tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-67714097207247634282024-02-20T01:44:08.732+00:00ART of PHOTOGRAPHYAMANOhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18182786264442948736noreply@blogger.comBlogger33125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6771409720724763428.post-53489652476041273152011-11-21T15:02:00.001+00:002011-11-21T16:53:06.200+00:00A good People and Place photo<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
One takes many photographs which might help to fulfil a brief but may not be anything exceptional. Sometimes, one does make a photograph that stands out.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikYLrrg65lC8Y_h2JNTDXsragrQ1JBIGY6WFhJfGKE_3HWDQ2vRKCTOONYp-B6N_8fkvT1U7ZPbrFszZ2yNxT8mvTS9DYNSbP6IdXpnIvU92pgwuFFBDuouKvY1vqLsoh2At_kp6hyO7wm/s1600/AMANO-web-Dorothy+unwell-20111112_Bristol_0471-087+as+Smart+Object-1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="280" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikYLrrg65lC8Y_h2JNTDXsragrQ1JBIGY6WFhJfGKE_3HWDQ2vRKCTOONYp-B6N_8fkvT1U7ZPbrFszZ2yNxT8mvTS9DYNSbP6IdXpnIvU92pgwuFFBDuouKvY1vqLsoh2At_kp6hyO7wm/s400/AMANO-web-Dorothy+unwell-20111112_Bristol_0471-087+as+Smart+Object-1.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Dorothy unwell after lunch</td></tr>
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When I showed this photograph to others, they immediately picked it out from a group even though there were other impressive images such as an Osprey with a duck in it's claw and a panoramic view of the Bristol docks. The assumption was that this image must have been set up when in fact it was not; Dorothy, a member of a group with whom I was lunching, had fallen ill after lunch and an ambulance had to be called which is why one sees a man leaning near her with a phone in one hand; this act further adds to the emergency of the scene.<br />
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The composition works since the figures are placed in such a way as to add to the dynamism of the scene and yet the distortion, although partially removed by a lens profile and some tweaking, rather lets down the reality of the scene unless one is prepared to accept this effect as adding to the atmosphere.</div>AMANOhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18182786264442948736noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6771409720724763428.post-45248894484001949602011-11-21T11:36:00.001+00:002011-11-21T14:56:03.956+00:00Martin Parr in Bristol - second visit<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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I had gone to see Martin Parr's exhibition of photographs made in the Bristol area for a second time partly to meet up with other OCA students, an unofficial study day, yet also to listen to a social historian talk about the photographs on display. However, the talk was by Phil Walker who had worked closely with Martin Parr over the exhibition since the social historian was unable to attend.</div>
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Martin Parr is liked by some and disliked by others; I am a liker but want to understand the other view. Perhaps it is just a matter of taste but there are those who do seem to raise a serious objection to Parr. He is an internationally renowned photographer, a documentarist who is head of Magnum UK and whose work is also considered art. One can look at his work in different ways such as the social historic which is really the basis of this exhibition. Parr came to Bristol in the late 1980's, producing The Cost of Living (1987), when there was the divided society of the late Thatcher era.</div>
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For Parr, the role of photography is to exaggerate and some of his images contain not so much a <i>punctum</i>, what Barthes describes as an area of significant detail, but are themselves a <i>punctum</i>, a punctured view of the world. Photography tends to be used to make things look better than they actually are and Parr challenges this. </div>
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Does Parr reveal any truths about Bristol or is Bristol just a backdrop for his view of the world. Henri Cartier-Bresson, one of the founding members of Magnum, suggested that Parr might be from another planet. His work is seen by some as dispassionate and detached.</div>
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One image of two people standing outside their prefab house does have historical significance. There are not many of such buildings left and there is talk of the remaining ones being listed. Parr met with the occupiers who are photographed standing outside.</div>
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A photograph of a Yoga class taking place in the city is indicative of the kind of alternative culture that exists in Bristol. The photograph of Airbus workers at work is also a reminded of the kind of industry found in Bristol.</div>
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One photograph of four women in Cribbs Causeway standing facing the photographer in what amounts to a portrait photograph. This attracted a lot of criticism as not being representative of the shopping centre as a whole yet as usual, Parr had interacted with his subjects and what makes this photograph special is that the four women are all from the same family, ranging from Great Grandmother to Great Grandchild. The photograph hence gives us an insight into Cribbs Causeway through contact with it's people rather than merely representing part of the building.</div>
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Parr takes thousands of pictures every year yet is usually only happy with about 10 of them!! For him, photography is a calling as well as a profession. Editing is not easy owing to there being so many images to consider.For this exhibition, Parr managed to edit down his images to 600 from which the 60 on display were chosen.</div>
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There are recognisable themes to Parr's work such as consumerism, shopping, issues around class etc Parr claims he is trying to be objective in his search for truth. Photography is a "soap opera"! There is subtle stage management as he knows what he is looking for.</div>
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Another striking image is of a rather dubious looking yacht salesman, a sign of the times when greed was considered good.</div>
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The Commonwealth Society Function where a young black man faces a couple of older Britons has an obvious narrative of racial tension.</div>
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There is a garden open day which features what appear to be a couple with a child; there is no proof of this particularly since they do not seem to be communicating with each other although they do both wear Rohan trousers of similar material. Perhaps their apparent dysfunctionality is a result of the presence of the photographer. As with much of Parr's work, there is a constructed narrative at work along with a dry humour and an unflattering approach.</div>
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Mshed are going to purchase 10 works from this exhibition that are about the city and representative of Parr's work; visitors have the chance to vote for the one they like.</div>
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Anti-consumerism images include an attractive jar of lemon curd from a church fete with the winner's name written on a label. </div>
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A photograph called The Clifton Club (2008) shows a rack of towels in cubby holes; they look almost like pieces of ivory and are reminiscent of one of Fox Talbot's earliest photographs of china pieces in a chest.</div>
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One aspect of these photographs is that one is not aware of the photographer making the pictures, they speak for themselves.</div>
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There is a view of Parr's work that it is perhaps cruel and lacking in empathy; it is not a people's art. </div>
