Thought this was already posted but apparently not?

                This is the first time I’ve had such a negative reaction to observing and evaluating another artist’s work, photographer or otherwise.  My issues with Christopher Williams focus strongly on his methods of production, technological and otherwise.  I’m completely okay with his apparent expression of distance between producer and consumer of art, the viewer.  I think his approach is a very targeted essay on the subject.  And maybe it’s just the article’s hero-worship of Williams and comparison in an almost negative quality of Nan Goldin’s work that strikes me core so violently.  I feel in love with Nan’s intimate body of work years ago and I got overtly defensive.

                Once you get past the masturbatory praising of Williams in the article, the examined difference between him and artists like Goldin becomes apparent: Photographs are frequently labeled as ‘better’ or having a significantly improved quality when they make some kind of emotional connection with the viewer.  This connection can be furthered by a context given by the producer, or passed on thru education about their work.  Some artists close that gap between subject and viewer to a very close level.  Williams, on the other hand, seeks to remove such context and emotional connection from his work and the viewer that he overly simplifies, practically eradicates signifiers and commonalities in his work.  This I’m okay with.  I’ll address my problem in a moment.  His mind’s inner workings are ironically familiar to me as well, as someone else who also will fanatically absorb information about the oddest subjects in some bewildering pursuit of arcane knowledge.  In a round-about way, thru his own research he becomes closer to his subject than the majority of other people, though he methodically releases this information and context in a controlled way, thru interview and public speaking.  Other people can certainly make the connections between his unusual subjects and the knowledge behind them, though that’s far from the common reaction to be gleamed from his work.

                Apparently, in his effort to distance himself and therefore the viewer, Williams’ work is actually produced by a professional studio.  I still can’t fully wrap my head around this; other artists have certainly let the physical labor of taking a photo or making an art piece fall into hired hands.  But to the extent, they still regain some creative control by composing the shot for example.  I don’t know the details of the instructions Williams gives these studios, but it’s readily apparent that all the technique and classic structure is by the photographer’s hand.  I can’t even bring myself to call Williams’ a photographer, if he’s so removed that he’s neither composing the final work nor taking the picture.  I think there’s other ways he could certainly remove himself, hyperbolically so, and retain creative license.  If he wants to enlist the widespread technical access our generation enjoys, why not direct a shoot via Skype?  Or Tweet instructions, within a 150 character limit?  These methods might actually add something other than distance to the work, but at a certain point there is a barrier to creativity where you loose the ability to credit yourself for work.  Friends and family have given me ideas to build photography project foundations upon; would they be able to consider themselves the photographer?  Because at that point their involvement is more personal and detailed than Williams.