(...This is assuming that you want to avoid clichés. My basic principle is that anyone can do anything they want with their photography as long as they're not hurting anyone, and if someone wants to shoot nothing but stone clichés, okay.)
Gordon Lewis defined "cliché" as "something that betrays a lack of original thought or insight. The general reaction to a cliché, at least among the visually aware, is 'Ho hum, seen it all too many times before. Snore.'"
I have a few suggestions as to how to avoid clichés:
1. Be obsessed. Many photographers have obsessions. They deeply love the things they photograph, or their photographs of those things. They photograph them so much and so attentively that they speed right past the realm of the cliché and by pure force of will and weight of long practice become subtle and distinctive. An insect photographer knows which of his 12,000 insect pictures are extraordinary, and why. Cliché is really the province of the dilettante superficially skimming past on the way to something else; those who get immersed in their subject get to know it much better and can go deeper. Besides, the more you photograph something, the more likely the magic lightning is to strike.
2. Be good. Really good. Huw Morgan pointed out, somewhat contentiously perhaps, that Kate Kirkwood's pictures in our current sale...including "...cars on a misty road..." could be considered clichéd subjects. All right; maybe. But if there are nine million pictures of distant headlights on a dark road out there, then hers is better than 99.999% of them. After all, "Afghan Girl," like the Mona Lisa, is just a portrait of a young woman. If you've done something really good, instead of Gordon's "Ho hum, seen it all too many times before. Snore," what you'll get is "Wow, I've seen a lot of pictures of that kind of thing, but seldom one as great as that." (Wait till you see the print.) And it's not a generic road; it's a road in Cumbria and Cumbria is her wider subject. Anyway, be good and you'll sidestep cliché.
3. Take pictures that are personally meaningful to you. Robin P. sent me a picture of a dog who just got a new mat. Now, to you, or anyone else, that might just be yet another dog picture. You might think it's a cliché. But it's not to Robin. To Robin, it's his beloved Daisy, who he knows very well, and whose expression in this photograph naturally delights him. That makes the picture infinitely richer and more resonant to him than it might be to a stranger.
This picture (being a sunset) might be a cliché to you. It was taken from the sidewalk along the high bluff over Lake Michigan where various members of my father's family owned a summer house since the 1930s—from which my father said that his mother, my grandmother, who died when I was six but who I remember well, liked to watch the sunsets over Lake Michigan. That meaning, to me, makes it a richer experience for me than it might be for you. To you perhaps it's generic; not to me. I believe personal meaning can save pictures of standard subjects from the pitfall of cliché, at least for ourselves, and for those who care enough about us to understand what our pictures mean to us.
Mike
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Featured Comments from:
Huw Morgan: "Thanks for this. My comments on Kate's images were intended to make the point that the subject is the least relevant part of an image. It is the interpretation that matters. Kate is a master at communicating the emotion of the moment and her passion leaps off the page.
"Obsession, mastery and passion are absolutely key. You are bang on. As photographers, we need not be concerned that subjects have been done to death as long as we can communicate our intense feelings towards the subjects. For example, there is an old locomotive in a town nearby that has been photographed to death from the point of view of the parking lot. The background from that angle shows a high school football field, complete with goal posts. If you go around to the other side of the locomotive and photograph towards a lake in the background, you can create an image that invokes the romance of the rails. With the right lighting and cloud cover, you can create an image that conveys a sense of mystery and power. Taking the time to stake out the subject and find the right way of communicating your feelings about the subject are key to making art."
kodia xyza: "The best example of subjugating a cliché, as noted by the three points listed, and perhaps much more, is among the work of Saul Leiter. Thus, really, the idea is not to avoid cliché, but to be aware and wrestle them. A noted cliché is the photographing through a window with raindrops, and Mr. Leiter loved it so (some collection of such photos here), enough to say 'a window covered with raindrops interests me more than a photograph of a famous person.'"
Tricky subject. A cliche picture, maaaybe. A clicheed subject, I don't believe in it. Quickly: name three subjects which have not been photographed many times.
I think the cliche is often more in the brain of the receiver, if he is not able to look with fresh eyes.
All the more reason to look at *pictures* rather than subjects.
Posted by: Eolake | Thursday, 04 June 2015 at 12:12 AM
One photographer's classic is another's cliché.
