Problems of Socialist Realist Photographic Art

Gerhard Henninger, Die Fotografie 11/1960

»In the continuing ideological struggle for our socialist cultural development according to the Bitterfeld guidelines, an inseparable, mutual connection must always be preserved between the development of all artistic abilities and activities of the masses and the rise of our literature and art to new masterly achievements of socialist character.«

This advisory of the culture conference of 1960 also outlines the basic question of photo-artistic creation, which we are currently trying to solve. It confirms that we are on the right way, the way we have taken one and a half years ago in discussing and adopting new principles for the practice of photography groups, and in connecting the central and local photography committees of the GDR. We have seen this way realized in many exhibitions last year as well as in the theoretical debate in March of 1960. Exhibitions since the second Bifoto in the regions of our republic - in particular, the Photo Exhibition of the Leipzig Region 1959, the exhibitions on the occasion of the Second Worker Festival in Karl-Marx-Stadt, the park festival in Sanssouci, and on the occasion of the Ostseewoche 1960 in Warnemünde - have documented: Our photographic creations have become more rich, more diverse, and at the same time more distinguished. The theme of the Karl-Marx-Stadt exhibition was: »The formation of socialist man.« We have all the right to say that this theme has become the slogan of the photographic work of thousands of amateur and professional photographers of our republic. To form the socialist image of man has become the main concern of our photography as much as for all the arts. Our photography tries to form the image of the new man with his characteristic traits, on his way from the »I« to the »We,« struggling for a socialist morale and developing a well rounded personality. This image of the new designers of our everyday life, who set new standards, also conveys the beauty and dignity of man freed from exploitation. We have begun to make amateur photography an organic constituent of the well-rounded, artistic-creative practice of the working people, a practice which expresses a characteristic of the new socialist man. We have already spoken in detail about the photographer's tasks that resulted from the Culture Conference of 1960. (Cf. Die Fotografie 8/60.) The following will treat several questions and problems that still impede our work on the path outlined by the Culture Conference. For this great, pleasant process does not evolve without difficulties - how could it be otherwise. In order to develop the good, hopeful beginnings further and everywhere, we therefore also have to deal with old, outmoded, and often tough opinions and practices of the past.

Some photographers still think that our striving for a socialist photography implies a creative constraint with respect to the choice of motifs. This worry is based on a deep misunderstanding, a lack of clarity about the essence of socialist photography, and of socialist art in general. It would be superficial and wrong to assume that socialist photography could be created solely through a »progressive« choice of topic, through the choice of an equivalent object. In looking at our exhibition catalogues, one unfortunately finds that some photographers add titles to their images. These titles are seemingly meant to stand in for a lack of visual effect and expressive force. One cannot make socialist photography by turning one's camera by 90 or 180 degrees to move it from focusing on a landscape motif to the chimney of a factory or a tractor on the field. The content of an image is always determined by the theme AND the idea of the artist. Of course those themes are of primary importance which relate to the creations and life of our workers and cooperative farmers, to our intellectuals and to the whole working population. Our central concern is of course the new socialist man at work, in the context of his family, on vacation, while doing sports or studying. But the choice of these themes is not enough. »Only the works of those artists who know the life of the working people will live up to the critical standards of the workers and peasants, those artists who understand their feelings and thoughts and not only their life and doings, of those artists who learn to shape the richness of life in the spirit of the new class.« This sentence, taken from the resolution of the Culture Conference, draws our attention to the attitude and the spirit which motivate the photographic artist in his mastery of the various new themes. Such inner clarity is necessary, a capacity to recognize and design what is characteristic in such a way that it enhances and activates our life. It is as necessary as the choice of the theme. A photographic artist must not only be able to »see« photographically, but also socially. Then he will recognize that our path does not lead to restriction and superficiality. Instead, all aspects of our life must be thought through anew and must be shaped anew from the new point of view.

