Reaction to apparently distracting elements!
I find the vehicle in the background very distracting.
Michael,
I agree, but I allow for the artist's intent, or else everyone should make photographs with our own unquestionably good guidelines.
However, there are schools of photography that echew even removing a dented cola can from a otherwise pristine wedding picture, as they strive for "the truth".
Maggie Terlackie, one of our OPF photographers, often quotes the late Leonard Cohen's poetry
"There's a crack, a crack in everything. That's where the light comes in!"
So for in this instance, the kind of "out of place", distracting element as the truck, could add contrast, absurdity, or an opening for a testing of some accepted ideas we take for granted, or it could be simply poor taste.
I am generous and humble about these things. After all, my own lack of immediate appreciation might be down to inexperience. There may be a new range of ideation that I am not yet qualified or interlectually or culturally prepared to entertain right now.
To really appreciate heads by Picasso one might need to already be familiar with the work by Matisse that inspired him!
Not that I put these pictures on the same rare plane of achievement. Rather I am constantly aware that art appreciation has many dependencies that I might not have experienced as yet. So while I might say, "Why on earth didn't you clone away that distracting truck?" I won't declare that the photograph is fatally flawed. However, I might do that if the photographer's explanation seems absurd!
Asher