Posted by: Auntipode | Thursday, 04 June 2015 at 12:28 AM
It's probably just me... I'm sure it is. But I think discussions about cliches are, well, to borrow a phrase (making it a cliche), "Snore." One important rule I learned early on: "Everything has been photographed." Every thing. There is nothing new to photograph. Be it sunsets or waterfalls or people standing in front of red phone booths. Therefore, everything is a cliche. Every thing. Rather than looking at the THING you are photographing as the holy SUBJECT MATTER, may I so humbly suggest that it is, rather, raw material. Raw material, malleable and plastic, bendable to your own unique vision and approach. Raw material, like a tube of paint waiting to be applied to canvas, a slab of marble awaiting chisel and hammer, a hunk of clay on a potter's wheel hands at the ready, a blank page in a typewriter, fingers poised over the keys. Why do photographers look at the world as if it is predetermined, set in concrete and inflexible? If you go down that list of cliches posted earlier, what else is left to photograph? Nothing. If your approach with your camera to the world, every time you look through the viewfinder, is simply to utter a long list of, "No. Been done before..." you'll end up with a whole bunch of nothing. Nothing. Instead of looking for the 'next big thing' to photograph that's never been photographed before, instead go seek a new and unique way to work that raw material into something that is yours alone. To worry about how your vision compares to others, I believe, is to create your very own dead ends. Don't worry about what is 'cliche,' and instead turn off your brain and see with your eyes when you have camera in hand out in the world. (Turn on your brain later, during editing to be sure.) But I'm sure this is just me (and a couple others I know).
Posted by: Ernest Zarate | Thursday, 04 June 2015 at 01:18 AM
"Besides, the more you photograph something, the more likely the magic lightning is to strike."
Ah, finally, the rationale I needed.
Posted by: Moose | Thursday, 04 June 2015 at 01:44 AM
"Take pictures that are personally meaningful to you."
Yes, this is my goal. If I get lucky and other people like my shot too, that's just gravy for me.
Posted by: Art in LA | Thursday, 04 June 2015 at 01:44 AM
I think point 3 could be very dangerous. Obviously it's not just yet another picture of a tourist in front of {insert well-known landmark here} if it's a picture of ME!!! :)
Seriously though, here's an interesting thought experiment. Imagine that tomorrow a deity or alien influence stopped us all taking photographs. We would not somehow be "short" of pictures of sunsets, or Yosemite, or pretty ladies, or any of the other items on your list, would we?
We would, however, sorely miss the ability to capture events, be they personal, sporting, geopolitical or geophysical. And of course, in the personal lists, would be the events of our visits to {insert well-known landmark here}.
So here's an alternative view. It's not a cliche if it has meaning beyond pure representation of subject to at least one person...
Posted by: Andrew Johnston | Thursday, 04 June 2015 at 04:57 AM
Go somewhere where no human has ever been.
Measure light, frame and "clic".
Example:
http://i.space.com/images/i/000/047/941/original/ESA_Rosetta_NAVCAM_20141023_enhanced.jpg?1433208746
Posted by: Gildas | Thursday, 04 June 2015 at 07:38 AM
Obsession with anything has never been good for my wallet or my relationships. I think point #3 is all anybody really needs. Trying to make art is a sure way to fail at making art, or so I've heard.
Posted by: Jimmy Renfro | Thursday, 04 June 2015 at 08:58 AM
Two of your three suggestions cut towards the core of the issue, Mike. Developing a deep knowledge of your subject and having visual objectives in mind helps to insure that your images are meaningful to you. And that's the only audience the vast majority of camera owners really need to please.
Here's one last thought experiment on this topic. Consider the countless millions of sports event photographs made by professionals each year (each WEEK). The basketball player making the lay-up against grim-faced defenders. The race car rounding a turn. A soccer goal being scored. Every single one of those images is cliché yet news agencies spend millions each year to capture them over and over and over again. Why?
Just take the best pictures that make you happy and fuggettabout "cliché".
Posted by: Kenneth Tanaka | Thursday, 04 June 2015 at 10:52 AM
Get the clichés out of your system by deliberately going into cliché mode when you approach a new subject. Shoot the obvious image and then make your brain and your eyes work on getting better ones.
Posted by: Alan Hill | Thursday, 04 June 2015 at 02:05 PM