#4IMAG001W

[hannahmatthewswestminster]

i’ve looked to Nan Goldin to gain more inspiration for my project in representing and photographing a group of individuals/subcultures, to show their personalities and characteristics through an image. Her images are so powerful in communicating life and expression, so looking to her work is an inspiring motivator. She’s known for her deeply candid and personal portraiture

“for me it is not a detachment to take a picture. It’s a way of touching somebody- it’s a caress. I think that you can actually give people access to their own soul” - nan goldin

a beautiful way to look at portraiture of the people who surround you and bless you throughout your life. The people you meet along the way of your own personal journey

[elsaruffieux]

Street Photography: Imaging the Social Landscape

Neil Matheson’s lecture - 03.10.2018

Colin Westerbeck and Joel Sternfield define Street Photography as ‘picture of people who are going about their business unaware of the photographer’s presence … candid pictures of everyday life in the street’. (Bystander. A History of Street Photography, 1994)

When we are photographing someone, as photographer (especially in street photography) we have a certain power of representation over our subject. From not being aware, they automatically don’t have any control over what we decide to photograph. But if they do know they are being photographed, they take control and will show whatever they’ll want to communicate. Photographing someone blind, could be a way to keep “the power” over the image, after it might not be really ethical.

Philip-Lorca DiCorcia, Heads, 1999-2001. André Kertész, Meudon, 1928

‘I just go and watch the people and photograph them  and try to do it so people see me … it’s a way of photographing. It’s very quick … That’s one of the reasons I think the picture succeed. None of [the subjects] is really conscious of the camera’   Robert Frank

We can also find narrative in many street photography images, often the viewer will make his own narrative when reading the image. The use of visual rhetoric will make images more interesting to look at.

Vivian Maier, Untitled,  n.d. Robert Frank, Drug store, Detroit, 1955,  from The Americans, 1958.

Henri Cartier-Bresson

Author of ‘The Decisive Moment’ (Image a la sauvette) and very well-known photographer. He used to find an interesting place and wait for something to happen. His composition was always really thought through and the fact that Cartier-Bresson trained as an artist before taking on photography is visible in his work. He used to work with a 35mm camera and a wide angle lens. Cartier-Bresson had an sort of way to humanised any of his subjects.

Henri Cartier-Bresson, Hyères, France, 1932.

Subway Photographs

Many street photographers such as Walker Evans, Helen Levitt or even Bruce Davidson have tried to photograph people in the underground. This started to raised issue about consent. There was this idea of invisibility that I guess is still seek nowadays.

Walker Evans, Subway Passenger, New York, 1941. Philip-Lorca DiCorcia, Igor, 1987.

[laurenejohnson99]

LEE FRIEDLANDER - vast body or work,  I'm interesting mainly in his images which include reflections e.g. shop windows looking like double exposures and images where peoples limbs/body parts are obstructed by things in the street e.g. lamp-posts. The window reflections offer an image which included both what you see from he photographers point of view and what can be seen from the other side of the glass, presence of the surrounding. 

[jsitarz]

Doing my monthly press review...

Mojo, January 2018

and realizing that this picture is everything I want to do in my future

[sianmarsden]

Shizuka Yokomizo - Dear Stranger (1998-2000)

Dear Stranger, I am an artist working on a photographic project which involves people I do not know…I would like to take a photograph of you standing in your front room from the street in the evening. A camera will be set outside the window on the street. If you do not mind being photographed, please stand in the room and look into the camera through the window for 10 minutes on __-__-__ (date and time)…I will take your picture and then leave…we will remain strangers to each other…If you do not want to get involved, please simply draw your curtains to show your refusal…I really hope to see you from the window.

This series by Yokomizo was done by sending people a letter explaining her project and asking them to stand in their window at a certain date and time if they wanted to participate and if not to merely close their curtains. 

In my opinion the way Yokomizo executated this project makes it extremely unique and intriguing as she never really had any proper communication/interaction with her subjects and she merely saw a snapshot of their life through a window. 

[gambinijournal]

Reflections, reflections....I’m obsessed with them. One day I shall collect all my ‘reflections images’ into one album. This is the recent one from the 2nd of January 2018!

[jack-stalker]

Lewis Baltz 

In order to research Baltz and his techniques i have looked into “New Industrial Parks near Irvine”

For this i have been consumed by the actual images them self's due to there depth and complexity despite the simple nature of these images. Shown above are some of my favourite images from his series. 

After reviewing these images it is clear that they have all are very carefully thought about and meticulously obsessed over to composure ensuring that all features within the image fit in and are balanced. As i feel that the main reason to his success if that due to such balance he has made not one clear subject more so multiple subjects that all build up one and other the build an idea. So much of this image is left for the viewer to interpret seeming unguided by the photographer, fulled not but shoving a subject in front of the viewer but more so sparking curiosity which encourages attention and further thought. 

Also i have read the book “LEWIS BALTZ TEXTS” which shows the writing of Lewis Baltz as he discusses his of works. This was very interesting to see his opinion on the images and understanding the reasoning for their production.

I feel that i can apply this to my images by building scenes within my photographs which use some of the techniques discussed so that the viewer is starved as to the context of the bins that they and encouraged by curiosity to strip the image of its details to build what/where the are. 

[elsaruffieux]

Split Grade and Dodge and Burn

We learned how to practise those two technic in the darkroom, which I both used for my final print. I used the first photo I printed in the darkroom as the window in it could use some retouched.

I started with three test strip: 1 using the grade 0, another one using the grade 2.5 and the last one using grade 5.

I selected with Rachel’s help the right exposure for both the grade 0 and 5. I printed three different version of it, trying to add some dodging and burning.

[iriswu1997-blog]

Martin Purr Louvre, Paris, France,2012

[erinaimeeabbott]

Wolfgang Tillmans

Wolfgang Tillmans is a German Photographer who is notorious for his still life images. Much like the other photographers I have researched, Tillman’s concept of absence and presence is very similar to the other photographers as he uses still life to reflect the absence of people while showing life within each image- by taking imagery of used items etc.

[sarawitek]

Chernobyl and Auschwitz.

[jsitarz]

Show me your soul: outcome

[anastasiachristou]

The photographer that has inspired me with his work for my next project is Robert Polidori. His exhibition Versailles made me see a different perspective to photography. All the details in his images and the vibrant colors makes them stand out even more.  As I am photographing Greek Orthodox churches my aim is to work in a similar way to Robert Polidori, and capture every detail that will make my pictures more interesting. There’s only one difference; I’m shooting with B&W film instead of color.

[gambinijournal]

[charlottehghs]

When discussing absence and presence, and time, light & space on our first lecture, I discovered photographer Ori Gersht. I loved those two photographs by him. I Iike the way the majority of the photograph is empty yet there's so much to it. And down at the bottom of the image are a few tiny details that give away the whole city that's lying right beneath the sky. With nothing he manages to show two entirely different worlds. His work has inspired me a lot for the absence and presence project we have been assigned.