Artist Lectures

Patrick Kelley

His photographs capture his entire surroundings, 360 around and up and down. It is an impossible space because we cannot see all of this at once like the picture is showing. It must be manipulated on a computer. We have to move around to see everything and the only way for a camera to capture the entire space is to take multiple pictures. His work shows us everything, not just pieces like photographs usually do, so in a sense it is more realistic. If we were to go where the photo was taken, this is everything we would see, it is distorted, but it is everything. It does not really have a frame like a regular photograph, which only shows us one view of the place.

Richard Avedon Lecture

Frank Good year talked about how Avedon took his pictures and how he treated the people he photographed. It is interesting how he can capture such a personal portrait of someone when he only wanted a few minutes with the person and did not want to get to know him or her. He tried to have a "brief, intense intimacy" with each person and he did not tell them what to do or how to pose. I guess this could capture the truth of a person better than a posed portrait or one taken by someone who knows the person well because Avedon does not have any previous ideas of the person or who they are or should be in front of the cameras.

Paul Roth talked about Avedon's work and how it changed throughout his life. Avedon's pictures challenge people's belief that they know famous people. He photographed people when they were not at their best. His portraits were a surprise to the public because they usually saw famous people at their best.

"Annie Leibovitz at Work"

Here is a new a book by Annie Leibovitz from amazon.com

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0375505105/ref=amb_link_82707291_1?pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=right-1&pf_rd_r=1QGPH4BTFHB9ZK47VGWR&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=464184351&pf_rd_i=1

For the semester long project, my partner and I focused on watermen and the impact of development on their careers. We specifically looked at St. George's Island. It's about twenty minutes up on Rt. 5, a little bit past Tall Timbers. It is a really beautiful area that shows the change in the county. There are plent of nice, new houses built up next to old shacks that are falling apart. Its worth taking a trip up there.

Anyway, my partner and I interviewed a waterman, Shelley, whose family has been in the business for generations. My partner interviewed and I took a few pictures. During the interview, I was reminded of the Richard Avedon lecture. In the lecture, the speakers dicussed Avedon's tendency to photograph standing on the side of the camera to have a more personal shoot and capture more realistic portraits. I could definately sense that Shelley was conscious of my photographing, and I'm not sure that he was completely himself. I tried to get involved and make him feel more comfortable, and I could tell that he was beginning to relax by the end of the interview.

I was also reminded of the lecture when I printed the photographs and showed them to my partner. She was in the frame with Shelley, and some of the images which I thought captured the two of them best she disapproved of. This brings up the different motivation of the photographer and the subject. I wanted to capture the sene in which I thought that Shelley and my partner looked most natural and most like themselves. However, my partner was more interested in looking "good." This, from my experience, is very common. I think that, in this sense, it is hard to please everyone. The subject has a different perspective on the image and although the photograph may be wonderful by many standards, if the individual does not feel that they look their best, they will likely be unhappy. Kissinger, for example, asked Avedon to "please be kind to me" and various individuals were unhappy with their portraits. However, many of these portraits are seen as great photographs by other individuals. This is an interesting concept and it experiencing it first hand helped me to understand.

my gallery talk

This work is a series of photographs titled “Time Away.” Not all of the images in the series were displayed in the gallery today due to space restrictions. The photographs were produced by shooting with a medium format camera, scanning the negatives into the computer, and printing them using a laser inkjet printer. The images form a narrative without a concrete plot. Some of the images are portraits, while others come across more as landscape images with figures in them.

I understand this work as being about slowness of perception and careful awareness of our surroundings and about respite and a break from routine. My world, and almost everyone else’s, is chaotic and fast paced. I find myself longing for a chance to slow down and rest. I rest at night, yes, but I don’t rest my senses per say and I definitely don’t rest my mind because I am not slowing down enough. in we are constantly inundated with visual and other sensory information. This flood of easily attainable stimulation and information causes us to pay less attention to our surroundings. Why work to obtain information when so much is just given to us, almost forced upon us, via television, the internet, magazines, food packaging, etc? I fear that this phenomenon will expand to have more negative effects on our senses and ability to perceive. Thus, I aim to create photographs that give a sense of slowness that causes the viewer to engage with them more fully. With the work I am trying to call upon viewers to slow down, savor moments, and pay closer, more careful, attention. I often do this by eliminating information from a photograph by specifically highlighting through selective focus and cropping what I want the viewer to engage with.
(talk about focus in Kanga and Uphill- allows for confined reading, full experience of only one aspect)