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Parr's images contain mini-dramas.</div>
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One OCA student reckons he could have done photographs as good as those Parr has made; what makes Parr's work as art!?</div>
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Editing can be painful ... how to select from so many images. Some images are meaningless, not striking in any way.</div>
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Parr's people are not posed and possibly not representative of Bristol.</div>
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</div>AMANOhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18182786264442948736noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6771409720724763428.post-75508823656243737342011-10-22T23:21:00.001+01:002011-10-22T23:21:18.579+01:00POST-MODERNISM - OCA notes<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Having received some references prior to viewing the Post-Modern exhibition at the V+A, I decided to note down a few of my thoughts about the material suggested.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">The first is a review in The Guardian which starts by referring to post-modernism as "all swagger and stance" which although humorous does sound a trifle dismissive; it also refers to post-modernism as belonging to the past which is interesting to note. As someone new to the subject, I was unaware of that.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">The journalist, Hari Kunzru, says that post-modernism was all "<span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; color: #666666; line-height: 19px;">Fun, bright, clever, but disposable and disturbing." Again, one is left wondering what he means since post-modernism tends to evade definition.</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; color: #666666; line-height: 19px;">Kunzru's first mentions architecture. Modernism has resulted in a great deal of joyless architecture with the result that there was a revolt and it happened in the modernist skyline of New York with an atrium in the AT&T building. Nicknamed The Chippendale building, it was seen as a bit of a joke yet was to mark the beginning of a new artistic approach.</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; color: #666666; line-height: 19px;">These days, driving through a city one is surrounded by a plethora of coloured signs, semiotic seductions. I can't help but think of Orwell's novel "1984"which describes a modernist world without any sign of the art that was to replace it which got underway in the 1970's.</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Kunzru goes on to define post-modernism, this time in less racy terms, "<span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; color: #333333; line-height: 18px;">This is the essence of postmodernism: the idea that there is no essence, that we're moving through a world of signs and wonders, where everything has been done before and is just lying around as cultural wreckage, waiting to be reused, combined in new and unusual ways. Nothing is direct, nothing is new. Everything is already mediated. The real, whatever that might be, is unavailable."</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; color: #333333; line-height: 18px;">The V+A have decided to cut out the art and literature side of post-modernism, they are essentially a museum of design, and also present post-modernism as a movement that lasted 20 years although they do go outside this time frame. There are numerous examples, the subject of this exhibition.</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; color: #333333; line-height: 18px;">Postmodernism is said to have ended with 9/11, the toppling of the Twin Towers in New York which ushered in a new era. Obviously, one can not be too dogmatic about this but a parallel can be drawn between the rise of the internet and the end of postmodernism.</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; color: #333333; line-height: 18px;">Irony has been distinguished as one of the main characteristics and the end of postmodernism has been referred to as the end of the age of irony. Postmodernity follows postmodernism!</span></span></div>
</div>AMANOhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18182786264442948736noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6771409720724763428.post-19229272824761591782011-10-16T13:16:00.000+01:002011-10-19T14:39:23.841+01:00Lee Friedlander exhibition in London<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: 'Adobe Garamond Pro'; font-size: 18pt;"><b>LEE FRIEDLANDER<o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: 'Adobe Garamond Pro'; font-size: 16pt;"><b>at the Timothy
Taylor Gallery, Carlos Place, London<o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: 'Adobe Garamond Pro'; font-size: 16pt;"><b>September 2011<o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibkyRtIlTVX_5O5Jg8efpixR5yZo09k3Ed-tr6ea49Q1uw8VT0leUtCN-aAXTgpky59x6VKQ7tJFCCfJBxa6v1NnIEAbT1HaJSALXm0hUE5v_kj_u3XaJg3_AxlZ0gQOEputkk6wikb-3m/s1600/Friedlander+Exhibition-20110928_London_2972-033.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="231" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibkyRtIlTVX_5O5Jg8efpixR5yZo09k3Ed-tr6ea49Q1uw8VT0leUtCN-aAXTgpky59x6VKQ7tJFCCfJBxa6v1NnIEAbT1HaJSALXm0hUE5v_kj_u3XaJg3_AxlZ0gQOEputkk6wikb-3m/s320/Friedlander+Exhibition-20110928_London_2972-033.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b>outside the gallery in Carlos Place</b></td></tr>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: 'Adobe Garamond Pro';"> There
was no charge to see the Lee Friedlander exhibition; after all, the prints were
on sale at prices ranging from about 600 to almost 1,000 USD. The gallery
itself is situated just south of Grosvenor Square which meant a walk through
the West End in late afternoon sunshine. There are not so many people and cars
here as in Oxford Street to the north and Piccadily to the south.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: 'Adobe Garamond Pro';"> The
exhibition space was composed of white walls on which were hung a couple of
exhibitions by Lee Friedlander at about eye level; these ran around the room.
There were very few people which allowed one a good view of the prints which
were excellently crafted and, in some cases, such as the auto-portrait Lee
Friedlander presents at the very end of the exhibition, one wonders how he
managed to get such a wide range of tones in the image and capture such a wide
dynamic range since there is darkness of the car’s interior as well as sunlight
falling on skin. Presumably, he has good knowledge of the Zone system.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgVuPCM9dKBeXRh14TYdkCtosUAz2paOwxNZlqjnQHwDldIuMa-mTX8cV1buYwL7Gs3ploNlpDoApsmscVALwEE2MzDtxV7xhvdVtXxeU3ytkQyvNExwVGrp_6Q71FJwK9fusFZqGMibzlJ/s1600/Friedlander+Exhibition-20110928_London_2980-041.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="209" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgVuPCM9dKBeXRh14TYdkCtosUAz2paOwxNZlqjnQHwDldIuMa-mTX8cV1buYwL7Gs3ploNlpDoApsmscVALwEE2MzDtxV7xhvdVtXxeU3ytkQyvNExwVGrp_6Q71FJwK9fusFZqGMibzlJ/s320/Friedlander+Exhibition-20110928_London_2980-041.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b>Inside the Timothy Taylor Gallery</b></td></tr>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: 'Adobe Garamond Pro';">Lee Friedlander appears
to belong to the school of black and white photography in which form plays an
important part. Woven around these forms, often partially framed by the car
itself, are wonderfully and highly complex details. Although not a post-modernist,
Lee Friedlander seems to anticipate the era that was to follow.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: 'Adobe Garamond Pro';">The first series of
photographs are about cars from 1964. Lee Friedlander was given a brief by
Harpers Bazaar magazine to photograph the new cars just coming on the market.
He did this but instead of putting the cars at the centre of his images, he
says “I just put the cars out in the world, instead of on a pedestal.”