In order to overcome vulgar opinions, it will be necessary to eliminate those practical prejudices that - intentionally or unintentionally - support the superficial interpretations of our efforts. Some friends of photography argue that the theoretical discussion of aesthetic questions and problems is unnecessary, that only those photographers can make definite statements who have already had success in their own work. Certainly the experiences and visual examples of our best photo artists present an important help and support for the general qualification of our work. As photographers, we know how impressive images can be, that we can often say more with images than with long descriptions and explanations. But it would be wrong and harmful to our development if we denied that our new reality also sets new aesthetic standards, the reality of which we have the social task to shape anew. For it is precisely the main task of marxist aesthetics to analyze the development of new aesthetic standards based on our new socialist reality, to generalize theoretically and hence to serve the continued development of socialist art. It is precisely here that we still have essential defects in the area of photography. We frequently lack criteria of judgment for our work. In many exhibitions, the evaluation of pictures is often dependent on very subjective factors and personal tastes of the members of the jury. For example, we know that there there can be no general ideal of beauty. Instead, in each epoch, this ideal is finally determined and shaped by opinions, concepts, and ideas of the respective classes. It is also true for photography »that practice is the criteria not only for truth, but also for beauty« (resolution of Culture Conference, 1960). Accordingly, we must increase our efforts to apply the principles of marxist aesthetics to photography, to make it essential to the qualification of the photographic practices of our professional and amateur photographers. This will help us overcome those outmoded opinions and standards that are currently still used to evaluate our photographic work. Obviously, socialist photography can only be created by photographers, but marxist aesthetics can and must give valuable, guiding impulses. Hence one cannot underestimate the theoretical debate and discussion in all groups and circles, for it, in addition to their excursions and experiments, constantly contributes to their education. Quite a few search for »the« image of socialist photography. They think that one cannot speak of a socialist photography until this image has been found. This is a mistake. They underestimate what many of our professional and amateur photographers have already achieved during the past months and years. Socialist photography cannot be measured »once« against »one« image. Instead, it develops through a constant process out of the creations of our photographers. There will be more and less successful solutions. There will be different levels. Yet we can by all means say that we already have at our disposal a respectable body of images which can be classified as socialist-realist photography. The broader the scope of our creations, the larger the number of high achievements will be. Especially the Fotokino publisher and magazines are obliged to popularize these images to a greater degree. In light of several important and interesting aspects of our new life, it would also be wrong to wait for »the« image, which then should be the only standard for socialist photography in that respective genre, for example, in socialist festivities, the socialist transformation of agriculture etc. After all, we are moving on completely new ground and can be proud of our works, even if they do not immediately offer a perfect, unsurpassable solution. Despite perhaps still existing faults, these pictures, which are understood and loved, are a hundred times better than any showmanship. Think for example of the many cobblestone, puddle, and laundryline motifs which are only mere copies of photographs already seen and made hundreds of times.

A question essential to the evaluation of our pictures and the direction of our practice is the question of the purpose and social function of photography in general. We have distanced ourselves in principle in the last months from formalist tricks as well as from the non-committal and in part incomprehensible »experiments« that are »fashionable« in the bourgeois world and evidence of its demise. Yet in many cases, we have not thought through the social mission, the function, and the potential effects of our photography. There are still amateurs who exclusively take photographs for large exhibitions and »salons.« They are striving for images which are valued highly in the bourgeois-capitalist world. Yet they do not notice that they are about to fabricate a tasteless warmed-up version of bourgeois fashion trends. These photographers have no right to look down upon the shutterbug, as they call him, who takes his photographs for the family album. Yet many of these so-called shutterbugs probably have a clearer vision why and for whom they take photographs, a clearer vision than those timeless and homeless people who, without their own point of view, only imitate what someone once called »modern.«

Why do I take photographs? Each amateur should always think through this question thoroughly. It is pleasing how many new effects have been discovered in the past year by the workers and cooperative farmers who take photographs. They take photographs for the brigade books, village chronicles, company and wall-newspapers, exhibitions in companies, cultural centers and villages - and also for their colleagues, for their relatives and acquaintances. Many of them still lack artistic maturity. They are still »shutterbugs.« But is it not precisely them whom our efforts for better qualification must serve? Do they not give all of us, do they not give to photography incomparably more ideas and impulses than those other routined shutterbugs, who turn their lens according to the fashion trends without a point of view? Exhibition curators should therefore in the future consider that these exhibitions, in contrast to the »salons,« are part of our enthusiastic new life, that they mirror and at the same time help to change this life. For us, an exhibition is not just a competition of the best photographers. For us, exhibitions are at the same time a representation and an inspiration for the multiple ways in which photography can become effective in our life. And the selection of images for our exhibitions should already begin in the groups. Discussion should not be the exclusive task of a small jury, but the task of everyone. We will take this direction in preparing the Sixth German Photography Exhibition in the spring of 1961 in Leipzig. Those workers who take photographs in the context of these new forms of artistic practices demonstrate how necessary it is for our qualified photographers to help them. They should help them and »penetrate deep and with empathy into the work, the thinking, and the feelings of the workers, help them to recognize that which is new in society and artistically shape it in such a way that the workers accept these creations as their own concerns, as their art.« (Walter Ulbricht)

Never before in the history of German photography have there been more possibilities than in our Workers' and Peasants' State. These possibilities are obliging.