not necessarily sour grapes

Art + Commerce sent out announcements today that the winners of their Peek 2007 competition had been selected. I'd entered but wasn't one of the 11 winners out of the 1200 or so who entered. It's always disappointing to get that email - "hey you're great, keep submitting, but unfortunately..."

I always go check out who won these things. And alot of the time, I just don't understand the criteria behind the selections. Obviously I'm partial to my own work ... but really, I'll study the selected images, consider technical merits, composition, tone, feel, subject matter. And for the most part, I'm just not seeing what the judges are. Not so much that I think - "oh, ok. THAT's why I wasn't in the running."

There's also a certain style that I see over and over again in competitions. I think it partially stems from the technical capabitilites of these super digital cameras - but the images are super sharp, super focused, evenly color-balanced, luminous colors really. A lot of subject matter seems to focus on the banal or the Eggleston-like snapshot - a crumbling brick wall in the city. Desolate night shots. Or a suburban lawn with a house at an odd angle. Moody clouds over a street sign. I don't know. Some lovely stuff, don't get me wrong, just... so much of it seems the same.

Anyway. I'll get back to critiquing my own stuff.