I also want the images to convey a sense of rest, similar to that which is achieved on vacation. However, I do not want the images to read as snapshots that were or could have been taken on a vacation. During a critique it was brought up that the images were reading in this way because of their uniform size and printing. People felt as if the photographs were moments that had been captured and were being played back, as if in a filmstrip. In order to move away from that reading I though about how the way I present the work effects the meaning. For this exhibition, I am tackling this through size. Changing the sizes of some of the images helps to convey that they are more or less important to the series and in conveying my ideas. I think that changing the size of some of the images causes them to read less like snapshots because they will not be so repetitive, as snapshots from vacations often are. It also causes the reading of the series to slow down because the larger images will take longer to process.

I am taking on a more minimalist approach; give the audience minimal information and make them do work, in this case with their eyes. I don’t want to rock the viewer’s world by making a bold, loud image. I want the viewer to use their senses and become more invested in the world that is already present.

"Henri Cartier-Bresson: The Impassioned Eye" (2003)

Hello fellow photographers,

  I hope everyone's project is going smoothly.  Anyway, I watched this documentary on Henri Cartier-Bresson, exploring his life and work.  It tells the story of how his photographs shaped the emerging field of photojournalism. This is one documentary you won't want to miss!  Here is my response to the documentary:

Henri Cartier-Bresson photographs are from all over the world such as the United States, France, Germany, etc.  He was always interested in the actual shot.  He never enlarged the photo because he liked the original shot.  In my opinion, his images are so powerful and mysterious.  He focuses on capturing the perfect moment in time and place.  Other photographers in the documentary have learned a lot from looking at Cartier-Bresson's photographs.  One mentions that there is a mysterious link between the people and the things around them because his photographs, people are doing some kind of action.  In my opinion, one picture that I was attached to was the photograph of the children playing in front of the Berlin Wall.  There is this sense of innocence surrounding the reality of violence relating to the Berlin Wall.  

 

While running through his photographs, there is a musical feel to them.  Piano music is playing in the background throughout the documentary and there is one point where he is pretending to play the piano while look at his photographs, which was pretty interesting to me.  It is interesting to me because of the way he moves his head while look at the photographs; it is similar to how a person plays the piano.  The hands moving across each page of photographs relates to the hands moving across a piano.  It reminds me of the years I spent playing the piano as a young girl.  

 

Here is a quote from photographer Arthur Miller: "America is a place of extremes.  If you look at these extremes, it can be tragic."  Looking at his photographs taken in the United States, we are being reminded of our history and culture.  In my opinion, a lot of us may forget about our history and photography is an excellent reminder of that history.  Cartier-Bresson photographs every aspect of extremes Americans faced throughout history such as the Great Depression, World War II, segregation, etc.  I agree with what Miller says because it is both tragic and powerful to look at these photographs and be reminded of American history.  

In conclusion, Henri Cartier-Bresson is probably the most influential photographers in photography because he increased the emergence of photojournalism as well as inspired a lot of upcoming photographers of his time.  His photographs have a structure to them.  He expresses his love of geometry through the discovery of lines and rhythms.  He believes that geometry is the foundation that makes a good photograph.  I agree with him because there is sense of perspective in his photographs as well as imaginary lines.  In all, Cartier-Bresson is telling us about himself when telling about the world through photography.  

YouTube Video on Street Photography

Hello fellow photographers,

   I found this YouTube video on Street Photography by Felix Lupa, a photographer from Israel.  His images look so powerful; he captures the perfect moment.  Enjoy it!  

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8sev2zzZLTs&feature=related

http://www.felixlupa.com/ (Here is his website) 

final written assignment

Oh yeah everyone... don't forget about the 3-5 page written assignment for this class. I almost forgot! I think it's due on the final presentation day, but I might be wrong. Does anyone know?

Never buy camera batteries again!

Ok, so I just got out of my chemistry class and we were talking about piezoelectricity. I will attach a short explanation from Wikipedia, but essentially it is created by pushing two poles (same energy sides, like in a magnet) together. When the weight is lifted off, the poles will push away from one another since they repel naturally, and create electricity! They were talking about using them in cell phones because they can be small or anything else where movemet or sound vibrations will actually cause the battery to charge. For example, if you have this piezoelectricity in your camera, and you move around to take pictures... the movement will charge the battery! Or if you have a digital camera, you will never have to recharge the battery again. I know chemistry and photography is interrelated, but I just thought this was really cool. Sadly, it's really expensive and the government is fooling around with it, so it's kindof off limits to everyone else. Here's hoping for the future thought!

