There are untold works of portraiture by my contemporaries, younger and older alike, with whom I’d feel honored to share company in a juried competition—even as a runner-up. But in this instance, I was dismayed by the context in which my own work appeared. With respect, I’ve asked that my photographs be withdrawn from the print edition of AAP Magazine #48: Portrait.
Sour grapes? Nope. My concern is broader—and more pressing. It has to do with how portraiture has come to be ill-defined, misrepresented, and, therefore, contextually misjudged.
The First Prize-winner—representing a series of photographs (not just one), while admirable in many ways, is explicitly described by its author as the work of a documentary photographer. Her term, not mine. The Third Prize image closely mimics a well-known portrait by Herb Ritts (Djimon Hounsou with Octopus)—which, while perhaps an homage, raises serious questions about its originality in a juried context. And many of the remaining photographs blur lines between genres to the point of making portraiture itself unrecognizable as a separate category.
This kind of categorical slippage may feel inclusive, even progressive. But it threatens to erode the expressive ethos that distinguishes portraiture from documentary photography, photojournalism, and conceptual art. A photograph is not a portrait simply because it includes a person in the frame. And a photographer’s portfolio of portraits need not represent a series to be taken seriously; it can be discursive without losing its semblance of singular style.
A bit of context: Having been published prolifically when magazines ruled the media, throughout the heyday of editorial photo assignments, I had little use for contests. Few working pros did. We relied on steady publication—backed by photo credits—to reach additional editors, art directors, and curators. And we got paid.
I quit shooting just as my career reached escape velocity, coincidentally on the cusp of the industry going digital. That’s another story. Nevertheless, having returned to photography after a 20-year hiatus, I now find myself in unfamiliar territory. To get my work seen again, in a world where I am as unknown now as any newbie, I splurged on entering contests—an experiment if you will. The upshot was, with regard to earning a living, or even just self-approbation: it’s not even close to the value of cultivating personal relationships with the gatekeepers who now hide behind a curtain of contests.
Because of my long absence, I have a clearer picture of how radically this change has affected photographers. Unlike the proverbial frog, I didn’t get imperceptibly boiled—I jumped back in the pot and found it immediately scalding.
The most seismic change I see? So-called “content,” dominated by politically relevant images, tinged with poignant social justice issues, too often outweighs the intellectual rigor and technical skill that clarify any given photographer’s vision. A distinctive voice—evident across a broad range of subjects—is no longer enough. Work must now conform to a project, a theme, a narrative arc that can be easily pitched and parsed on an Instagram feed—or a contest. And photographers are now obliged to enter them all, hoping that someone who can hire them, if not the judges themselves, will see their pictures. It’s part of a pay-to-play protocol that is distasteful to me in a world where getting a magazine assignment is like finding a payphone that still works, and “photobooks” rule the day. Good luck making a living at that!
The lack of a straightforward path to publication, online or in print, editorial or commercial, let alone to print sales and books, plus the demise of a once-prevalent system of photo agencies (thanks to the rank ignorance of Getty Images and the erstwhile Corbis about the pecuniary value of photography), has engendered not only a prevailing culture of contests but a greater proliferation of photographers who enter them. But don’t get me wrong; I’m seeing more and better work than ever before. Yet when an even bigger firehose of mediocrity dilutes that stream of talent, photography is celebrated less for its quality than its subject matter, and ill-defined borderlines between genres diffuse the power of creativity.
Specifically, the conflation of portraiture with both documentary photography (which proselytizes a specific agenda) and photojournalism (which bears witness to unfolding events) are the most egregious examples of this homogenization of genres. The advocacy of political, societal, and moral issues has begun to eclipse the importance of photographic craft and the expressive ethos of portraiture itself. Mixing apples, oranges, and bananas may make a tasty smoothie, but you'll miss the individual textures and flavors of each individual fruit.
This is not a call to reject work with social or political substance—far from it. It’s a call to restore balance: to reaffirm the value of formal rigor, genre clarity, and the vision that defines great photography in every category. We urgently need to resist a flattening of standards—where “portrait” becomes a catchall for any image with a face, and reject initiatives that value form over substance, content over quality. We can do that and still make room for eclectic, rigorous, and idiosyncratic bodies of work without contradicting the inherent differences between photographic genres when they're forced to compete indiscriminately with each other in the same arena.
Thank you for the space to share these thoughts. I hope this letter contributes to a larger, necessary conversation—one that challenges, yes, but also clarifies what we mean when we say something is portraiture.
Respectfully,
Tom Zimberoff
More information about Tom Zimberoff here
Principles of Portraiture on Camera by Tom Zimberoff
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