Nowadays, such an approach might be considered almost <i>de rigeur</i></span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: 'Adobe Garamond Pro';"> but at that time cars
were supreme status symbols, a Very Big Deal, and his approach was deemed
“subversive” and too avant-garde. Contextualising the subject albeit
artistically was not an acceptable approach.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: 'Adobe Garamond Pro';">The second series of Lee
Friedlander’s photographs are taken from a car, hence “America by Car”; we move
from photographs of car exteriors to photographs made from car interiors of the
outside world which perhaps indicates a shift in Lee Friedlander’s way of
looking at the world. Here he uses a super-wide camera but crops the images to
a square. He makes use of “side and rear view mirrors, windscreens and side
mirrors as framing devices”. The compositions are visually intriguing as well
as being technically superbly crafted; they give an impression of America that
is varied although there are few people and often little sign of life. It is a
steely eyed and yet somewhat sterilized view of the United States.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: 'Adobe Garamond Pro';">None of the photographs
in either section carry captions although these can be found elsewhere; one is
left to enjoy the visual treat Lee Friedlander presents without the need for
reference.</span><span style="font-family: 'Adobe Garamond Pro';"><b><o:p></o:p></b></span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEinMp5JC5nyEBhKgofRSPHTP0yyPg5o99yc2Wl6ZptXfMlcdkg6uQnK09lph7nQ6zq_EP9oKU8Bz1J9Ih271RcgplJKSMnb-u3iEoQhf1wb83vQ1hjsbQLgjngtaI2573VNW5gkyIOTMZU7/s1600/Friedlander+Exhibition-20110928_London_2978-039.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="194" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEinMp5JC5nyEBhKgofRSPHTP0yyPg5o99yc2Wl6ZptXfMlcdkg6uQnK09lph7nQ6zq_EP9oKU8Bz1J9Ih271RcgplJKSMnb-u3iEoQhf1wb83vQ1hjsbQLgjngtaI2573VNW5gkyIOTMZU7/s320/Friedlander+Exhibition-20110928_London_2978-039.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b>Pond in Carlos Place</b></td></tr>
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</div>AMANOhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18182786264442948736noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6771409720724763428.post-20515975037959281612011-10-16T13:03:00.000+01:002011-10-19T14:41:23.354+01:00Eyewitness : Hungarian Photography at the Royal Academy of Arts<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<b>Eyewitness : Hungarian Photography at the Royal Academy of Arts</b><br />
(London – June to October 2011)<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKDTUXiiqUEi307_8DTbXrEdLJ-Z7GrnoNPPNozwMJ285lvO6G6ofp8fFR4udIAT_oNt10UEP94eXgeff9zsQ4nAtK0UYe_rhOaVkaXZbRLzzHv9hmc4MKFT61wnSeQ4Aws-Su1HpI9Swf/s1600/Eyewitness+Exhibition-20110928_London_2944-005.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKDTUXiiqUEi307_8DTbXrEdLJ-Z7GrnoNPPNozwMJ285lvO6G6ofp8fFR4udIAT_oNt10UEP94eXgeff9zsQ4nAtK0UYe_rhOaVkaXZbRLzzHv9hmc4MKFT61wnSeQ4Aws-Su1HpI9Swf/s320/Eyewitness+Exhibition-20110928_London_2944-005.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b>Exhibition entrance</b></td></tr>
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<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span lang="EN-US"> </span> </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-US"> As I entered the Royal Academy, I sensed a
certain presence; this historic building in Central London is at the heart of
the British art establishment and yet this is the first time I have seen a
photographic exhibition here although at the Academy’s annual summer
exhibition, photographs are routinely shown. One wondered as to what might be
so special or important about the Hungarian contribution to photography to
necessitate an exhibition of it’s own and by the end of the exhibition, I still
found myself considering this question; certainly, the Hungarian influence on the
development of photography is considerable and needs to be noted but I was not
entirely convinced by the argument put forward although it is surprising to
consider the number of Hungarians active in photography resulting in the
exhibition reading rather like a history of photography.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-US"> The exhibition offered the chance to hire an
audio-guide that really helped to enjoy the event; instead of having to read
captions, one was able to listen to informed people describing the significance
of the images on show. I was struck by the quality of the prints, done on
silver gelatin, revealing a good range of tones. In fact, photography in
Hungary was considered something of a fine art with Rudolf Balogh being an
accomplished exponent at the beginning of the twentieth century. In spite of
concern for detail and aesthetics, photography was regarded as primarily a tool
of communication rather than an art tool.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-US"><br /></span></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitm5t3jQSaQpqM2RtfQHaoDrnD4F7Ys7gr-MBWIl-ym_Lr-BEMcLZ0vU1Wyoug_NP2pMHMHAECaS42Nj3W_LuUMh6FfkmKmRW8GZ_mWK8MzzrJCO_WOaJNpI98kTq94G1jSDRGpqSduTdL/s1600/Eyewitness+Exhibition-20110928_London_2940-001.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitm5t3jQSaQpqM2RtfQHaoDrnD4F7Ys7gr-MBWIl-ym_Lr-BEMcLZ0vU1Wyoug_NP2pMHMHAECaS42Nj3W_LuUMh6FfkmKmRW8GZ_mWK8MzzrJCO_WOaJNpI98kTq94G1jSDRGpqSduTdL/s320/Eyewitness+Exhibition-20110928_London_2940-001.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b>Inside the exhibition</b></td></tr>
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-US"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-US"> For example, the female photographer K. Sugar,
who focuses on the peasant population at a time when most people did not
recognize them as a social grouping because there were so many of them, made
fine photographs of them revealing them with fascinating detail. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-US"> Andre Kertesz, one of the great Hungarian
photographers, was self taught (his initial images are somewhat amateurish) yet portrays his subjects in an </span>endearing way; for instance, there are three images of musicians
side by side in the exhibition. He was active from after the First World War
onwards. At the age of only 16, he made a remarkably composed photograph of a
sleeping boy; lines apparent in the design of the photograph cross each other
over the boy’s face. Interestingly, it was later in life that Kertesz revisited
the photograph and altered the framing to make an even more striking image.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-US"> Another photographer who was also to leave
Hungary was Munkacsi who was an established professional specializing in sports
photography. His image of a racing car might not look very much by today’s
standards of auto-focus, high ISO and fast motorwinds but in 1929, it was almost
impossible to catch such action; the image is also beautifully composed.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-US"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-US"> One series of images that catches the eye, is
those made during the war by unknown soldiers although their names are
recorded. They were encouraged to make images of front line warfare and send
them to a newspaper for possible inclusion and even prizes. One haunting image in this style is of a dead body lying in the
snow with three Ravens in attendance nearby. These are the beginnings of
photojournalism showing the horrors of war (trenches with damaged equipment and
dead horses) yet not without humour (a dog on a mountain top has a pair of
binoculars placed before his eyes).<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-US"> Jozsef Pecsi was a Hungarian photographer who
specialized in advertising and wrote a book on the subject that was published
in 1930. Kati Homa experimented with photo-montage which is evident in her
double-exposed image of a female face in the wall beside a staircase. It was
perhaps the need to work with basic materials that encouraged such innovation.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-US"> Hungary itself fared badly in the various
trials and tribulations of the twentieth century. After the first World War,
Hungary had lost 72% of it’s territory and 64% of it’s people.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-US"> One noticeable feature of Hungarian photography
from this era is the habit of looking down, usually at an angle of about 45
degrees, on the world below; there is one such image of a group of nuns walking
along the side of a road in which the photographer turns the image into almost
an abstract form owing the head gear worn by the nuns while another “looking
down” image is of Winchester College by Cornell Capa, the brother of the famous
Robert Capa. Cornell Capa is often overlooked as he did much to keep his
brother’s memory alive but it was he who set up an institution that was later
to become the International Centre for Photography in New York. There was the
idea that photography could become a tool for good in the world and help to
make it a better place.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-US"> Another great Hungarian photographer who went
on to be a significant part of the Bauhaus movement, was Laszlo Moholy-Nagy. He
experimented with photo-processes such as photograms and his publication
“Painting, Photography, Film” emphasises the need for photography to meet the
requirements of realistic representation in which representation could itself
be an act of creation; painting was considered to be more concerned with colour
and composition.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-US"> Brassai, another great Hungarian photographer
who was eventually honoured by the French, worked a great deal in Paris.
