mentioned some of the ‘beautifully rendered fakes’ he has come across. “With such talent, those artists could have come up with their own works!”
The fix: do your own research and purchase artists making a good name for themselves. Udaipur-based artist and collector Waswo X Waswo says, “It’s a gamble, but their work will probably increase in value, and since you started supporting them early, there is little chance that you’ll be buying a fake.”
5. Trustworthy galleries and documentation: Kulkarni underscores the role of reputable galleries in supporting genuine artists. “Such galleries have made modern art of India shine. Galleries like the Kumar Gallery in New Delhi have supported artists like Gaitonde, Ram Kumar, and Satish Gujral. When a buyer approaches such galleries, they will get original works with letter of authentication and a provenance certificate.”
Reputed galleries usually maintain a catalogue of the artists’ works which makes it easier to check the authenticity of a work. Bengaluru-based artist Gurudas Shenoy usually offers to give an authentication certificate with every painting he sells. “Although, some galleries prefer to give their own authentication certificate,” he says. “Apart from the authentication certificate and provenance, a buyer must preserve the bill because that too becomes a legal tender.”
Waswo advises buyers read the fine print of any contract they sign. “Make sure that the seller guarantees to reimburse the full amount of purchase if the work is proven to be a fake. Reputable galleries and auction houses wish to maintain their reputations.”
6. Cross-referencing the artist’s works: Before buying an artist’s work, Shenoy suggests that one should find out the galleries the artist was associated with and cross reference the work by looking at the artist’s biodata which usually lists the exhibitions the artist had participated in.
“My father, GS Shenoy, in his catalogue would include all the exhibitions meticulously,” he says. “Nowadays, one can go to social media and crosscheck the artist’s exhibitions and the works featured in them.”
Understanding the materials of the period when the painting was done is a great way to spot a fake. “Some of the original paintings of the previous century came in funny sizes unlike the standardized sizes of today,” Shenoy says. “So, look out for that.”
Check if the medium used is the correct one pertaining to the period in which the artist had painted the painting you are keen on. “It’s amazing how simple yet significant points like these can help in spotting out a fake.”
How AI became a mainstream part of photography in 2023
If 2022 was the year that AI image generation began to transform photography, 2023 was the year it became mainstream. With the software giant Adobe and even stock photo suppliers like Getty and Shutterstock launching text-to-image tools, generative AI has become inescapable in many forms of visual art, and it’s increasingly finding a place in photographers’ workflows.
Things have developed fast in the past 12 months, with AI image generators producing better results and the number of tools multiplying. But we’ve also seen the fight back begin, with glimpses of tools that could help photographers protect their work from being used to train AI models. As we approach the end of the year, we round up some of the biggest moments in the development of generative AI in photography in 2023 and consider where the technology is going.
AI image generators take (another) huge leap forward
The big leap in AI image generation came last year, when diffusion models with massive datasets replaced generative adversarial networks as the main tech involved. By the end of 2022, models such as DALL-E 2, Stable Diffusion and Midjourney were already impressive and had thousands of users. But the images they produced still betrayed their origins. Human figures had unusual numbers of fingers, and text would be rendered as nonsensical scribbles.
This year, almost all of the major models advanced enormously in terms of the reliability and quality of their output, particularly when it comes to photorealism. DALL-E 3, Midjourney V6 and Google’s Imagen 2 can all produce much more realistic images than their predecessors. And it’s not just hands with the right number of fingers. Lighting, gestures and hair are all much more convincing, making it hard if not impossible to distinguish some AI-generated images from photos. Zoom in on the viral ‘Pope in a puffer jacket’ and you’ll find smudges and blurs that give the game away, but it looked realistic enough to fool many people. And this was only in March.
AI apps multiply
As well as quality, 2023 brought quantity and a new ease of access to AI image generation. Whether browser-based or in the form of mobile apps, AI image generators seemed to be launching on an almost daily basis this year. Some of them even billed themselves as alternatives to hiring a photographer. Erm…
Photo AI is one of those cases, and no it’s not likely to be replacing photoshoots anytime soon. Upload images of yourself taken from different angles and the tool will create AI models that you can use to “do photo shoots in different poses, places, and styles”. You can even choose different outfits. However, our writer found the resulting images didn’t look much like her. Apparently aimed at people who want a presentable photo for their CV but can’t be bothered to get changed out of their pyjamas, it doesn’t have an obvious professional use at the moment, but I wouldn’t be surprised to see such apps become more accurate in the months to come.