Wikipedia excerpt:
Piezoelectricity is the ability of some materials (notably crystals and certain ceramics, including bone) to generate an electric potential[1] in response to applied mechanical stress. This may take the form of a separation of electric charge across the crystal lattice. If the material is not short-circuited, the applied charge induces a voltage across the material. The word is derived from the Greek piezein, which means to squeeze or press.

The piezoelectric effect is reversible in that materials exhibiting the direct piezoelectric effect (the production of electricity when stress is applied) also exhibit the converse piezoelectric effect (the production of stress and/or strain when an electric field is applied). For example, lead zirconate titanate crystals will exhibit a maximum shape change of about 0.1% of the original dimension.

The effect finds useful applications such as the production and detection of sound, generation of high voltages, electronic frequency generation, microbalances, and ultra fine focusing of optical assemblies. It is also the basis of a number of scientific instrumental techniques with atomic resolution, the scanning probe microscopies such as STM, AFM, MTA, SNOM etc, and everyday uses such as acting as the ignition source for cigarette lighters and push-start propane barbecues.

Megasonic cleaning uses the piezoelectric effect to enable removal of submicrometre particles from substrates. A ceramic piezoelectric crystal is excited by high-frequency AC voltage, causing it to vibrate. This vibration generates an acoustic wave that is transmitted through a cleaning fluid, producing controlled cavitation. As the wave passes across the surface of an object, it causes particles to be removed from the materials being cleaned. The technology was originally developed by the U.S. Navy as an element in anti-submarine warfare.[2

Final Project Proposal

Hello again,

   I want to clarify what my intentions are for the final project.  If I was not clear at the critique this morning, I apologize.  Here is my plan: I will have 5 photographs depicting space that have personal meaning to myself; 3 of these photographs will be areas on campus that I am familiar to me as well personal meaning;  the last 2 photographs will be areas off campus that I have explored for the semester long project.  So, thats it for now.  Good luck!  

"Motozine ZN5 Makes Pictures Equal to Calls"- NY Times

Hello fellow photographers,

   I found this interesting article about this new camera phone and its features.  I figured I would go ahead and share it since camera phones have been brought up in class; everyone seems to laugh when the subject is brought it.  The beginning  has a funny satire.  Take a look at the cartoon below the title before you start reading.  Pretty funny!  

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/04/technology/personaltech/04pogue.html?8dpc

NY Times Article on Ray Mortenson

Hello fellow photographers,

   Here is a wonderful article on photographer Ray Mortenson called "Crumbling South Bronx as a Muse."  During the 1980s, Mortenson photographed abandonment in the South Bronx of New York City.  His photographs are so powerful like they are taking us through history.  It relates back to our semester long project.  My partner and I focused on abandonment in St. Mary's County.  Enjoy it!  

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/01/arts/design/01brok.html?_r=1&ref=design

"Saving Those Landscapes, in Pictures at Least" NY Times

Hello fellow photographers,

   I found this interesting article from the NY Times about how a team of photographers have been commissioned to photograph lost landscapes and the meaning behind them.  Enjoy it!

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/23/arts/design/23shat.html?ref=design

Digital FIne Art paper sampler

I went to the Hahnemuehle website and contacted their rep for some paper samplers and they emailed me a response. Apparently, they are nice enough to send me a pack for free. It's an awesome opportunity to try their papers - if you guys remember my first project (the portraits of "painted" women), I used Hahnemuehle "Bamboo" paper. I have only good things to say about it and this is a good treat for digital printing.

http://www.hahnemuehle.com/site/us/810/digital-fineart.html

Enjoy ~

Photography Masters on YouTube

Here is a YouTube channel on Photography Masters: videos of documentaries on famous photographers such as Ansel Adams, Annie Liebowitz, and many others.  Most of the documentaries are very old like from the 1980s.  Enjoy it!  

http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=Rangefindergeneral&view=videos

