Read Douglas Crimp’s essay ‘The Photographic Activity of Postmodernism’ on the oca student website. This essay was first published in October 15 (Winter 1980) and is also available in Crimp, D.
As with all the readings you’ll be asked to do for this course, make notes on what you’ve read – and its relevance to your practice (if any) – in your research folder. (Boothroyd, 2020:28)
The Photographic Activity of Postmodernism.
Douglas Crimp first presented 1980, He is an art critic and a professor of art history.
Crimp calls Postmodernism a breach of modernism, from the museum, art history and photography.
Photography. In his 1978 work “Pictures”, he used the term post modernism referring to exhibited art of some younger artists in New York. He explored their concern about the seventy’s performative art, moving towards art with a “presence”.
He goes on to describe the difference between a presence as being there, to a subject having a presence. Concluding that work can have a presence even as a reproduction at a distance from an original. Whilst Benjamin only conceded aura to a minority of art works, Crimp points out that photography has since had aura conferred to it. He suggests that photography can be authenticated by classifications such as rarity of age, and the vintage print, but more importantly the “subjectivization of photography” (Crimp, 1995:97), an appreciation of artist’s stlye, which collecting and exhibiting artwork enhances.
Within this essay he discusses statements of Sherrie Levine on representation. On AfterSherrieLevine.com (AfterSherrieLevine.com, 2021) she rephotographed Walker Evans’ photographs from the exhibition catalogue “First and Last”, which can be downloaded to print out with a certificate of authenticity for each image, thus making them accessible by anyone. Levine suggests that representation creates desire to see the original subject, which can never be fulfilled as it is the art, not the subject that is the original, and therefore photography is the artwork.
Crimp also gives as an example the work of Cindy Sherman where she creates, narrates, and acts in her images. In doing so Crimp says that she has reversed the terms art and autobiography. He also comments on the work of Richard Prince who uses commercial images and presents them as documentary. Crimp suggests that these images “acquired an aura, only now it is not a function of presence but of absence, severed from origin, from an originator, from authenticity” concluding that aura has translated into a presence or a ghost (Crimp,1995:100).
Crimp shows that mechanical reproduction reducing the importance of the original, was a sign that modernism, which valued originality and artistic expression was being supplanted by post modernism. He appreciated new approaches to photography in this emerging postmodern era which embraced more contemporary theories in photography, and the role that photography played in challenging the museums and galleries. At this point I’m not sure whether postmodernism will be relevant to my practice.
WALTER BENJAMIN “THE WORK OF ART IN THE AGE OF MECHANICAL REPRODUCTION”
Read Walter Benjamin’s essay ‘The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction’ in Evans & Hall (1999) Visual Culture: The Reader. What do you think about Benjamin’s viewpoint? And Kracauer’s? Make some notes on your learning log. (Boothroyd, 2020:25).
Benjamin’s 1936 views on art, aura authenticity are put forward in his essay “The work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction” (1999):
Though art has always been replicated photography could do this at speed.
Reproductions of art will always be lacking in the elements of time and space, its unique existence, and the original is proof of authenticity.
Photography as a process of reproduction is able to enhance aspects possibly unseen by the naked eye, as well as place the object into a place where it couldn’t be otherwise.
However, when art is mechanically reproduced and loses its physical existence in time, and the physical existence ends, then its transmissibility is gone; Benjamin calls this the loss of “aura”.
He says that destroying aura by reproduction and transferring its location extracts its uniqueness; Uniqueness is bedded in the fabric of tradition and uniqueness is not transmissible, and distance however close, destroys this.
Benjamin did however believe that reproductions which produced and circulated copies of images enabled more people to view images, increasing communication, viewing and interpretation, and therefore democracy in photography.
I have found it hard to access much about the German critic Siegfried Kracauer and have resorted to Wikipedia for some clarity. He was critical of mechanical reproduction, he thought that memory was under threat and was being challenged by modern technology, particularly photography as it replicates some of the tasks done by memory. His view was that photography fixes one moment in time, where memory draws from various instances; he suggested that photography removes and emotion, essence and meaning from an object, and stressed the ontological relation of the photograph to reality.
