What properties are more fundamental to a photograph than light and shadow? In his essay, "Is Photography a Plastic Art?", Jean-Claude Lemagny states that "continuous encounters between light and shadow result in new meanings". I came across this essay in an anthology called Poetics of Space edited by Steve Yates.
Further along in the essay, Lemagny writes what I think is a better sentence: "Photography is the art of making a concrete substance out of the nothingness of shadow." It will take me a few rolls of film and at least a half a dozen memory cards to get to grips with that idea.
There's much more to be learned from this essay, such as the intimate connection between photography and sculpture.
Expose for the shadows is a well known rule of thumb from the days of film. But after reading Lemagny's essay, I think it probably can be applied to the medium of photography in general.