Recording the seedy nightlife was part of his work and one image stands out,
that of a bejeweled woman alone in the corner of a restaurant, her claw-like
hands encrusted with jewels. One may question this person’s sexuality, her
femininity is questionable, but the image is not about that rather it is
concerned with her overall appearance and presence.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-US"> Brassai was to photograph Picasso with whom he
developed a life long friendship; there is a wonderful image in the exhibition
of Picasso seated by the most extraordinary stove with a curving metal chimney
yet in spite of the fine metalwork, it is Picasso who stands out. He managed to
discover the surreal in the everyday and unwittingly became known as a
surrealist.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-US"> When Munkacsi went to America, he expected to
become a sports photographer as he had been before in Europe. However, he made
an image of a model running rather than standing still while working on an
assignment for a fashion magazine and this image not only made him famous but
started something of a revolution in photography. He turned what was often a
joyless, static, studio-bound approach into something much more lively.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-US"> Another famous Hungarian photographer was
Robert Capa who might have become better known if his life had not been cut
short by a landmine. Some of his best known photographs are those from Dunkirk
made during the Second World War. They were largely ruined by an inexperienced
lab technician yet the surviving images add to the eeriness of the occasion.
After the War, Capa became one of the founders of the Magnum photo-agency.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-US"> Kertesz had a great eye for a photograph. Some
of his images are very imaginative and personal such as his lonely cloud, a
single cloud juxtaposed with a high-rise building. Another is of a “pigeon
landing” where the form of the pigeon is seen amidst the back drop of a
building. Towards the end of his life, after the death of his wife and having been inactive in photography for awhile, Kertesz was given a Polaroid camera by someone and he
began making subtle colour images which seem to be more about his life and his
mental state.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-US"> Following the Second World War, photography in
Hungary became concerned with socialist realism and this lead to repression
within the art of photography. The work of Peter Korniss is noticeable during
the 1970’s and 1980’s; he managed to fulfill the brief of getting close to his
subjects. One witty image from this time is by Lasglo Fejes of a Christ figure
in a church beside which stands a camera; the image is entitled “Suffering
Christ” a comment perhaps on the suffering that photography has the capacity to
record and expose. By the end of the 1980’s, the year 1987 is cited, Hungarian
photography ceased to reveal uniquely Hungarian qualities as it came under the
influence of globalization and so the exhibition ends at this point. There is a
final noticeable image of a fallen communist relic made by a Hungarian from New
York.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-US"><br /></span><br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGtWmSz6jHPxMnB746sYZdTGM0_TjRSLvvZJr55BsAcRD-xmdsk7Juq40izfKAqtPlvxh900zDHp3SHfaRwjz1QvFvD_D7kM-Mx2ajR8ygdn4f6ouDpkzZpOJxqqAZVoiurpvbJH9Gn-ht/s1600/Eyewitness+Exhibition-20110928_London_2947-008.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="153" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGtWmSz6jHPxMnB746sYZdTGM0_TjRSLvvZJr55BsAcRD-xmdsk7Juq40izfKAqtPlvxh900zDHp3SHfaRwjz1QvFvD_D7kM-Mx2ajR8ygdn4f6ouDpkzZpOJxqqAZVoiurpvbJH9Gn-ht/s320/Eyewitness+Exhibition-20110928_London_2947-008.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">outside the Royal Academy of Arts, London</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
One of the most contentious images in the
exhibition is of Robert Capa’s fallen soldier about which much has been
written. Was it staged? Recent research has shown that it may well not have
been owing to records made at that time yet the argument continues. The
exhibition however does not dwell on this image merely mention it’s
significance for above all, it presents a wide array of excellently executed
black and white photographs that cover many significant aspects of nineteenth century
Europe as well as the development of the photographic medium of this time. It
also reminds us of the part Hungarian photographers played in all this,
something that should not be underemphasized or overemphasized for that matter. As it happens, one of the world's leading nature photographers is Bence Matte, a young Hungarian with an individual approach.</div>
</div>AMANOhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18182786264442948736noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6771409720724763428.post-43352412848460497802011-10-12T11:59:00.000+01:002011-10-12T11:59:16.801+01:00Raghu Rai looks at a few of my photographs<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">At first I showed Raghu Rai a couple of prints that I had done by a printer he had recommended to me. He found them too bright .. he prefers prints with more density. I saw his point and mentioned I was trying to reveal the luminosity of my subject.<br />
<br />
He looked through my Taj Mahal photographs and pointed out that close-up photos of for instance someone's sari hanging over their shoes said little about the Taj Mahal itself. Similarly, photographs of the fountains looked much better if the Taj was reflected in the water around them; otherwise, the images tend to become slightly meaningless abstracts.<br />
<br />
Later photos do include the Taj Mahal in the background and manage to say more as a result.<br />
<br />
He suggests sitting on the platform of the Taj Mahal and photographing people with the Taj as a background! A practical piece of advice!<br />
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I was a little hesitant at showing him the deliberately photoshopped Taj Mahal photos. He liked the one of birds but felt the more general views of birds on the lawn at the Taj needed to be seen first as a kind of introduction to the close ups.<br />
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Was glad to see that he was amused by some of my photoshopped Taj Mahal photos of towers morphed into birds ... !!<br />
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</div>AMANOhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18182786264442948736noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6771409720724763428.post-63114033357271044172011-10-12T09:16:00.000+01:002011-10-12T09:16:33.501+01:00a chat with Raghu Rai<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">I met Raghu Rai on the terrace above his office; it was a cool, sunny, late afternoon in early march and we drank tea and munched a biscuit or two.<br />
<br />
I had asked Raghu about Martin Parr, the first "real" photographer I had met, at a time when I knew nothing of photography. For Raghu, Parr is photographing the superficial and while his work was exciting for a time, it has now been overdone. Parr needs to move on! He risks repeating himself.<br />
<br />
Another German photographer, Raghu is at a loss to recall his name, had done some panoramic photographs which Raghu admired but when this photographer came to India in the mid-1980's, he only stayed about 10 days, shooting with flash into people's faces; from this a book was made. It said little of the real India and was in many ways was insulting to Indian people.<br />
<br />
People have a natural dignity and it needs to be respected. When Raghu photographs in India he is one of it's people and he emphasises with his subjects; to impose upon them might create dramatic photography but does not create truly insightful photography.<br />
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The West has adopted an arrogant approach.</div>AMANOhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18182786264442948736noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6771409720724763428.post-71907840933728877912011-09-24T22:50:00.007+01:002011-10-16T11:23:02.752+01:00Martin Parr- visiting the exhibition in Bristol - september 24'th<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<br />
I met Eileen Rafferty of the OCA at Bristol Station and we took a taxi over to MShed in Bristol's dockland where the exhibition was being held. It is a collection of Martin Parr photographs all made in Bristol or roundabout and the 60 images on show more or less cover the range of Parr's career except for the earlier pre-1987 years before he moved to the area.<br />
<br />
I was immediately struck by the quality of the photographs - large, well focused, sharp with a sophisticated sense of colour - Parr may be a post modernist photographer but this does not mean to say he can not deliver a technically proficient print even if it is the subject matter that draws one's interest.<br />