Benjamin brought to attention some of modifications he noticed mechanical reproduction brought about the destroying of the aura, but also highlighted the liberation it can bring. Whilst Benjamin connects aura with the presence of the original, and reproduction depreciates this he concluded that some photographed work does retain an aura. Kracauer however was less positive about the effect of technological change on art. Other critics in the 1970s such as Rosalind Krauss and Douglas Crimp focused on the demise of the original piece of art as a sign that the modernist movement was dying.
I believe that as long as reproductions are noted as such, and manipulations of artworks are also noted as such, then there are many positives about being able to share works of art in a wider sense. Being able to share art in an aesthetic of informative manner widely may be more important that authenticity.
References:
Benjamin, W (1969) “The work of art in the age of Mechanical Reproduction” In: Evans, H. (1999) Visual Culture: The Reader. (ed.): SAGE Publications. Pp 72-79 (Accessed 1.10.21)
Boothroyd, S (2020) Photography 3: Body of work coursebook. Open College of the Arts. Barnsley.
Marien, M. W. (2014) Photography: A Cultural History. (s.l.): Laurence King Publishing.
Coming up for air: A retrospective- Stephen Gill 16 October – 16 January 2021, ARNOLFINI, Bristol
This exhibition draws together new and previously un-exhibited work from the Bristol born and based photographer. He is described as a “‘documentarist’, ‘anthropologist’ and ‘dazzling visual poet’”, Bristol Photo Festival (2021) his over-arching ethos is experimentation, which has led to chemical and alchemical experiments such as photographic burials, floral collage, in-camera photograms and submerging work. His experimentation takes his work beyond the usual boundaries of photography.
The exhibition presented a huge amount of his work, I detail below the series that were of particular interest to myself or my practice:
Please notify the sun (2020):
is a good example of what the gallery guide describes his work as exploratory journeys. For this he repeated a journey 9 times over 10 weeks to photograph a decaying fish he’d caught. To achieve this, he prepared the equipment he’d need beforehand, worktop, fridge, microscope, and lights. The gallery description describes the series revealing an unknown but somehow unfamiliar environment as you travel through the fish. The images are microscopic photographs of a fish, although they would be unrecognisable as a fish if you didn’t know this. They appear as unusual abstract shapes in a variety of colours some quite strong, with textures; through these images Gill creates a whole new landscape through the fish’s body.
Gill took these images in a Swedish forest by attaching cameras with motion sensors to trees at a low level to capture creatures at night. Here he uses chance as a method, relinquishing to a degree his authorship of the photographs, encouraging the subjects to present themselves. These are printed with locally collected plant pigments, it was the beauty in the organic black and white prints now as collotypes which attracted me, the plant and tree subjects rather than the animal subjects.
Gallery installation images
Buried 2005-6:
The gallery text describes this as a:
“collaboration between myself and the place. I would make half the work and the place would make the other half. It was an early attempt to step back as the author” (Gill, 2021).
After taking the images he buried them beneath the ground for varying lengths of time, dictated by the amount of rainfall, and varying depths and positions; allowing the “place” to make its mark upon the work. Each photograph bears individual traces of time. The original images are now very distorted:
Gallery installation image
Off ground 2011:
This was Gill’s way of responding to the aftermath of the 2011 London riots. Not wanting to add to the film and stills footage of the violence he collected fragments of thrown rocks and rubble. These he took back to his studio and made photographic portraits of them. An interesting method of capturing an event, Gill says “I see such studies as starting points for reflection, that are pinpointed to a certain time and place” (Gill, 2021).
Talking to Ants 2009-2013:
Is described as work that is both in front and behind the lens. Gill scooped up objects and inserted the detritus (dust, glass, plastic, insects, plant life and so on) into the body of the camera, resulting in surprise outcome again, with both chance and intention colliding in the images he knew the ingredients, but not the outcome. He describes this as incapsulating the spirit of the place in film emulsion “like objects embedded in amber” (Gill, 2021). Here again is confusion of scale, lack of information and ambiguity. The background objects are obscured by the items in front of them from inside the camera. The colour of the objects changes the landscape behind and the size of them alters the sense of scale; the layering creates new landscapes.
Hackney flowers 2004-7:
This is an attempt to describe what a place feels like beyond a visual description, an attempt to capture the essence of it. Taken in Hackney like many of his series, he added organic matter, such as flowers to the images, whilst he also buried some of the images. For this series he used a medical camera which resulted in a strange and confusing sense of scale. Base images with people place and objects overlayered with organic matter often to deliberately create an illusion.
