0:00:09.514,0:00:13.037
If you happen to like[br]beautiful photographs,

0:00:13.037,0:00:16.524
you probably won't like[br]what I am going to say

0:00:16.524,0:00:18.924
therefore, let's start where it all began,

0:00:18.924,0:00:22.601
sometimes it makes it easier[br]to think along.

0:00:22.601,0:00:26.313
For me, it started with the work[br]of a photographer;

0:00:26.313,0:00:27.656
Arsath Ro'is,

0:00:27.656,0:00:29.732
he worked for the Amsterdam municipality

0:00:29.732,0:00:31.957
a civil servant,

0:00:31.957,0:00:36.041
and his job was to record[br]the changing city.

0:00:36.041,0:00:39.019
Every morning he would take his moped

0:00:39.019,0:00:43.708
and drive to the outskirts of Amsterdam -

0:00:44.708,0:00:47.009
where the buildings sites were

0:00:47.009,0:00:52.374
and the tunnels were dug[br]and the ring road was built -

0:00:55.051,0:00:57.355
There was always[br]a lot of sand in his pictures

0:00:57.355,0:01:00.022
and that's why the civil servants[br]he worked with,

0:01:00.022,0:01:03.903
called him the "sand photographer."

0:01:03.903,0:01:06.470
You probably noticed already

0:01:06.470,0:01:10.081
that there is a moped in every image -

0:01:10.081,0:01:12.763
the story goes like this:

0:01:12.763,0:01:16.036
one day Arsath Ro'is was taking a photo[br]on a building site,

0:01:16.036,0:01:20.497
and he was just focusing[br]on his camera and the subject,

0:01:20.497,0:01:23.456
and behind his back[br]somebody was stealing his moped.

0:01:23.456,0:01:28.545
(Laugher)

0:01:28.545,0:01:32.936
And he swore never to leave[br]his moped out of sight.

0:01:32.936,0:01:42.632
(Laugher)

0:01:42.632,0:01:44.441
So, what have we got here:

0:01:44.441,0:01:48.027
we've got very[br]straightforward photography,

0:01:48.027,0:01:52.233
there are no artistic ambitions.

0:01:52.233,0:01:56.128
Arsath Ro'is was not interested[br]in taking interesting photographs,

0:01:56.128,0:01:57.629
he just wanted to do his job

0:01:57.629,0:02:01.827
and he didn't want[br]his moped to be stolen again.

0:02:01.827,0:02:06.333
And that is what makes him so authentic.

0:02:07.579,0:02:10.299
Now I'll mention a photographer

0:02:10.315,0:02:12.382
with artistic ambitions:

0:02:12.382,0:02:17.219
there was a time that I was[br]a photographer with artistic ambitions -

0:02:17.219,0:02:19.387
(Laughter)

0:02:19.387,0:02:22.262
You know, I had shows in galleries,[br]and in museums,

0:02:22.262,0:02:24.018
I made books, there were concepts,

0:02:24.018,0:02:30.099
and projects and themes[br]and series and subjects -

0:02:30.099,0:02:34.561
I could have bought a moped

0:02:34.561,0:02:36.434
(Laughter)

0:02:36.434,0:02:38.614
and put it in every image that I took

0:02:38.614,0:02:42.063
I could have adopted a surrealistic style,[br]a straight forward style,

0:02:42.063,0:02:44.031
I even could have had success with it,

0:02:44.031,0:02:47.086
but it would have been[br]just another concept,

0:02:47.086,0:02:49.021
it would have been fake,

0:02:49.021,0:02:52.785
and would not have been authentic at all.

0:02:52.785,0:02:56.037
Isn't is weird that somebody[br]working for the municipality

0:02:56.037,0:02:59.021
is more authentic[br]than an artist may ever be?

0:02:59.021,0:03:05.258
Mind you, a civil servant,[br]working from 9 to 5.

0:03:09.135,0:03:12.011
There are two things[br]that you can conclude from this:

0:03:12.011,0:03:17.037
one thing is, it's dangerous[br]to have artistic ambitions,

0:03:17.037,0:03:19.711
they may prevent you from being authentic;

0:03:19.711,0:03:22.341
second, if you really want[br]to make interesting pictures,

0:03:22.341,0:03:25.070
you shouldn't want to make them.

0:03:25.070,0:03:27.781
Do you want me to repeat that?

