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Week 8

The book by Martin Barnes - the Shadow Catches: Camera-less Photography (Merrell 2012) Highlights the use of imagery by imprinting ‘shadows’ on light-sensitive paper, a technique familiar with camera-less photography. A simple process of restricting light in patches to form light and dark and thus an image of a sort, a shadow, and light.

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An example of a New Matter photographer - Kate Robertson. Kate lives and works out of Melbourne. The dust landscapes, a medicinal plant of Siwai are of particular interest. Kate was a part of the New Matter Exhibition mentioned in Week 8 - at the NSW Art Gallery in Sydney which ended in February 2017. 

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Week 8 Analogue and Alternative Processes in the Contemporary Context

I have provided some links for you to begin your research. This is only a starting point, feel free to go further.

Shadow Catchers – Camera-less Photography

https://vimeo.com/13149612

https://www.creativereview.co.uk/shadow-catchers-at-the-va/

http://www.vam.ac.uk/content/articles/c/camera-less-photography-artists/

Light Paper Process: Reinventing Photography

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OtZIgjRY-mk

http://www.getty.edu/art/exhibitions/process/

http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/arts/la-et-cm-ca-light-paper-process-getty-photo-show-20150503-story.html

Emanations: The Art of The Cameraless Photograph

http://www.govettbrewster.com/exhibitions/emanations-the-art-of-the-cameraless-photograph

https://artblart.com/2016/07/31/exhibition-emanations-at-the-govett-brewster-art-gallery-new-plymouth-new-zealand-part-1/

New Matter- Recent Forms of photography

https://www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au/collection/works/?exhibition_id=7312

https://www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au/artsets/qdrle3

[1] Batchen, Each Wild Idea - Writing, Photography, History. Pg. 137

[2] Baker is paraphrasing Rosalind Krauss’s position from the 1979 paper Sculpture in the Expanded Field.

George Baker, "Photography's Expanded Field," OCTOBER, no. 114 (2005). P. 136

[3] Ibid. P. 138

[4] Virginia Heckert, Light, Paper, Process: Reinventing Photography (J. Paul Getty Museum, 2015).

[5] Batchen, Emanations: The Art of the Cameraless Photograph. Pg. 47

[6] Martin Barnes, Shadow Catchers: Camera-Less Photography (Merrell, 2012).

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Week 9 Contemporary Practitioners of Alternative Process Photography

The Anthotype

Brandt’s experiments incorporating unconventional materials into the photographic process is by no means new. As we know, the photographic pioneers tried an endless list of strange concoctions in their hunt fir the perfect medium.

Our old friend Sir John Herschel, the inventor of the Cyanotype process, photographic fixer, and coiner of terms negative and positive, also discovered the Anthotype process.

This process involves making a photographic emulsion out of crushed organic matter. All plants are light sensitive, as they draw their energy from the sun through the process of photosynthesis. Herschel began exploring with the light-sensitive properties of plants around 1942. Plant matter is crushed and mixed with a solvent like alcohol. Once combined, the emulsion is coated onto paper and left to dry in the dark. The coated paper can than be used with a positive transparency, or some other material. When placed in strong sunlight, the UV light will bleach out the exposed areas, leaving the impression of whatever was covering the coated surface.

Fixing an Anthotype is difficult as the image remains light sensitive. It is recommended that the results are scanned digitally, or stored in a dark box and viewed in subdued light.

A full step-by-step account of this process can be found here. http://www.alternativephotography.com/anthotypes-making-print-using-plants/

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Week 9 Contemporary Practitioners of Alternative Process Photography

SCANOGRAPHY

Courtney Johnson’s practice introduces a relatively new piece of photographic technology to our discussion of analogue processes. The digital image scanner.

The digital scanner follows many of the same processes of the digital camera, using light, mirrors, lenses and digital sensors to measure the colour and intensity of light and convert it to computational data, which in turn can be converted into pixel data to form a visual image. In many ways, the digital scanner is a camera taking another form. It is a relatively new tool in the photographer’s toolbox, yet artists have discovered that even the most basic office document scanner to create fascinating images.

Unlike camera-based images, scanners do not capture depth. The uniform distribution of light and the close proximity of the lens creates a relatively flat image. Depending on the quality of the scanner, you will be able to increase the resolution of your scans to capture great detail. Some scanners are capable of capturing almost microscopic details when an image is enlarged in post-production.

Scanography is similar to many other photographic processes, following largely same principles of calotype to the cliché-verre (although digital). The image content is prepared on the glass bed of the scanner and an image is made. Thanks to digital processing software, these images can be inverted between positive and negative, digitally manipulated, resized and printed. The subject matter of scanograms is limited only by your imagination. Artists have used their scanners to create botanical studies, abstractions, portraits, collages, glitch art, images of liquids… just to name a few. Also, don’t be afraid to experiment with movement on the scanner bed.

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Week 11- PHOTOGRAPHIC COLLAGE | PHOTOMONTAGE

ACTIVITY

The scanogram images that you have been posting to TUMBLR are fantastic. This process can be adapted to use existing images as well. In many ways, Collage/Montage pair nicely with the digital scanner. It allows you to make and capture compositions quickly, without the need to permanently fix your raw material.

Students may like to try cutting images out of magazines, newspapers or junk mail and arrange some collages straight onto the scanner bed.

Others may prefer the more tactile nature of cutting and pasting printed images - or the more digitally inclined may like to work with found images and manipulate them digitally.

Wagga Wagga based artist (and former SCCI student), Adele Packer, utilises all of these methods in her creative practice. Notice how effective and jarring it is to juxtapose a well-known image with something completely from left field?

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Week 11 Photographic Collage - Photomontage

Thought this was a good combination, hope not too politically incorrect!

Anne Pacey

Canberra

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http://www.photography-now.com/exhibition/22276

Triptychs - Interesting and thought to provoke. Thinking outside the comfort zone, think abstract, not literal. Start thinking like a photographer instead of snap shots. 

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Week 8 Scanography

This is a great way to produce well inspiring images. This one Daffodils dead and alive from the back garden. I left the lid up on the scanner, sort of given it a depth to the image. Hmm, will try some more!

Anne Pacey

Canberra

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Week 8

Why do you think there has been a rise in the practice of alternative and analogue processes? Do you think that it is a rejection of the omnipresence of digital technology?

Is it a nostalgic gesture to the aesthetic of the past?

Are people interested in just slowing down and making something with their own hands? What was the motivation that drove your interest in analogue and alternative processes?

STUDENT TASK.

Your task this week is to research some of the artists featured in the exhibitions mentioned above. Choose an artist that you are particularly drawn to, explain what about their practice is appealing to you and try to discover why they are drawn to the process they use.

Post your response to the TUMBLR page.

I have provided some links for you to begin your research. This is only a starting point, feel free to go further.

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Shadow Catchers: Camera-less Photography - Garry Fabian Miller

Week 8 PDF’s 

https://www.creativereview.co.uk/shadow-catchers-at-the-va/

https://www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au/collection/works/?exhibition_id=7312

https://www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au/artsets/qdrle3

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https://www.creativereview.co.uk/shadow-catchers-at-the-va/

http://www.vam.ac.uk/content/articles/c/camera-less-photography-artists/

21.9.2017

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https://vimeo.com/13149612

Week 8 Documentary - water, shadow catchers - cameraless photography

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Blueprint to cyanotypes - e-book in Pdf format

Alternative Photography: Art and Artists, Edition I - e-book in Pdf format

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Anthotypes - e-book in Pdf format

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21.9.2017

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https://www.theguardian.com/education/teacher-blog/2013/nov/04/photography-amnesty-international