My learning:
I was amazed at the breadth of Gill’s work. I had briefly researched Gill for my BOW genre coursework and then commented that his techniques did not appeal to me but that it demonstrates how broad a photographic response to a place can be. However, having viewed his work firsthand I found aspects that I should note:
Value in letting your curiosity lead you.
Playing with scale, whether that is with the equipment used (Camera, lens, lighting) or other methods.
Revealing and denying
Finding ways of allowing chance and intention to work together- possibly relinquishing authorship in some way.
Experimentation
Finding alternative ways of place making its mark on work
HELEN SEAR EXHIBITION WITHIN SIGHT Bristol 23.10.21
This was part of a shared exhibition with 2 distinct series with Robert Darch called Turn to Return. I was interested inDarch’s exhibition The Island, as he made the landscape images as a response to Britain’s vote to leave the European union; interested in that he has used landscape to represent his feelings about a tangible other subject – just as I am contemplating doing in my BOW.
Helen Sear’s series of black and white photographs were made in December 2019 whilst she repeatedly walked a mountain route, Sear says “the photos explore imitation and contagion as forms of magic through repetition and contact…they reveal a path whilst simultaneously denying a view” (Sear, 2021).
I understand from her exhibition notes that the visual denseness of the trees and the contours of the boulders should lead us on and off of the path, and cause us to ask what lies behind them, however without this narrative I would struggle to find meaning in them. Though in relation to myself intending to use landscape as metaphor it reinforces that an artist’s intention may not be taken on by the viewer.
Reference:
Sear, H (2021) Exhibition notes. Within Sight, Bristol. Centre Space Gallery.
I am glad that I had done the course prereading on Photo books before the exhibition and as I enjoyed the books, I was able to assess the books for different criteria. There were those that I appreciated not for their content or concept but for their design.
There were those the design and their concept fitted.
Tamsin Green’s this is how the earth must see itself, was my favourite. She made it whilst repeatedly walking the South Coast of England. It contains her images as well as archival material and uses the Ordinance Survey mapping system and symbols. In her walks she follows rock outcrops and photographs them in different scales. Green says that she:
“oscillates between seeking to know and name the land, and melting into aimless wandering, loosing sense of time and scale. The process of ordering the images into these pre-defined categories throws up questions as pebbles become boulders, flowing water becomes outcrop…As with all classification systems, the rules are subjective, leading to their own telling of the story.”
The handmade book design emulates the shape of an OS map, the haptics has the same tactility and folds. Unfortunately, its price meant that I was unable to buy it to explore it fully, such a shame for me as the content was relevant to the work that I am doing. There is a vimeo video referenced below which takes you through the work, and the beautiful black and white landscape and still life images of rocks can be viewed on her website listed below.
Robin Maddocks England. I was attracted by the tactile and handmade nature of his book, each cover individually spray painted by him, and each with four pages removed by him because he thought the book better without them. I thought that the variety of bold background colours used, and the varied text and image layouts fitted his images which were bold, graphic, and chaotic.
Billy Barraclough’s Murmuration’s, with poems and images of a variety of sizes, where the largest folds out to an A2 image. I would have bought this and been able to describe and comment on it further but unfortunately, he had sold out. From what I remember I think his subject the mass gathering of starlings did suit the book design; murmuration’s come in many different forms and their black and white natural colours was echoed in the black and white minimal book design.
Some designs I noted as interesting were:
Colin Plantall, All Quiet on the Home front, where I liked the tactile raw, smaller text pages inserted into the book.
There were those that I took things away that were useful to me:
Mark Mattock Spring in the temple of plastic pillars and Where rude boys never think to look, both landscape photography of edge lands. I was taken by the gate folds in the later book of scrubby woodlands. Mattock described to me how he had chosen the gatefolds to emulate the feelings of claustrophobia in those woodlands, and once described this did enhance my experience of his book.
Green, T. (2021) this is how the earth must see itself: A walk with Natural Features – Tamsin Green. At: https://vimeo.com/567428495 (Accessed 31/10/2021).
EVENT PRE-READING REVIEW
The history of the photobook provided by David Company (Company, 2014) gave me lots of background information. I enjoyed the discussion on editing photobooks and his view that photographers are generally lousy editors of their own work. His final paragraph discussing a move from the recent widespread use of the term photo book to something more definable was thought provoking. Campany calls for some discipline around the term. Which led me nicely onto my next read below.