Adobe launches Firefly (and Generative Fill in Photoshop)
Until this year, the big AI image generators were new names. Using their models wasn’t always the easiest or most intuitive experience for the uninitiated, and there were serious questions about copyright because they were trained on datasets scraped from the internet.
In March 2023, Adobe launched Firefly, aiming to make AI both more palatable and more useful with an accessible model trained exclusively on public domain images and assets from Adobe Stock. Two months later, it began to introduce Firefly-powered tools to Photoshop, the industry-standard tool for image manipulation.
This had a huge impact on photography for several reasons. The fact that many working photographers already use Photoshop meant they now had easy access to AI image generation and could start to experiment without seeking out new tools. And, in practical terms, Generative Fill and Generative Expand in Photoshop are tools that are actually useful for photographers and fit their workflows, potentially saving hours of work for those who create composite images. There’s also the issue of legality. In its Firefly for Enterprise plan, Adobe promises to indemnify users against compensation claims that could arise from the use of its AI tools.
As always where Photoshop leads, competitors have to follow. Starting in October, Skylum started adding a raft of new generative AI features to its Luminar Neo editing software, with GenErase, GenExpand and GenSwap. The next year will surely bring more AI tools to conventional photo editing. Both Adobe and Google are developing ‘zoom-and-enhance’ tools using AI to refine low-quality images like what we see in TV crime shows. I’m personally hoping to see Adobe’s Project See Through for removing glass reflections makes it into Lightroom.
Getty Images launches an AI image generator
We predicted in our roundup last year that a big area for AI image generation would be stock imagery. Sure enough, this year stock libraries began bulking up their products against the new competition by adding their own text-to-image tools. Both Getty and Shutterstock have launched AI image generators directly within their sites, allowing customers to edit stock images using AI if they can’t find a shot that suits their needs.
Getty’s development with Nvidia was particularly notable considering that the image giant had been wary of AI, even launching a lawsuit against Stable Diffusion. There are repercussions for photographers here but also opportunities. There’s a chance stock image customers may be more likely to buy an image if they can quickly change certain details to make more closely fit their needs.
Brands turn to AI for product photography
Last year, we saw some AI-generated images used in advertising, but usually as a joke. This year, it became a serious tool for product photography, although not always with successful results.
In March, Levi’s announced that it was working with lalaland.ai on creating AI models for its clothes to make shopping “more inclusive”. And in October, Amazon announced the beta launch of the Amazon Ads AI image generator, which sellers can use to create adverts showing their products in contextual situations, for example on a desk in an office. More bizarrely, Uber Eats apparently began testing AI image generation for restaurant menus, much to the bemusement of a New York pizzeria that found its menu illustrated with images of fruit pies.
Uber Eats is using AI for pictures of food. It doesn’t know that “pie” means pizza, and it invented a brand of ranch dressing called “Lelnach” pic.twitter.com/raFZArsERNNovember 30, 2023
There are clearly types of product photography where AI image generation makes total sense. Generating backgrounds can save the huge amount of time and investment it can take to set up a scene with the right props desired. Generating images of fictional dishes for a real restaurant isn’t one of those situations.
AI makes it to magazine covers
Image 1 of 3
AI-generated ‘photos’ also made it to the cover of magazines in 2023. France’s Réponses Photo launched its March issue with two covers, one a real photo and one AI, challenging readers to identify which was which (it’s the one on the right in the image in the gallery above, if you’re still trying to guess).
Meanwhile, a Barbie-inspired cover for the July edition of Glamour in Bulgaria featured an AI-generated image of the model Lisa Opie, and Vogue Italia ran a cover shoot with Bella Hadid featuring “real shots on imaginary backgrounds created by DALL-E”. Both came in for criticism, but they also showed us the kind of role that AI image generation could play in fashion photography in the future, being early examples of ‘co-creation’ between AI and human photographers.