3D Art Journey Project

Hello everybody,

  My 3D Art project back in October relates back to the "Radiohead" video Colby showed us earlier in the semester.  My professor, Pat Kelley, showed it to my 3D art class because it relates back to the project and how both photography and 3D modeling are incorporated in the video.  At one point in the video, there is a little 3D animation of what appears to be a neighborhood where they were filming.  So, with this 3D project, we had to create a journey through a place we were familiar with and interpret it.  For this project, I wanted to focus on my neighborhood in Mitchellville, MD.  With the use of the camera, I created a motion path through the neighborhood and when you play it, the camera is just following that path.  There were a lot of things that were unintentional, but other than that, my goal for the project was achieved.  I hope you enjoy it! 

http://www.youtube.com/user/jeweldance1

street art, as it's meant to be.

Kelley Reception and Gallery Talk

I was pleased by the level of arbitrariness of present in Kelley's artworks. He did not appear to be too concerned with the philosophical, cultural, apparitional, or otherwise theoretical/imaginary parts of his artwork. I liked this. Most of his talk was related to breaking down the elements of the image and explaining their origins, and how he made the images (without revealing any trade secrets).

He works primarily with computers, but has an affinity for presenting artwork in non-digital formats. He has a series of digital photographs that were presented as a sequence in small books. I asked him why he did this. Couldn't he just make a .mov file with the sequence? I was pleased by his answer. He said that he gives control to the audience. The vagaries of movement, the intention of the user in flipping the pages, did not generate the same experience as a digital video file. A video file is uniform and plays the same way for everyone. Kelley empowers the user.

I think that anything is possible in the digital realm, and that with advances and new features in digital video, the experience of a unique experience for each individual user watching a sequence as a video file, will be possible. All the subtleties and control for the user will be possible eventually, so the idea that a small paper book generates a special experience unattainable with digital formats is not completely true, but I do like the idea that he considered the audience and put a lot of thought into how they would be viewing it.

Portraits of Power

I was just waiting to tear this artist up after watching him revealing his political leanings and bias through his work. However, it seems that he was pretty fair and there did not appear to be any difference in his portrayal of Democrats and Republicans. It doesn't seem that he had any goal, but, he was simply interested in the concept of power. He was able to photograph many different people, but I was interested in hearing about what people he asked to photograph but was turned down.

One part that stood out to me was the photograph of Rove, that the subject was very upset about. He seemed to feel that the photographer was out to get him. I think he should grow up and just realize that photographer was interested in taking a photograph of a natural moment in time. I don't think he was trying to make Rove look bad, for not taking a photograph that is a carbon-copy of virtually every other photograph of American politicians. It was also funny when Rove was so upset that he told the interviewer to pass it on to the photographer that he thought the photographer was trying to make him look stupid and the interviewer had to tell him that he was dead. I wouldn't object at all if a similar photograph was published of me. In fact I would feel good to know that such a great photographer wanted to photograph me.

One of the photographer's final works before he died, was a picture of Obama, which the lecturers gave us a little context for by reading the photographer's commentary. It would seem like a strange bit of luck or foreknowledge that he said that Obama would run for president someday. However, I wonder how much availability heuristic plays into this- perhaps the photographer had other works from 2004 that went by unnoticed, because they retroactively did not have similar significance.

Response in the Voice of Benjamin

As the function of artworks have changed throughout human history, so have images of humans. Artworks have gone from having a definite purpose to existing within the context of its social function. This photograph may have been taken for purposes of record, correspondence, or memory, but within a modern context could have other implications. The image was presented without any information on its ownership, age, or where the photograph was taken, which obscures its cultural value. The fact that there is no actual original version aids in this and makes it easier to conceal such things. This photograph, by the fact of it being a photograph and placed in digital format to be downloaded online, has lost its potential for politicization.

Those in need of proof for the reproducibility of art separating the audience from the original experience should look at the metadata on the .tiff file; An analog photograph which appears to be quite a few years old (judging by the way the people are dressed) has been brought to the masses (digitally) by a scanner from 2007. There has been room for the uniqueness of the original experience to be altered by the copying of the image from its original color space to a digital approximation of that space called “Nikon Apple RGB”.

Photographs can allow the audience to experience things they normally cannot achieve. It is difficult to look at objects close and objects far away simultaneously, but with this photograph, the background and foreground are in focus simultaneously. The absence of an artist illustrates the decline of the exclusivity of art. The person in the bottom appears to be holding the mechanism that opens the camera, so there wasn't even a photographer. No painter was necessary, nor even a photographer. Art for the common people.