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The talk was given by the curator whose views I did not entirely agree with since there were times she seemed to reading into the images rather than from them. Hence, assumptions were made about the relationships between people in the photographs unless she actually had some definite knowledge that this was so. However, her guided tour of a small number of images did help to intensify one's view of what Parr's photography is about. Awkwardness of composition is one important characteristic of Parr's work which also plays on the need for vulnerability in photographs.<br />
<br />
The first photo we were shown shows a young black man in conversation with two purse lipped white people in an image entitled Royal Commonwealth Society Evening; Britain in a post-colonial era. A carefully choreographed image and yet Parr can not have been telling his subjects where to stand rather he got himself into the right position. For the curator, this image is "almost unbearable" and yet I can not help feeling that this is an encouraging image since here are black and white as well as different generations facing each other albeit uncomfortably.<br />
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Parr's images are often carefully choreographed. His images display a comedy of manners. As a child, his parents took him birdwatching and it is perhaps from this time that he developed his power's of observation.<br />
<br />
The second image we are shown is of a show house in Bath; we see the inside of a meticulously if not over designed bedroom. A car on the window sill is mirrored by a car standing outside the house. He is working as a documentary photographer but he is turning his lens inwards rather than outwards at the world as other more established documentary photographers had done. Someone suggests that Parr might have set up the cars to create the punctum of this image; this strikes me as unlikely although Parr does plan his photographs to some extent such as by asking subjects to attend a dinner.<br />
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This kind of domestic documentary was also being created by photographers of the time such as Brian Griffin and Meadows.<br />
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Another photograph is of a couple at a Garden Open Day. The curator says they are a married couple not communicating very well; this again strikes me as an assumption since they may not be related and her downward directed gaze may be nothing more than nervousness when faced by a photographer.<br />
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There is a lot of humour in Parr's photography but not all his images are amusing. He does seem to be a satirist though (and parallels have been drawn with the artist Hogarth.)<br />
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Another photograph is made on the beach at Weston-super-Mare where again the curator talks about the relationship of the two people in it as if she knew they were married. However, the significant point about this image is that it is a vertical crop where one might have expected a horizontal one.<br />
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Egglestone the U.S. photographer who pioneered the use of serious colour has been an influence on Parr. The photograph of a jar of prizewinning homemade lemon curd entitled Harvest Home - 1992 can be read as an example of this influence. This is the photo that Eileen chooses as her favourite since the gallery are asking people to each choose one image and the most popular image will be retained in an archive.<br />
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A photograph of cricketeers looking for a lost ball has a neo-romantic quality evident in the greens of the vegetation. One can see the underpants of one cricketeer, a sense of vulnerability.<br />
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Is Parr looking for the strange with his artificial colours and "hysterical" sense of composition?<br />
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The Badminton Horse Trails is an image that reveals a confusion of gazes and plays upon our sense of voyeurism. The subjects are mostly attractive young women but one looks accusingly at the viewer.<br />
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Another photograph is entitled St.Paul's Carnival - 2009 and shows a group of people both black and white, most of whom although close to each other are not communicating between themselves. It is an example again of Parr's interest in people looking, of voyeurism.<br />
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The "decisive moment" where the photographer captures a particular instance is evident in Parr's work although in many ways it could not be further from the work of Cartier-Bresson who coined that particular phrase.<br />
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One of the photographers who was against Martin Parr's entry to Magnum other than one of the agency's founders, Cartier-Bresson, was said to be Phillip Jones Griffiths who argued that since Parr was admired by Margaret Thatcher he could not be a worthy photographer. If Thatcher was actually aware of Parr's work then probably she would not like it; this was the curator's view which I find myself questioning since Mrs.T was obviously an intelligent woman who would be capable of understanding the work of someone like Parr rather than reacting to it.<br />
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M.Parr was influenced by American photography yet introduced his own way of making images in which he is expert - fill flash with a medium format camera has been part of his technique.<br />
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What though is the reason for Parr's success? A question worth answering and one that I can not immediately respond to.<br />
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He has built a massive and diverse collection of photographs covering the contemporary world. He is also a compulsive collector, a habit that is evident in some of his work.<br />
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Eileen and I discuss what is perhaps my favoutite image, Neighbours from Goldney Avenue, since I see subtle traces of flash of which she is not sure. Her favourite image is of a lemon curd jar that has won a local award.<br />
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Another image we both enjoy is entitled Airbus Factory 2008; as in other photographs by Parr, the horizontals are not aligned and while this may be disconcerting to some, it here adds to the visual effect. Another image like this is of the swimmers descending into the Bristol Channel, an image that reveals the sea horizon at an angle. I enjoy this kind of almost amateurish approach to photography in Parr's work; it might be considered post-modern as might other aspects of Parr's work such as his choice of subject matter and blurring of boundaries between art and documentary. I have however, never heard of him being described as a post-modernist photographer!<br />
<br />
Another noteworthy image is Cribbs Causeway Shopping Centre 2002 which shows four women staring somewhat awkwardly at the camera. The women in the image are, we are told, four generations of the same family, great grandmother to great grandchild, which adds another dimension to this otherwise rather bleak image of a modern shopping centre on the outskirts of Bristol.<br />
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In his approach to street photography, Parr does not want people to smile at the camera but to look natural although many of his subjects do not look natural at all but exhibit discomfort perhaps because of the photographer yet also possibly because they suffer from a contemporary angst which colours their lives. An example of this is The Gymkhana photograph which reveals a small group of young rather well-to-do women, none of whom appear to be responding to each other while one looks somewhat ferociously at the camera.<br />
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There are also a couple of films that Parr made for the BBC showing in one corner of the gallery. One entitled "Think of England" is characteristic of Parr's approach to the country of his birth yet the other film, Vivian's Hotel, is a remarkably sensitive documentary of a woman dying told not through interviews with her and her family.<br />
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Critics such as Val Williams, curator of Parr's retrospective exhibition at the Barbican in London, describe Parr's work as discomforting. I think this is because he is telling the truth and for most people, that is too much to take on board. Perhaps he is being cruel but he is also being honest. What makes him so acceptable is perhaps the great Hogarthian sense of humour that pervades his work.<br />