AI causes a headache for photography competitions
With AI image generation becoming so convincing, photography competitions found themselves in a pickle. In April, the German photographer Boris Eldagsen won the Creative Open category of the annual Sony Awards only to reveal at the ceremony that The Electrician (above) was generated using AI. And it can go the other way. Perhaps being extra cautious as a result of that controversy, the judges of a competition run by Sydney print shop Charing Cross Photo had to apologise after disqualifying a real photograph that they thought was AI.
It quickly became clear that competitions would need to define whether the use of generative AI is permitted or not and how they would police it. World Press Photo initially announced that it would allow both generative fill and fully generated AI images in its Open Format category in 2024. It backtracked in November due to an uproar among photographers and photojournalists.
Many would agree that images generated entirely by AI should not be accepted into a photography competition, but enforcing the rule, and defining how much generative AI is too much, is fraught with difficulties. This is something that will need to be resolved in the coming year.
Amid such confusion, we can be grateful that there have been advances in the development of tools that can vouch for an image’s authenticity or help identify AI trickery. As part of the Content Authenticity Initiative (CAI), Adobe Firefly includes data identifying AI-generated images. Adobe’s also teamed up with Leica on the M11-P, the first camera to allow photographers to attach Content Credentials to their images at the point of capture (see our Leica M11-P review). And this month, we saw the release of , an iOS camera app that uses ContentSign authentication to allow users to include proof of authenticity in image metadata.
These tools allow photographers to verify the authenticity of their work, which could be a source of value in itself going forward as we face the likelihood of the internet being flooded with AI-generated images. We’ve also seen the emergence of tools that aim to identify whether an image was created by AI. Is it AI? and AI or Not from Optic are free browser-based image checkers that aim to determine if an image was created by a human or not. They can’t always tell, but they do seem to catch a lot of AI-generated images.
The fight back begins
Many photographers understandably want to be able to protect their work from being used to train more AI models in the future. The Glaze project at the University of Chicago aims to do just that. Researchers came up with a technique of applying imperceptible modifications dubbed ‘style cloaks’ before uploading images to the web. When used as training data, the modifications can effectively prevent AI models from being able to copy the style of an image.
Free to download, the tool was mainly developed with artists in mind, preventing models from copying the artist’s style, but it could also help protect the work of photographers who have a particular style… at least until AIs are developed that can detect and undo the style cloaking.
But the people behind Glaze have another tool up their sleeves. In October, they announced the development of Nightshade, which effectively ‘poisons’ AI models by providing corrupted training data. It looks like we’re entering a race in which AI image generators and AI antidotes or poisons will have to be continually updated to identify and outwit each other. The AI image generators had the head start, but it might just be possible for the likes of Project Glaze to catch up.
AI camera concepts emerge
Perhaps the strangest development in AI image generation this year was the appearance of concept AI cameras. SnapChat developer Kyle Goodrich came up with DreamGenerator, which turns real photos into AI-generated images in-device with one of 30 preset themes, Why anyone would want to do that isn’t clear, but Goodrich thinks his concept would be more intuitive and accessible than the usual process of taking an image and then uploading it to a text-to-image generator.
Introducing – Paragraphica! 📡📷A camera that takes photos using location data. It describes the place you are at and then converts it into an AI-generated “photo”. See more here: https://t.co/Oh2BZuhRcfor try to take your own photo here: https://t.co/w9UFjckiF2 pic.twitter.com/23kR2QGzpaMay 30, 2023
Even wilder was the Paragraphica camera, which doesn’t take photographs at all. Designed by Bjørn Karmann, it uses location data. The viewfinder displays a real-time description of the location, pressing the ‘shutter button’ results in the creation of a scintigraphic representation of the description, and three dials let you control the data and AI parameters. There’s no reason for it to have the size and shape of a camera other than for novelty retro value.
Strange times indeed. I can’t see either of these particular experiments with bringing AI into camera hardware catching on, but it will be interesting to see how the major camera makers react to the incursion of AI. It’s likely that we’ll see more AI-driven features for things like autofocus, noise reduction and fixing distortion and vignetting.
One thing that we can say for sure is that AI is now part of photography. Just as there are still photographers who use film, there will be many of us who choose not to use generative AI, but many will and are incorporating it into their workflows, whether that’s as part of the retouching process, to remove distractions and artefacts, or for more overtly AI-influenced work in the form of collages and composite images.
Like other digital artists, many photographers are likely to turn to AI image generation where in the past they might have used stock images to create compositions. We could also see AI-generated scenery take an increasingly present role in product photography and even portrait photography, saving time and expense.