From the film, an indefinite number of copies can be made, which further erodes the exclusivity of that image. This image was posted online. The fact that the photograph is reproducible causes this erosion to occur. It makes a visual experience possible only under certain circumstances for normal vision, possible for many. The hilly landscape appears inside one's house through a computer monitor. If the owner of the photograph valued the aura of the image, it is a bit of irony that he contributed to the decay of the aura by allowing the film negative to be reproduced.

http://nkirkpatrick.com/2site/1ex.jpg

http://nkirkpatrick.com/2site/2ex.jpg

http://nkirkpatrick.com/2site/3ex.jpg

http://nkirkpatrick.com/2site/4ex.jpg

http://nkirkpatrick.com/2site/5ex.jpg

5 Images

All of the pictures I posted are found photographs from these two sites:

http://www.moderna.org/lookatme/

http://www.timetales.com/introMid.htm

"These photos were either lost, forgotten, or thrown away. The images now are nameless, without connection to the people they show, or the photographer who took them."

Photographs

Photography Reader- Benjamin

Photography, as well as other advances in technology, changed the way that art is viewed, produced, and interpreted. The “eye can perceive more quickly than the hand can draw” and photography allowed the process of “pictorial reproduction” to accelerate to the extent that a single instant could be preserved. From photography followed sound film which enabled “reality” to be captured in a way that it could not before.

The ability to reproduce famous works of art changed their impact and interpretation by the public. Reproduction became an art form in itself. The original holds all of its authority in the presence of a reproduction, but the fact that the reproduction exists changes the meaning of this authority. Reproduction enables artwork to meet the viewer halfway. It makes it possible to view works of art, in reproduced form, which otherwise would have remained a mystery. This, it appears, has both advantages and disadvantages.

“The work of art reproduced becomes the work of art designed to be reproduced.” With the knowledge that reproduction is the final stage in the creation of an image, the decision making during the development is likely to be affected. Viewing this image, the first thought that comes to my mind is reproduction. The choice of the photographer to include the negative strip and a section of the upcoming photograph immediately reminds me of the reproducibility of the image. A slightly altered version of this image would not be hard to come by. The idea of an “original” print is photography is a strange concept as many different prints can be made from a negative. Which is the original?

The focus on reproduction has led to a shift in meaning of an image. Whereas the focus used to be on the ritual and the importance of the subject matter, it seems now to have shifted to what will be seen by the viewer rather than the importance of the actual scene. The importance of aura itself has shifted. There is a different focus when producing a work of art to be a simultaneous collective experience, as can be done with photography, than when this collective experience is not a possibility when creating a painting.

A “different nature opens itself to the camera than opens itself to the naked eye.” It is important to remember that although photography can capture an instant, there is still a question as to whether or not this instant represents reality. Individuals often act differently when being photographed and scenes will be staged in order to create a desirable final image. In this particular image, the family is staged and although it may be a representation of the time and the family, there is still a question as to its relation to reality.

Five Images

if I could draw.. I'd aim for this.

5 pictures

An Article on Photographer William Eggleston

Here is an article on photographer William Eggleston's show "William Eggleston: Democratic Camera, Photographs and Video, 1961-2008.  ENJOY IT!!!!!  

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/07/arts/design/07eggl.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&ref=design

Pictures

Poignant and Uninterested Barthes

This photograph, like all others, is ‘pure contingency and can be nothing else.’ This means that something is always represented—a representation which connects the photographer, viewer, and people being photographed. If cameras are clocks for seeing, then what is being represented here?

In this color negative, we see a family: a woman, her two children, cat and dog posed outside in a green, rural, hilly landscape. The picture was taken quickly, while the dog was still in motion while looking up to and pawing at the boy. What is special about this picture? Clearly, it is full of studium for me, leaving me with feelings of unconcerned desire, various interest and inconsequential taste. I like this picture I guess, but I certainly do not love it. It is not poignant to me, it does not evoke any special emotion except, “oh, another family portrait.” This leaves me questioning what the photographer’s interests were.