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After seeing the exhibition, Eileen and I made two visits with lunch in-between, we went to the shop to buy the newspaper format catalogue of the exhibition; not expensive yet since it is a limited edition, it is set to become a collector's item. As we were making our purchases, I enquired about the Martin Parr talk that was due to be held in a couple of weeks time; unfortunately, it proved to be booked out. It was at this point that a voice behind me asked if he would like me to sign the catalogue for him; this was none other than Martin Parr himself. A wonderful coincidence!<br />
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I had done a workshop with Martin Parr over 20 years ago before he became so well known. At the time I knew nothing of photography as a medium yet after that workshop I had a much better understanding of the potentiality of photography which although requiring some degree of technical ability is really concerned with seeing the world and responding to that rather than merely recording it.<br />
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After this encounter, Eileen and I wandered off to make our way to the station by foot. Not far away, we came across some Morris dancers performing outside a pub. We stopped to make some images relecting that this was just the kind of subject that Martin Parr would like to cover; he would however make images that reflected something more than the apparent inconguity of the situation and give some insight into the psychological forces at work. The Morris Dancers of today are not eccentric yokels but rather contemporary citizens who like to dress up and have fun.<br />
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A link to a blog about Martin Parr's exhibition in Paris ...<br />
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<a href="http://www.noblahblah.org/?tag=martin-parr">http://www.noblahblah.org/?tag=martin-parr</a><br />
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<br /></div>AMANOhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18182786264442948736noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6771409720724763428.post-927711671015297152011-09-22T19:47:00.000+01:002011-09-22T19:47:18.833+01:00POSTMODERN exhibition at the V+A<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">review on Front Row 22.9.2011<br />
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<div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><b>Post-Modernism</b></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">Known as "pomo" also "nono"</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">Some visitors will arrive feeling hostile towards subject</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">Exhibition a difficult remit</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">Chairs you can not sit in</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">Building without doors</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">2,000 year old Ming vase with Coca Cola on it</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">post-modernism the death of modernism … !?</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">not about cynicism</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">could be seen as expansive and radically optimistic</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">good fun, not a great deal to say for itself</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">opposite of killing a butterfly with a hammer</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">lot left out of exhibition …</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">covers of music albums</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">what was the fatal blow to pomo … its’ not dead!!</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">More diffused now</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">Paper architecture; </span>"Marginally functional" paper chairs!</div><!--EndFragment--></div>AMANOhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18182786264442948736noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6771409720724763428.post-24703296316204435112011-09-11T06:28:00.000+01:002011-09-11T06:28:59.882+01:00The Black Chronicles<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">Have been invited to an opening at Magnum in London of the following exhibition ... it is interesting to reflect on the way photographs made sometime ago may now be read in a different way! The following from the Magnum website seems worth reading.<br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #9da097; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 16px;"></span><br />
<h1 class="title" style="color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 22px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; font: normal normal bold 17px/17px Arial; line-height: 24px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 15px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 3px;">The Black Chronicles</h1><div style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0.5em; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Autograph ABP’s and Magnum’s objective is not to establish a prescribed way in which to read the presence of black people in photographic archives. Rather, it is to open critical enquiries into the archive to extract content not just by offering a reading of the aesthetic qualities contained within a photograph, but to examine ideological conditions in which photographs were produced and the purpose they serve as agents of communication.</div><div style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0.5em; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">This exhibition brings together the work of four different photographers, who have brought the black subject into focus through their work as longstanding Magnum members. It is therefore an invitation to unpick the authority the archive generates. This exhibition marks a modest beginning of an open enquiry that operates across many photographic archival stories in which the black subject is classified and fixed.</div><div style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0.5em; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Wayne Miller was one of the first Western photographers to document the destruction of Hiroshima. He had just returned from World War II working as a Navy photographer when he received two Guggenheim fellowships to fund an in-depth documentation of African-American life on Chicago’s Southside. The project, started in 1946 and spanning three years, captures both the cultural renaissance and the grim economic realities faced by the city’s largest black community in the immediate post-war era. Miller’s evocative black and white images provide a visual history of Chicago at the height of its industrial peak when the stockyards, steel mills and factories were booming. More significantly they capture intimate moments in the daily lives of ordinary people; factory workers, churchgoers, families and courting couples.</div><div style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0.5em; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">One of Magnum’s founding fathers, British photographer George Rodger produced a series of portraits charting the arrival of Afro-Caribbean migrant families at London’s Waterloo station in 1964, photographed as part of a wider project entitled Impressions of Britain. Photographs of smartly dressed families are displayed alongside Rodger’s original, hand marked contact sheet.</div><div style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0.5em; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Following his powerful portrayal of South Africa under apartheid, Ian Berry spent a significant period during the 60s and 70s photographing England as part of the first Arts Council Photography Bursary. His photographs of multicultural and black communities include several photographs that reveal an increasingly diverse British society, for example, two black male nurses tending to an elderly white gentleman and a dancing interracial couple, seemingly caught off guard by Berry’s lens.</div><div style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0.5em; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Chris Steele-Perkins’ portfolio includes intimate portraits in 1970s Brixton; families dressed in their church finery, schoolboys toying with the latest stereo technology, and a documentary series on Wolverhampton’s dancehall and disco club scene in 1978.