0:03:27.781,0:03:32.141
(Laughter)

0:03:32.141,0:03:34.993
So, after I saw the work of Arsath Ro'is

0:03:34.993,0:03:38.133
and I realised what it meant,

0:03:38.133,0:03:40.032
I dropped the projects and the concepts,

0:03:40.032,0:03:45.117
and the themes and the series[br]and the subjects -

0:03:45.117,0:03:48.782
I sold my equipment,

0:03:51.059,0:03:54.939
I threw away half of my negatives,

0:03:54.939,0:03:57.621
and the rest I sold[br]to the Dutch Photo Museum,

0:03:57.621,0:03:59.388
Nederlands Fotomuseum,

0:03:59.388,0:04:01.049
and I persuaded them to put it

0:04:01.049,0:04:05.312
downloadable for free[br]on their web site, high [resolution]

0:04:05.312,0:04:09.059
so you could make prints like this of it.

0:04:09.059,0:04:11.039
Sometimes people send me a picture

0:04:11.039,0:04:14.535
of what they have done with my picture -

0:04:14.535,0:04:20.110
(Laughter)

0:04:20.110,0:04:22.084
it may look that I'd done this

0:04:22.084,0:04:24.004
all in a whim,

0:04:24.004,0:04:26.030
but in fact it took me years to do it.

0:04:26.030,0:04:28.045
But, man, what a relief.

0:04:28.045,0:04:31.794
Finally I could see what there is to see.

0:04:31.794,0:04:34.555
Most photography is not about[br]seeing what there is to see,

0:04:34.555,0:04:36.775
most photography is about[br]presenting the world

0:04:36.775,0:04:39.267
in a well composed way

0:04:39.267,0:04:42.219
and that is not easy to do,[br]because the world is very chaotic,

0:04:42.219,0:04:45.025
and you have to be very skilled[br]as a photographer to do it;

0:04:45.025,0:04:47.400
and when you do it[br]as a photographer, people say:

0:04:47.400,0:04:49.789
"You are a good photographer![br]Look at this image,

0:04:49.789,0:04:53.379
what a beautiful image,[br]it's almost like a painting" -

0:04:53.379,0:04:55.817
(Laughter)

0:04:55.817,0:04:58.579
And it's not a modern painting[br]it's not Andy Warhol,

0:04:58.579,0:05:04.361
it's old-fashioned, 17th,[br]18th century, 19th century painting.

0:05:04.361,0:05:09.872
In 1816, a French naval ship[br]named "The Medusa"

0:05:09.872,0:05:13.023
sank to the bottom of the sea,

0:05:13.023,0:05:18.307
and 147 seamen managed to get on a raft.

0:05:18.307,0:05:20.267
They floated around for two weeks,

0:05:20.267,0:05:24.308
many died, and eventually 15 seamen[br]were saved.

0:05:24.308,0:05:26.937
Two years later, in 1818,

0:05:26.937,0:05:33.907
the French painter,[br]Theodore Gericault painted this ordeal.

0:05:33.907,0:05:37.872
And now we go to 2008,

0:05:37.872,0:05:40.715
Georgian army invaded South Ossetia,

0:05:40.715,0:05:44.222
the Russian army expelled them very soon,

0:05:44.222,0:05:46.561
and this is a picture of soldiers

0:05:46.561,0:05:49.614
retreating from South Ossetia --

0:05:49.614,0:05:51.625
You see the connection?

0:05:51.625,0:05:53.709
I can show a lot of pictures like this,

0:05:53.709,0:05:56.166
with all this connection[br]between painting and photography,

0:05:56.166,0:05:59.097
but I'm not going to do it,[br]I trust that you think alone.

0:05:59.097,0:06:01.050
I'll only show this one:

0:06:01.050,0:06:04.268
a picture I made myself in 1998,

0:06:04.268,0:06:08.117
it is very popular,[br]people like it very much,

0:06:08.117,0:06:10.283
it's the most downloaded from the internet

0:06:10.283,0:06:13.638
of the web site[br]of the Nederlands Fotomuseum.

0:06:13.638,0:06:16.497
Do you know why people like this picture?

0:06:16.497,0:06:19.041
Because it resembles almost every picture

0:06:19.041,0:06:21.173
of Caspar David Friedrich.

0:06:21.173,0:06:25.390
(Laughter)

0:06:26.882,0:06:29.007
And it's not on purpose[br]that people like it,

0:06:29.007,0:06:31.091
it's not on purpose[br]that I made it this way,

0:06:31.091,0:06:32.821
it's unaware,

0:06:32.821,0:06:35.227
it's something we carry around with us,

0:06:35.227,0:06:38.608
it's our cultural history.