Towards a Photobook Taxonomy (Colberg, 2018), made me reflect on what a photo book actually is and I found his categorization really useful:
Catalog- Structured presentation of bodies of work.
Monograph- presentation of one body of work, usually financed by the artist.
Journalistic- text is often heavy and relies on journalist conventions includes Photojournalistic, Documentary, Encyclopedic,
Lyrical- the images are foremost, and the text is separated, if it does include an essay it is separated. Four types are suggested:
Poetic, without a story but with facets of one, close to a monograph, interpretive.
Elliptical, narrative ambiguity, not a linear story, possibly with visual symbols.
Linear, combines elements of the poetic and elliptical but reliant on its sequencing, more easily decoded.
Narrative driven: Text is often integral:
Photo novel.
Linear.
Elliptical. Subjective documentary.
first person narration
At this stage I would be most interested in Lyrical, elliptical or a narrative driven elliptical or lyrical for my current work.
The Photobook (Steptoe, 2020) also discussed the history of the photobook. But goes on to explain the history of photobook events, sales, fairs, competitions, and exhibitions. Again, it was the discussion it provided on the nature of photobooks which caused me to reflect on them in a new way. I had not thought before about the difference between a book of photographs and a photobook. These are set out here as that the photobook should have a purpose or concept, use physical prints when edit and sequencing, and have limited text, no text or a large amount of text.
In terms reviewing a photobook the description of the process of assessing them in competitions was useful: The value of the concept, the photography, the sequencing, the placement and design of the book spreads and the total look and feel of the book. It was also good to read the view that in terms of the form of the book almost anything can be called a book, even single or folded sheets. If I am to produce a photo book, I will look deeper at this and read Understanding Photobooks (Colberg, 2016).
Overall, I now realise I’d not really considers what makes a photobook, and the varied forms that they can take. This was useful to reflect on before going to the event but also will be invaluable should I decide on a photobook as an outcome for my Body of Work.
Her talk was more useful for my practice and was about a work much different to that which I had researched on her previous work on her website, where it describes her work as focusing on the co-existence of human, animal and natural environments with a rooted interest in magic, realism, surrealism and conceptual art. Particularly of interest to me is her description of photography which “often challenges the dominance of the eye and the fixed-point perspective associated with the camera lens, and explores the potential of the artwork to activate and elicit feeling” (Sear, 2011). I must research her work more deeply.
Her talk at the BOP was on the development of her new book Era of Solitude (Dewi lewis publishing, 2018). The project was based in a warehouse premises of The Scrap Exchange, an organisation dedicated to re-diverting surplus materials from landfill. Sear saw it as a microcosm for our human relationships with, and impact on the environment and our immediate surroundings. In a makeshift studio she took portraits of visitors with hands holding chosen objects and photographed the place.
(Dewi lewis publishing, 2018)
She didn’t begin with the idea of making a book, it developed. She asked herself, how do you archive/capture/arrange something? Her process was intriguing:
How do you archive/arrange something?
She put her own story in text
Used layering with scrap fabric as a process to bring texture to portraits
To connect BW and colour images used off white backgrounds
She used monochrome portraits to reduce visual overload which she described as paring back
I took away her idea of putting associated words densely on a page, as a strategy.
She made dummy books before choosing the format.
Also of interest to me is her current work in the ancient forests in France photographing the foresters’ marks on the trees.
My response
It was good to hear from an artist that an idea developed that was not the road they intended to go down initially; meaning when they had the subject, they had no idea how they would execute or present it – comforting to my situation.
Dummy books
How to bring texture to work with fabric, collage and layering.
WOODLAND BILBLIOGRAPHY- ITEMS SCANNED READ AT THIS STAGE:
Beresford-Kroeger, D. (2019) To Speak for the Trees: My Life’s Journey from Ancient Celtic Wisdom to a Healing Vision of the Forest. (s.l.): Random House of Canada.
Deacon, A. and ) V. D. A. (2020) For the Love of Trees. (s.l.): Black and White Publishing Limited.
Wohlleben, P. (2017) The Hidden Life of Trees: What They Feel, how They Communicate : Discoveries from a Secret World. (s.l.): HarperCollins Publishers.
NIKI SOUTH 