</div><div style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0.5em; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">‘Curators in most instances simply replicate and maintain the power structures inherent in the archive. This process signifies an enquiry into what is clearly unfinished representational business, as we look further into the world’s image banks. The challenge is to avoid the trap of definitive story telling and to present photographs that enable reinterpretive moments, meanings and references to surface from within the archive. References that generate either real orn imagined experiences that enter the diverse fields of perception that viewing these historical photographs may trigger’. Mark Sealy, Director, Autograph ABP</div><div style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0.5em; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">‘Clearly archives are not neutral: they embody the power inherent in accumulation, collection, and hoarding as well as that power inherent in the command of lexicon and rules of language. Within bourgeois culture, the photographic project itself has been identified from the very beginning not only with the dream of a universal language but also with the establishment of global archives and repositories according to models offered by libraries, encyclopedia, zoological and botanical gardens, museums, police files and banks.’ - Allan Sekula</div></div>AMANOhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18182786264442948736noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6771409720724763428.post-65842673641013137122011-09-10T05:19:00.003+01:002011-10-16T13:16:49.848+01:00POSTMODERNISM<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
With a view to the OCA outing to the V+A later next month, I thought I would find out a bit more about this subject. Other than knowing that it followed modernism, I realised I knew nothing about what it actually is.<br />
<br />
Started by downloading a sample of A Very Short Introduction to Post Modernism by Christopher Butler onto my Kindle; soon after, sitting in a cafe in Delhi, I was able to buy the whole book since the introductory pages were quite informative and not too hard to read. Postmodernism is found in the writings of French intellectuals such as Derrida and Barthes also Foucault as well as Edward Said. It is not really a philosophy and has no doctrine, postmodernism being deconstructivist in nature; it is allied with Poststructuralism.<br />
<br />
Modernism characterised by the Bauhaus School of Art that grew up in Germany between the wars, was concerned with making the new industrial world a place that could be beautifully created rather than merely utilitarian. A "Brave New World" in fact. Postmodernism however does not have such lofty aims and might be considered as being cynical or at least leading to a general nihilistic view of life.<br />
<br />
One can not however deny its intelligence as it challenges so many formerly accepted modes of thought. For instance, history comes under the spotlight and is here generally understood to be closer to fiction than fact. History is written by people who never have all the facts and probably approach it from their own viewpoint often conditioned by the political viewpoint of the country they live in. The same can be said of literary criticism where someone may be writing about a novel from a Freudian perspective. Text is seen as something that can be read or understood in many different ways which lead Barthes to announce "The death of the author". One might ask, "had he/she ever been alive?"<br />
<br />
There is something very healthy in the way postmodernism challenges our assumptions but does it have anything to offer to compensate for that, to help one see the world anew rather than dismiss it. Largely the postmodernism view has been propounded by intellectuals and yet it has not been fully aware of former theories such as those of Wittgenstein which in many ways anticipated postmodernism. One of Wittgenstein's maxims was "<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; line-height: 22px;">Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent."</span><br />
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</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; line-height: 22px;">Postmodernism challenges the nature of language as one might expect. A word is not the same as the thing it represents even in the case of alliteration. There is much written on this subject and it is not really possible to go into it here except to say that not all postmodern arguments are generally accepted; this is also the case with the postmodern view of science where it is considered that some postmodernists are attacking science without understanding the way it proceeds although one can not ignore the fact that scientists do tend to make make general assumptions. For example, there is the view that it is the male sperm that competes for the female egg without considering the role the egg might be playing in this by actually attracting the sperm. </span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; line-height: 22px;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; line-height: 22px;">Some of the main post-modernists are Derrida, Barthes and Foucault also Said. Salman Rushdie's novel Midnights Children is considered to be the ultimate post-modern novel; it lacks the structure of an ordinary novel. Cindy Sherman is considered to be a postmodern photographer; I would like to add Martin Parr to that since his images do not reveal the strictness of much photographic composition as in his horizons sometimes being at an angle.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; line-height: 22px;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; line-height: 22px;">Postmodernism has questioned authority particularly in the way power tends to have its' own discourse.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; line-height: 22px;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; line-height: 22px;">Yet sometimes postmodernism does seem to assume ignorance on the behalf of it's audience. There are a lot of things that people don't really need to be told.</span><br />
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<br /></div>AMANOhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18182786264442948736noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6771409720724763428.post-57599872250084639312011-09-02T14:13:00.003+01:002011-09-11T06:42:21.440+01:00Struth<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">The OCA are seeing the Struth exhibition at Whitechapel Gallery tomorrow; I had planned to be there but am delayed in Delhi, waiting for my book to go to press. In fact, I did feel a sense of awe over the prospect of visiting this exhibition, one in which the photographer is being represented very much as the artist rather than merely a photographer.<br />
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One can find out about Struth on the net of course. He actually studied art initially at the Dusseldorf School being taught by the now well known Gerhard Richter, who sometimes uses photography in his work. It was however the Bechers who taught him photography. Their approach is a strictly documentary one in which the detail of scenes is accurately communicated; there is something refreshing I find in this honest approach although it might be considered a bit lacklustre. The Bechers for instance mostly photographed industrial buildings.<br />
<br />
My first impressions of the exhibition come from other OCA students as well as Gareth Dent who gives a brief account of the visit, saying ... "<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 18px;">There can be few photographers for whom the difference between viewing images on web and seeing them printed in a gallery is so dramatic as Thomas Struth"</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 18px;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 18px;">One student called Jim makes an interesting few points about his experience ...</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 18px;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 14px; line-height: normal;">• That images such as these can provoke some serious thought, way beyond the initial response of ‘I like or don’t like that’.<br />
• You don’t always need a focal point and something to lead the eye through the picture.<br />
• Artistic pictures can be technically excellent as well!</span></span><br />
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</div>AMANOhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18182786264442948736noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6771409720724763428.post-65805078061507737642011-09-02T14:07:00.002+01:002011-09-23T23:06:01.864+01:00Martin Parr - exhibition in Bristol - 1<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">The photographer Martin Parr is having an exhibition in Bristol. He is the first photographer of note that I studied with though at that time he had only just joined Magnum as an associate; now he is a full member and head of Magnum UK.<br />
