Is Photography Art?

Let's ask Google. I got something on the lines of:

Photography is not necessarily art. But it can be.

I think, we can agree. That's one of the answers which are correct, but completely useless. Does the question even matter? For an art museum, certainly. We have now photography of all sorts hanging in the finest galleries. So, I suppose, at least some kind of photography is art. And there are photographers who see themselves distinctively as artists. 

That brings me to a nice answer I found on Simon's blog. The question must not be if a photography is a work of art. Rather we shoud ask if the photographer is an artist who expresses himself through photography. This brings the question to a personal level and one of a communication with a viewer, instead of a question about a thing. I like that human level. For me, without it there is no art.

Can AI produce art? My answer might differ from the general opinion which is shaped by the rather insufficient artificial intelligence we have currently. I see no general limit for AI to actually think and feel like a human. You can call this mimicking. But we too learned a lot of our social interactions by imitation. Of course, a robot has no human flesh that feels pain and emotions directly. But it may well be able to understand us. I stress very heavily that we are maybe 10 years away from such an AI. The current generators of pictures simply repeat composition methods and picture qualities they found in the net.

But hey, isn't that what most photographers do too? We see lovely scenes or beloved ones, and capture them in a well composed picture. And that is already more artful than taking pictures just to win competitions, putting aside personal preference for the kind of stuff the audience likes. We should add our feelings to our photography. Some are personal. If I see the picture at the start, I immediately recall the cold and the sun. You might not.

I think an artist should convey emotions. Many artists would not agree. Some would prefer to say that they show ideas. Concrete Art does not play with feelings, at least not mine. Nevertheless, they say it is art, an artist expressing himself or herself. Some of this art is not accessible to the general public like me, some is. 

I am only interested in art as much as the artist is interested in me. 

And that's maybe the key. I am not interested to see an exhibition of pictures the photographer took for himself. Many street photography and almost all family pictures fall in that category. Rather, we should show something to our audience, something that goes beyond the obvious. We should try to speak to the viewer visually. The more I exercise this hobby, the less I want to publish. Nice pictures, sure, but rarely something that goes beyond the good light or composition.