Is it really important to explain which camp you fall under, and how it informs your work?
When I was getting my Masters in Architecture, there was this huge change going on in the architecture department... moving from the modernist and classical schools of architectural education to a more philosophy-based education stance. I loved it. The faculty members on both sides of the isle hated each other as both sides viewed the other in exclusionary terms. In simple terms, the philosophical guys were big into "intent" whereas the more old-school professors were about modernist visual convention and construction. The new-school guys looked at "intent" as some holy grail of design. Strangely, though, we would work on projects.... post them to be critiqued... get grilled by both sides... and THEN, I would invariably ask "why is intention so important when it, too, comes from the nether regions of my mind... like any other idea?".
I never could get an answer...
I'm not doing a good job explaining this... but I guess what I'm saying is that all camps, artistically, seem valid to me. If you asked me to align myself with one, it would be on the Gursky side of things... love his work and what it says to me. But, in the end, the moment rules the day and if someone gets a beautiful experience (for them) out of photographing those old rocks in the West, so be it. Gursky's art still seems comes from something inner that drives and informs his work... but is that any no more "valid" than the impulse driving the modern photographers in the Aesthetic-school?
That impulse just comes from a different place and may or may not lead to something "original"... and isn't experience what art is about, regardless of camp?
I excitedly look forward, however, to Tim's guests' posts... looks like it'll be a great series!