This photograph for the assignment was taken out of context, but it doesn’t seem to be capturing anything special/abnormal/monumental about this family or this day. Why was this picture taken and why am I looking at it and analyzing it now? I do not know these people and this photograph does not aesthetically appeal to me. On the other hand, if I knew these people and why this was taken, it would consist of punctum for me (punctum being what interests/captures and captivates me; what I love). If this were a picture of my family, for example, then I would love it and the photograph would automatically transform from a studium to a punctum photograph.

What differentiates our feeling of punctum and studium for each image? Shouldn’t I love or hate every image I see, or respond to it in a strong way? If I am an artist does that mean that every image I see must evoke a strong feeling within me? And if I don’t feel strongly for or against it, does that mean I am a worthless artist who is not trying hard enough or that I am ignorant and naieve to the world of art?

Photography is anything but simple. There are so many truths and distortions, emotions, memories and meanings captured by a photograph. We should be open to the punctum in every photograph, but as humans I do not know if we are capable of feeling so much with every photo or anything in general that we interact with. Would feeling that much put us over the edge? Cause a mental breakdown from the stimuli overload? Or is it the opposite—with so many photographs out here, should only a select few really speak to us since there are so many dangerous functions of photography? This photo doesn’t really speak to me and I don’t consider it dangerous, but if I overanalyze it it may speak to me and become dangerous.

I am looking at this picture while being excluded from it. It is just an image. The more I analyze it the more it continues to be just an image.

Szabo Symposium : Paul Roth and Frank Goodyear

On Thursday, October 30, 2008 Paul Roth and Frank Goodyear gave a lecture on the work of Richard Avedon, specifically his work dealing with power. The lecture began with Colby Caldwell giving a brief introduction to Avedon’s work. Included in that introduction was a quote by Avedon: “The photograph is a record of the transaction between the photographer and the subject. All photographs are accurate. None of them is the truth.” I found this statement to be quite pertinent when thinking about the issue of the “authentic moment” in the landscape which I am trying to show the audience in my current work. According to Avedon’s above thought, the simple fact that the work is a photograph is showing that I am having some sort of interaction, or transaction, with my subject, the landscape. While this is a fundamental idea, it makes me think more clearly about the fact that the interaction is already present in the work; it is the nature of the interaction that I am trying to convey. The second half of the quote also has resonance with my current working process. Over the past few months I have been trying to create photographs that accurately and honestly depict my interaction with the landscape. Avedon’s thought that photographs are accurate, that they capture a moment in time accurately encourages me to further loosen some of the rules that I have set up for myself in creating the photographs.

Frank Goodyear took a very interesting approach to studying Avedon’s career and creative process by interviewing the subjects of his portraits. I found the descriptions of Avedon’s working methods to be quite interesting and very different from my own. When I work in portraiture I have the model come to the location and work with them for about an hour, usually a bit less. I do my best to make the sitter feel comfortable and talk with them throughout. I feel as if I have some power but most of my power as the photographer is put into trying to make the sitter feel comfortable. This is in stark contrast to Avedon. His portrait sessions were characterized by words like brief, intense, short, and awkward. Such intense differences in process interest me.

Another aspect of Goodyear’s talk that interested me was the varying opinions about who controlled what happened in the portrait: Avedon, or the sitter. For example, during his discussion of James Carville who was photographed by Avedon in 2004, he said that Avedon seemed to allow people to photograph themselves and Carville himself said that Avedon “allowed me to be myself.” However, other sitters such as Jerry Brown felt that Avedon knew exactly what he wanted from the portrait going into the shoot. This dichotomy fascinates me as I often oscillate between the two working methods.

Paul Roth’s discussion of Avedon’s work was fascinating. His complete and thorough knowledge of Avedon’s methods, personal life, professional life, working process, and thought process was impressive, interesting, and enlightening. During Roth’s discussion he quoted Avedon as saying he was trying to “take the lying and the romance out of the picture.” I think this attempt can be clearly seen in Avedon’s work, especially during the years that he worked in his “mature” style using an 8 x 10 camera and a white backdrop. This style occludes a lot of visual information that could be used to draw connections or characterize readings of a portrait, leaving only the face, body position, clothing, and hair to relate information about the portrait. In the past I have worked in this way, using a white wall as my back drop and black and white photography to leave out the information brought to a portrait by color and surroundings. Earlier this semester I planned to work on a portraiture project that studied exactly what objects and location brought to a portrait. Revisiting this idea seems even more interesting now. Aspects of color versus black and white, setting, props, and clothing, among other things, could be manipulated in order to test what a portrait conveys through the different components.