0:06:40.824,0:06:43.628
And of course in the beginning[br]I liked it when people said:

0:06:43.628,0:06:44.964
this is a beautiful picture,

0:06:44.964,0:06:46.504
you are a good photographer.

0:06:46.504,0:06:48.950
But there came a moment that I thought,

0:06:48.950,0:06:50.801
I want to see what there is to see

0:06:50.801,0:06:53.010
and not be dictated[br]by painting all the time,

0:06:53.010,0:06:57.268
old fashioned painting all the time.

0:06:57.268,0:07:00.992
Can photography have a beauty of its own?

0:07:00.992,0:07:04.903
And if beauty is too much to ask,

0:07:04.903,0:07:07.664
can it be interesting on its own?

0:07:07.664,0:07:11.009
Interesting - if you really want[br]to make interesting pictures,

0:07:11.009,0:07:14.033
you shouldn't try to make them.

0:07:14.033,0:07:16.522
So I stopped -

0:07:19.783,0:07:23.212
This is a photography that falls[br]on your doormat every week,

0:07:23.212,0:07:27.066
it is inside the leaflets[br]of the supermarkets.

0:07:27.066,0:07:31.992
This is how supermarkets[br]present the meat they offer,

0:07:31.992,0:07:35.737
anybody thinking about photography now?

0:07:35.737,0:07:38.399
Now you think of meat!

0:07:38.399,0:07:40.787
This photography is so uninteresting,

0:07:40.787,0:07:43.761
that you forget photography,[br]you just think about the subject.

0:07:43.761,0:07:46.672
and that is what makes it[br]interesting to me.

0:07:46.672,0:07:50.515
(Laughter)

0:07:50.515,0:07:52.773
There is a big realm of things

0:07:52.773,0:07:56.536
to discover in this area of photography.

0:07:56.536,0:08:00.553
These are the ones I love the most.

0:08:00.553,0:08:05.621
Everybody should have[br]this picture on his desk,

0:08:05.621,0:08:08.279
then you don't have to[br]crack your brain anymore

0:08:08.279,0:08:11.125
which size is bigger: A4, A3, A6 -

0:08:11.125,0:08:13.715
(Laughter)

0:08:13.715,0:08:18.829
So, I started to collect[br]this kind of photography,

0:08:20.044,0:08:22.568
but then I had to move[br]to a smaller apartment,

0:08:22.568,0:08:25.217
I mean, I was a photographer,[br]I stopped photographies,

0:08:25.217,0:08:28.027
it is going to cost you --

0:08:28.873,0:08:32.721
And to fit in myself,[br]I had to throw away a lot of stuff,

0:08:32.721,0:08:35.583
and in the meantime,[br]the piles of uninteresting photographs

0:08:35.583,0:08:37.243
were getting bigger and bigger,

0:08:37.243,0:08:40.062
should I throw away the piles[br]of uninteresting photographs,

0:08:40.062,0:08:41.221
or should I throw away

0:08:41.221,0:08:46.041
the puppets my mother made[br]in the old-peoples home?

0:08:46.041,0:08:48.373
Every time she made a puppet -

0:08:48.373,0:08:52.749
(Laughter)

0:08:53.426,0:08:58.079
I'm just going to put a jacket[br]on the remaining time.

0:08:58.079,0:09:05.382
(Laughter) (Applause)

0:09:05.382,0:09:06.947
Every time she made a puppet,

0:09:06.947,0:09:08.838
she would show it to me and then said:

0:09:08.838,0:09:11.099
"Do you like it?" "Mom, it's great!"

0:09:11.099,0:09:14.290
and then she said, of course,[br]"Do you want to have it?"

0:09:14.290,0:09:16.796
and I said, "Yes, I'd really like[br]to have it."

0:09:16.796,0:09:19.058
So I got lots of this puppets in my house,

0:09:19.058,0:09:23.499
I held them above the bin,[br]but I couldn't let loose.

0:09:23.499,0:09:26.006
It felt like betraying my mother's memory.

0:09:26.006,0:09:29.784
Then I thought, memory,[br]isn't photography about memory?

0:09:29.784,0:09:32.464
So I bought a camera again,

0:09:32.464,0:09:34.757
took pictures of the puppets of my mother,

0:09:34.757,0:09:38.488
held them above the bin[br]and could let loose.

0:09:38.488,0:09:42.599
In that way I managed[br]to throw away a lot of stuff.

