Blurry?

Joerg just posted the following over at Conscientious:

Word on the street in Berlin has it that there's a massive reorganization going on in Düsseldorf. Apparently, the students were required to sell all their large-format equipment and to instead use Holga toy cameras. Several people independently told me about this, and over the past few days I have been trying to get this confirmed in Düsseldorf (where I know some people). All I managed to find out is that in all of Düsseldorf, Holgas are completely sold out! Apparently, some students are trying to figure out whether using a "Colour Sampler" camera will do - I guess habits are hard to break?!

I've always had an issue with blurry photography, including that which comes out of toy cameras. My eyes don't see that way. In fact they see much more crisply than my 5D. Photography for me is a way of entering an alternate reality, but one which is believable. My mother took it a step farther when we were at Photo LA and said, "I don't like these photos where part of the image is blurry (DOF). My eyes don't see that way." I tried to explain that they do actually, but she was having none of it.

Roger Ballen said in an interview that I read recently that he shoots around f8-11 because that's how the eyes see.

It seems odd to me that Dusseldorf would be rejecting new technology and large format in favor of hazy images. I have a deep hunch that the next great generation of photographers will comprise those who embrace the new technology and innovate with it as never before, not reject it. After all, isn't the history of the medium one of innovation and an embrace of that? Then again, daguerrotypes are amazing but they're a far stretch from images made with a Holga.