Images

Barthes

Total Death

I have become the object. Locked in a finite reality, I will never leave this field with the fence around it, the trees and hills behind it. I will never leave the sides of my children, or the space within the frame - the boundaries - of this picture. So when you look at this picture of me and my family, who do you see? Do you see me? Do you see me how I want you to see me? How the photographer wants you to see me? You don’t know if I am posing or have been posed, if I was caught off guard or I am purposefully distracted by whatever is off to the right. But this picture isn’t just about me; it’s about you, the spectator, too. If you don’t know me, maybe you are not pricked by this image. You may understand the studium, you may come in contact with the photographer’s intentions and choose whether you like or dislike the image and whether you find the formal qualities pleasing aesthetically or not. But whether or not this picture goes beyond that and gets into you, bruises you in a meaningful way, goes beyond the studium.
I exist in a different segment of history than you. You do not exist in this image, but you are allowed and asked to participate with it. Whether it moves you, whether there are details that puncture your thoughtfulness beyond visual acceptance, depend on what you bring to the picture. You read images within their context (what my field and clothing conveys to you), but you also bring your own cultural context and place in history to the interpretation and acknowledgement of the image. Ethnological knowledge is inserted into the image by what you know my sweater and hair wrap to say about me.
Through our three-way relationship (you, photographer, me), I have become something that does and does not exist. I am dead in this moment, frozen in your perception, whether it is authentically who I am or who the photographer wants me to be. In this moment I am dead, this instance of me belongs only to this image, and the “me” in it exists neither before or after, but remains the same as the exact moment when the photographer snapped the shutter and froze me in time.

My 5 Images

Consuming Photographs with Susan Sontag

I always find it interesting and a bit odd when I come across photography critics who are not also photographers themselves. Susan Sontag is in this category of photography critics and her approach to looking at the field and deciphering what is important is unique because she is coming from in between two worlds, one filled with photographers and another filled with the rest of the population who are not so artistically inclined. She does not consider herself an actually photographic critic because she is not particularly interested in practice of picture taking but the act of looking at and consuming images and how it impacts us.

Normally, the first thing I notice when I look at photographs is its aesthetic qualities. I love bold, colorful images that catch my eye and I love photographs that make me curious and make me want to think and learn more. I think this initial reaction is common for a lot of people looking at photographs. This type of reaction and contemplation about a photo is one than Sontag was uninterested in.

If I look at the photograph “Untitled” using Sontag’s approach, I am required to look at it from a completely different perspective. Sontag remarks that “the world becomes a series of events that you transform into pictures, and those events have reality, so far as you have the pictures of them.” This observation is an accurate one, I believe, because if I think back to my own personal experiences, the idea holds true. I’m sure everyone can attest to the fact that many events and gatherings they have attended in their life have been captured by a photograph. In our society, we rarely do anything of importance without taking a picture of it.

Instead of using photographs to commemorate important events, we now use photograph to deem events important; if a photograph is not taken at an event, it is as though the importance and the memory of that even is immediately lowered and forgotten.

So when I look at this photograph and see what appear to be a mother, her children and family pets, I automatically assume the photograph was taken to commemorate some sort of event. The fact that this photograph taken tells me that the purpose was to mark some sort of occasion, because “to appraise an event as valuable or interesting or beautiful is to wish to have a photograph taken of it.”

The existence of this photograph tells me everything I need to know about it. It represents something important because the act of choosing to photograph this event made it so. This is the “mindset” of our society now when it comes to viewing images. The way I just looked at this photograph is an example of our consummation of images. We see so many images and photographs now and they have become so ingrained in our culture that we have automatic associations when looking at them. We “know” why photographs are taken so we can glance at one, automatically “understand” it and go on to the next image.

I think what Sontag does is look at the field of photography as it exists within society. Once we as photographers find ourselves within the world of photography we get caught up in it and often forget that our work exists not on our own but within a society. The norms and mindset of our society has a great impact on our work and its meaning yet we often don’t remember that this affects how and why people look at our work. I’m glad Sontag wrote this because I think she bridges general society and photography together well and she reminded me something I tend to forget – we live in a consumerist world and photographs are consumed just like anything else.