0:09:42.599,0:09:44.656
(Laughter)

0:09:44.656,0:09:46.006
This is a childhood rocket,

0:09:46.006,0:09:48.137
I mean, what does a big grown up man

0:09:48.137,0:09:50.189
do with this stuff that is for children -

0:09:50.189,0:09:53.264
I didn't throw it away, I gave it away.

0:09:53.264,0:09:55.078
This is my television set,

0:09:55.078,0:09:57.659
people of the television area[br]don't have to worry,

0:09:57.659,0:09:59.354
it is not going to be any E-trend,

0:09:59.354,0:10:02.010
because it was taken away in a minute.

0:10:02.010,0:10:06.262
I wrote on it : "Steal in order."

0:10:08.062,0:10:11.037
And then I got a phone call[br]from Foam Magazine,

0:10:11.037,0:10:15.225
it is an international,[br]notorious photography magazine,

0:10:15.225,0:10:22.348
and they said, "We heard that you are[br]in the possession of a camera again,"

0:10:22.348,0:10:24.496
I said, "Yes, I have to confess,

0:10:24.496,0:10:26.588
I am in the possession of a camera again."

0:10:26.588,0:10:28.135
"What do you do with it?"

0:10:28.135,0:10:31.005
I said, "Well, I just take pictures[br]of things I throw away,"

0:10:31.005,0:10:32.566
(Laughter)

0:10:32.566,0:10:36.436
And they said, "We would like to see it"

0:10:36.436,0:10:42.049
And before I knew,[br]I had 24 pages in this magazine

0:10:42.049,0:10:44.015
on things I threw away.

0:10:44.015,0:10:49.835
(Applause)

0:10:52.143,0:10:54.008
This, I didn't throw away,

0:10:54.008,0:10:56.262
I found out that you can use[br]photography also

0:10:56.262,0:11:00.842
to prevent you from buying things[br]you don't really need.

0:11:00.842,0:11:04.911
(Laughter)

0:11:04.911,0:11:06.073
Yeah.

0:11:06.073,0:11:09.955
I managed to postpone[br]buying this computer for a year,

0:11:09.955,0:11:15.352
I just waited until a spilled[br]a cup of coffee on the old one.

0:11:15.352,0:11:19.999
And it was published[br]in the beginning of 2008,

0:11:19.999,0:11:24.027
the title was[br]"Photography against consumerism."

0:11:24.027,0:11:27.693
A few months later,[br]the credit crisis started,

0:11:27.693,0:11:32.058
so you can see what you can achieve[br]with photography?

0:11:32.058,0:11:35.378
If you skip the painting -

0:11:35.378,0:11:37.729
So, I was back in business again,[br]but not really,

0:11:37.729,0:11:39.533
I was not really back in business,

0:11:39.533,0:11:42.115
because I wasn't going to look[br]for the next subject,

0:11:42.115,0:11:44.966
and project, and theme[br]and series and whatever,

0:11:44.966,0:11:47.350
it just happened[br]that I wanted to throw away stuff

0:11:47.350,0:11:49.108
and photography seemed to help,

0:11:49.108,0:11:50.767
so I just took pictures of it,

0:11:50.767,0:11:53.521
I wasn't interested[br]in making interesting pictures,

0:11:53.521,0:11:57.004
I was just interested[br]in throwing away stuff.

0:11:57.004,0:11:58.688
So, then you start wondering,

0:11:58.688,0:12:01.594
"What makes a picture interesting?"

0:12:01.594,0:12:05.127
Do you think[br]this is an interesting picture?

0:12:05.127,0:12:08.016
It was taken half a year ago,

0:12:08.016,0:12:12.479
a boy shot in a school,[br]teachers and fellow students

0:12:12.479,0:12:14.739
and then he shot himself,

0:12:14.739,0:12:18.425
and among the things[br]people put in front of the school,

0:12:18.425,0:12:21.054
there was this panel in the background

0:12:21.054,0:12:25.085
in English it says, "God, where were you?"

0:12:25.085,0:12:29.860
Well, those questions[br]are not easy to answer.

0:12:30.983,0:12:32.976
There was another question as well,

0:12:32.976,0:12:35.265
"Warum", which means "Why", in English,

0:12:35.265,0:12:39.600
which is even more difficult to answer,

0:12:39.600,0:12:44.330
and here we have[br]the mysterious creator of this panels

0:12:44.330,0:12:46.296
by the looks of him,

0:12:46.296,0:12:50.305
he is not so interested[br]in answering the questions

0:12:50.305,0:12:54.083
but more in need of some attention.