There are still questions to be addressed. We need a reliable, universally accessible way to identify AI images for the purposes of avoiding misinformation, and the lingering issue of some models’ ignoring of copyright still needs to be defined either by the courts or through legislation. Watch this space.
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Drainage Work in Mysuru District Unearths Jain Sculptures | Mysuru News
Discover the remarkable discovery of Jain sculptures from the 11th century AD during drainage work in Mysuru district. Learn about the conservation efforts and the need for archaeological excavations in other Jain centres.
2023 In Review: Photography
Images can be indispensable to conveying the news. Many times they tell stories words cannot.
During the past year, photos by John Donegan, Eliza Green, and Rod Thornburg graced the pages of The Californian, bearing witness to moments of great import and deep emotion.
Drainage work in Mys dist unearths Jain sculptures | Mysuru News
Drainage work on Ambedkar Road in Varuna town, Mysuru district, unearthed three Jain sculptures from the 11th century AD. The sculptures, including an
Wyoming Photographer Dave Bell Features Otherworldly Images In New Art Show
Wyoming is a natural nirvana as a canvas for world-class photography, and nobody has a vision through his viewfinder quite like Pinedale’s Dave Bell. His stunning Cowboy State landscapes, views and vistas are works of art.
His work will be featured in a public exhibition at the Sublette County Library in January.
“Visual Phenomenon” will feature 36 photos taken by Bell throughout Wyoming on a theme that’s personal for him.
“I wanted to create a show that highlights images that I’ve taken of ‘astro-events’ — clouds, lightning, the moon and rainbows,” he told Cowboy State Daily. “I think there’s got to be something for everybody,”
The Ones In The Million
Bell has been a prolific photographer for decades, with more than 1 million photos on his hard drives. “Visual Phenomena” will showcase a couple dozen of his best and personal favorites.
“We’ve got some wonderful shots of the Milky Way in Sublette County, bright and beautiful over trees and landscapes,” he said. “We’ve got some gorgeous cloud images. I’ve said for many years that we get the best clouds in Sublette County — lightning, of course. Last year was a banner year for lightning. It was just incredible.”
The show will include Bell’s “most famous image” of light pillars towering over Pinedale. Each photo is printed on a 16-by-24-inch metal print, which will be available to buy.
“They’re pretty cool,” he said. “I think that people will enjoy them.”
His Own Agent
Bell has done several similar shows at the Sublette County Library and other locations over the years. How does he manage to get so many chances to showcase his work?
The simple answer is he creates his own opportunities. While Bell’s work is revered by many through previous shows and social media, the public art exhibitions are entirely on his volution.
“It’s my own idea,” he said. “For photographers to get out there, you’ve got to do things like this to highlight and showcase your work. Because of my work in Sublette County and involvement with Pinedale Online and Cowboy State Daily, people know who I am. They’ll want to show up out of curiosity and what’s new.”
Since it’s Bell’s idea, it’s also at his expense. Selling the metal prints of his photos will help recoup some costs, but he admits putting together a show can cost a lot of time and money.
“It’s a lot of work, and it’s a lot of expense. When you print 24 metal prints, you’ve got a pretty good amount of money in it,” he said.
In Bell’s experience, the key to a successful show is to go above and beyond. This show also includes an artist’s reception on Jan. 10 and a signing of his book, “23: The Place We Call Home.” It’s a perfect opportunity for anyone who received the book as a Christmas gift to meet and chat with the author.
Hello There
Bell said the social aspect of an art show should never be underestimated.
“You can’t underscore the fact that people like to see each other to visit and catch up, especially after the holidays,” he said. “In the past, we’ve had a nice crowd there. We all have to visit and talk about how life’s treating us.”
If the time and expense of putting together a show weren’t worth it, Bell wouldn’t keep putting them on. After years of photography and increasing his reputation, he sees the shows as an invaluable tool to get eyes on his work.
“I recommend it to any photographer if they can figure out how to do it in a cost-effective manner that really showcases their talent,” he said.
“Visual Phenomena” opens Jan. 8 at the Sublette County Library in Pinedale, where it will hang through Jan. 27.
Andrew Rossi can be reached at arossi@cowboystatedaily.com.