Photography Within the Humanities

When looking at this image after reading Sontag, I have come to realize the connection between Sontag's writing on looking at photography and this particular image.  In this essay, she examines the study of looking at photography and how it is considered a creation of images.  With this photograph of the mother and her children, it is a well-constructed image based on their position in the photograph.  I feel like that the photographer had placed them in that position for a reason.  The reason is probably to place them parallel to the background.  There is a sense of perspective in this photograph- a foreground and background.  

One point that struck me the most in the reading was when Sontag suggests that photographing something is considered valuable, interesting, and beautiful.  To me, I consider photographing something that is valuable and interesting as a way to remember something or someone.  With the photograph, it is considered interesting and beautiful because it is a family portrait positioned in front of a beautiful country background and considered a memorable keepsake.  

Other points that Sontag mentions is that the camera transforms the world and miniaturize it.  I find that interesting because many people believe that the world is infinite, meaning it never ends.  The camera can only captures certain parts of the world.  The photographer picks a certain view and photographs just that part.  When a photographer looks through the view finder, he or she is only looking through parts of the world.  The photographer knows what is beyond the frame, but the audience looking at the photograph does not know.  As a viewer, I always wonder what is beyond the frame, especially when looking at this family portrait.  I can picture a line starting from the bottom of the frame and going all the way to the back of the photograph in three dimensional photograph.  

An Interview w/ Susan Sontag

The Photography Reader
Susan Sontag
An Interview Dialogue about the Family Photograph

Photographic Researcher: Good afternoon Ms. Susan Sontag. It is a pleasure to meet you. I am glad that you were able to meet with me. I am doing a project researching how educated outsiders use their photographic eye to intellectually and critically talk about this Untitled photograph about Family.

Susan Sontag: Thank you for inviting me, I am honored. Although I am not a photographer, but rather a writer and filmmaker, I have always been fascinated with photography. I find that by writing about photography from a critical point it allows me to interact with and express my interest in photography.

Photographic Researcher: Well to get started I am going to show you the photograph. It is an untitled image and after looking at it I would like to know what your first impression of the image is.

Susan Sontag: After looking at the image the first thing that comes to mind is activity. Since in my opinion, photography is an activity and captures activity. There is the visual activity of the dog interacting with the cat, the girl interacting with the dog, and the mother with the child, as well as the hidden activity of the subjects interacting with the camera through their emotions and body positions. The second thing that immediately followed in my mind was how this raw looking image perpetuates my definition of photography, as a way to see the world, perceive the world, and store the information. With the edition of the film spokes leading into the next frame it leads me to believe that the photographer saw and perceived the unique interactions taking place and used their camera to capture the image and relay the information of their feelings. For example, the expression on the face of little girl with the pink pants is one that seems like disgust and almost impatience or frustration.

PR: You made a lot of interesting starting points. Could you expound more on the idea of how photographs relay information?

SS: Sure. Well when I describe photographs, I consider them creations that convey visual information through the image that is produced. A photograph is a form of information transmitter because they act as testimonies or as a form of witness. For example applying this concept to the Untitled family image it is conveying the testimonial information that this family probably lives in an area that is rural and that they spend a lot of there time outdoors. The factors of this image that relayed this information to me was the ‘outdoor’ or ‘play’ clothing that the children were wearing, the scarf on the mothers head (revealing that she did not want to wind to disrupt her hair), the stick in one of the girls hands, and the way that the older girl is interacting with the dog although her face is focused on the camera. One idea that I have realized, after observing the background information, is that the information that this image gives its reader can be drastically changed based on the context of the image. So in other words if this same format of three people and two animals standing together was in a different background the information and the read of the image would have changed significantly. So that is just to say that the testimonial information that an image communicates is also based on the context of the image.

PR: That is a very remarkable decipher of this photograph and the information that it is relaying. After having heard you speak of the factors that convey this information I now see the image in a new light. Before we close I would just like to thank you again for allowing me to use you to read this photograph, your insights are noteworthy.

--->MY FIVE IMAGES<---

http://www.naturalhomesolutions.com/images/family_walking_in_field_with_dog.jpg

http://www.rickgunnphotography.com/uploads/1792816838-9ChildrenPlaying2.jpg

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/91/271173340_62abc7c7f6.jpg?v=0

http://www.marieclaire.com/cm/marieclaire/images/6x/MCX0308MTPF002-md.jpg

http://static.flickr.com/95/242080213_21eb9e3f46.jpg

http://un.by/pdf/050609_12max.jpg