0:12:54.083,0:12:56.358
And that is what he was going to get.

0:12:56.358,0:13:00.279
(Laughter)

0:13:01.956,0:13:04.784
But I was wondering -[br]I have seen this guy before -

0:13:04.784,0:13:07.384
and, do you know, the "R" in this panels

0:13:07.384,0:13:09.745
and the question mark are very strange?

0:13:09.745,0:13:12.124
in "Warum" as well,

0:13:12.124,0:13:14.745
So, I did some research[br]and I came across -

0:13:14.745,0:13:16.343
do you remember, a year ago,

0:13:16.343,0:13:19.029
this guy who put his daughter[br]in a basement

0:13:19.029,0:13:21.014
and made children with her in Austria? -

0:13:21.014,0:13:26.030
Frittzel - this is his house,

0:13:26.030,0:13:28.836
and this is the mysterious creator,

0:13:28.836,0:13:32.049
and now he writes,[br]"How ever could it come to this?"

0:13:32.049,0:13:34.030
and the "Warum" again is showed weirdly,

0:13:34.030,0:13:37.904
it's something like "not again."

0:13:37.904,0:13:40.100
And still, this was not his coming out,

0:13:40.100,0:13:45.077
his coming out was in 2007,[br]December the 17th,

0:13:45.077,0:13:48.010
it was also in Germany,

0:13:48.010,0:13:53.147
here, this woman had shot herself[br]and her children

0:13:53.147,0:13:55.970
and he put "Warum" and the old panels[br]in front of the house,

0:13:55.970,0:13:58.226
on the pavement,

0:13:58.226,0:14:03.341
and two days later he managed[br]to get them next to the door.

0:14:04.603,0:14:05.903
But this is not the end.

0:14:05.903,0:14:08.620
Do you remember this year Queen's Day?

0:14:08.620,0:14:11.284
The third of April,[br]this guy bumped into the crowd,

0:14:11.284,0:14:14.158
and bumped into the monuments,

0:14:14.158,0:14:17.062
among the things people put there

0:14:17.062,0:14:19.967
to show their sympathy -

0:14:19.967,0:14:24.130
(Laughter)

0:14:28.422,0:14:31.016
Well, in a purely aesthetical, formal way,

0:14:31.016,0:14:33.002
this is not beautiful photography,

0:14:33.002,0:14:35.006
but there is something else in it,

0:14:35.006,0:14:41.005
there is something to discover,[br]there is something to find.

0:14:41.005,0:14:43.004
And that is what we can call beauty too

0:14:43.004,0:14:44.586
but it's another kind of beauty,

0:14:44.586,0:14:46.932
it's not a beauty[br]of the old fashioned painting,

0:14:46.932,0:14:49.159
but it is a beauty[br]of the scientific discovery,

0:14:49.159,0:14:51.878
of the [mathemathical] formula,

0:14:51.878,0:14:56.219
of the simple solution[br]to a complicated problem,

0:14:56.219,0:14:59.065
of investigation.

0:14:59.065,0:15:02.007
And suddenly I found myself[br]writing for "De Volkskrant,"

0:15:02.007,0:15:05.041
it is a big dutch newspaper,

0:15:05.041,0:15:10.013
analysing pictures in this[br]investigative way that I just showed you.

0:15:10.013,0:15:15.453
And this is what I wrote[br]about the "Warum" guy

0:15:16.745,0:15:19.706
and I was very happy that every week

0:15:19.706,0:15:22.083
I could tell my story about photography

0:15:22.083,0:15:24.020
in a different, not-paintily way,

0:15:24.020,0:15:25.738
but it was one drawback,

0:15:25.738,0:15:27.936
and it was that I only could show[br]one picture

0:15:27.936,0:15:29.454
I couldn't show my research,

0:15:29.454,0:15:31.024
and then "De Volkskrant" came up

0:15:31.024,0:15:35.057
with a very simple solution[br]to this complicated problem.

0:15:35.057,0:15:39.681
They gave me two pages[br]instead of half a page,

0:15:39.681,0:15:44.242
so now I can analyze[br]complete stories on photography

0:15:49.412,0:15:51.471
I've got more space for my research

0:15:51.471,0:15:54.000
and I've got more space for myself,

0:15:54.000,0:15:56.035
because I earn a bit more money,

0:15:56.035,0:15:59.063
and I've moved to a bigger apartment.

0:15:59.063,0:16:00.186
Thank you very much.

0:16:00.186,0:16:02.373
(Applause)