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There is an exhibition talk and I have been asking other OCA students to join me there via the OCA Flickr group ...<br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">"An exhibition of Martin Parr's work is going to be on show in Bristol this autumn.<br />
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Parr is a leading UK photographer, head of Magnum UK, whose work attracts a lot of controversy; he is of interest not just to photographers but also students of visual culture.<br />
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Actually, anyone with an interest in contemporary Britain especially Bristol might like it ...<br />
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Any other OCA students interested in meeting up there?<br />
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Amano"<br />
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REVIEW<br />
<a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/2011/jun/12/martin-parr-bristol-photographs" rel="nofollow" style="color: #0063dc; text-decoration: underline;">www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/2011/jun/12/martin-parr-b...</a><br />
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DETAILS<br />
<a href="http://events.magnumphotos.com/exhibition/bristol-and-west-photographs-martin-parr" rel="nofollow" style="color: #0063dc; text-decoration: underline;">events.magnumphotos.com/exhibition/bristol-and-west-photo...</a><br />
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BOOKLET download<br />
<a href="http://www.intellectbooks.co.uk/File:download,id=424/2.martin%20parr.pdf" rel="nofollow" style="color: #0063dc; text-decoration: underline;">www.intellectbooks.co.uk/File:download,id=424/2.martin%20...</a> </span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;"><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;"><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">Henri Cartier-Bresson, the great French photographer, was said to be "highly suspicious" of Martin Parr's work. The suggestion is that he is laughing at his subjects rather than documenting them.<br />
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Parr's photographs make me laugh and yet I wonder why.<br />
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Perhaps it is that by holding up very ordinary scenes for display, he is relieving us of the misery they tend to inflict upon us!? Perhaps he weighs on our capacity for guilt which is why some find him disturbing. Personally, I find his images full of insight and humour.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">It seems easy to go over the top about Parr and so a little information might help to make any OCA conversation less backchat and more constructive.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;"><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">Brian aka Noble Savage wrote ...</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">Where do you see opposition to Martin (Parr) Amano? He's always been controversial, particularly within Magnum, but I haven't heard anyone say he should go off and do something else.<br />
I cringe rather than laugh at his photos, but both are valid emotional responses.<br />
I enjoyed hearing him speak a few months back when he was very sharp with people who tried to praise him in intellectual terms, eg "how does your work achieve such a marvellous three-dimensionality?" - "what do you mean, it's a photo, it's only two dimensional". Inspirational.. </span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;"><b>I replied ...</b></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">Well, I have heard opposition to Martin Parr voiced on OCA days.<br />
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Was it not you Noble Savage who did a post about Parr's portrait day when he was photographing people for a tidy yet not unreasonable sum? You were quite surprised I think by some of the reactions to that post.<br />
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Parr is controversial for sure. I find myself trying to understand my reaction to his work ... </span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;"><b>Brian continued ...</b></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">It was me who started that post, and I said I admired his marketing genius. At the end of that thread I also said "All my posts express my respect for Parr in some area. I also said I'd swap places with him anytime."<br />
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I was only surprised that people hadn't read my posts fully before metaphorically putting words in my mouth.<br />
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In a different post I also expressed admiration. I'm a big fan, perhaps just not unconditionally so.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">I continued ...</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">Have just purchased a copy of Martin Parr by Val Williams (about £20) which contains images as well as a good critique of his work. I would like to develop a more informed view of this controversial leading UK photographer who seems to have a foot in both the documentary and the art world.<br />
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OCA tutor, Peter Haveland comments that some students particularly more mature ones tend to overlook contemporary work for more traditional or proven material. I know that when I went to Bradford this year for the OCA view of From Back Home, I had to see the Fay Godwin exhibition; the difference between the two exhibitions was striking.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">A interview with Parr and a brief review of the exhibition that opened yesterday ... !<br />
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<a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/art/art-features/8723045/The-foibles-of-the-world.html" rel="nofollow" style="color: #0063dc; text-decoration: underline;">www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/art/art-features/8723045/The-...</a> </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">I read Val Williams' book about Martin Parr (published by Phaidon). She starts by saying that Parr's photos "can make us feel very uncomfortable" which seems to be a fairly typical approach and one that I do not share. Apparently, Parr is good friends with Bruce Gilden which does not surprise me much yet reminds me of that other side to Parr, the side that is as tough and as solid as the metal and glass in his camera. I know I do not want to intrude into people's lives the way Gilden does on the streets of NYC and yet I don't see Parr as such a merciless snooper.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">One of Parr's books that he sees as one of the most important is Common Sense; the cover shows a rusty model of the globe which is being used as a money box, a reflection of his "growing preoccupation with globalism and the corporate culture". Val Williams also describes this book as "violent", a violence that is increased by showing objects of possible veneration such as a cup of tea in a willow-patterned tea cup with more grotesque object of consumerism.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">By 2001, Parr was quoted as saying that his best photography was behind him rather than in front of him. It is not easy to draw conclusions about him because his work is so diverse and complex in meaning. One might call him a post-modern photographer perhaps since he pays little attention to the so-called rules of photography in which composition is much more formal and colours not so gaudy.</span><br />
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</span></div>AMANOhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18182786264442948736noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6771409720724763428.post-37547457733351923072011-07-29T09:06:00.002+01:002011-07-29T09:06:53.731+01:00Post-modernism (exhibition at the V+A)<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">Here is a link to the photographic display ...<br />
http://www.vam.ac.uk/content/articles/s/signs-of-a-struggle-photography-in-the-wake-of-postmodernism/</div>AMANOhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18182786264442948736noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6771409720724763428.post-29807747304106891222011-07-11T12:53:00.007+01:002011-07-11T14:03:14.513+01:00OCA informal meeting of students in the South West<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSP2h1doZFGhWtt2x-9lDgr2onL0WXAN-6tnADUDBFThrXjk-oh8mHC6VtLnJ96JBN50qqdiBl-oVD7hOH_C5PBPO2Bd4AtHn2-eUWE_0jg7AjGYfV-gnMhpYGZ7WtmranH8iQdF1StI8Y/s1600/01_OCA+meeting+in+Bristol_20110709_Bristol_8694-003.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSP2h1doZFGhWtt2x-9lDgr2onL0WXAN-6tnADUDBFThrXjk-oh8mHC6VtLnJ96JBN50qqdiBl-oVD7hOH_C5PBPO2Bd4AtHn2-eUWE_0jg7AjGYfV-gnMhpYGZ7WtmranH8iQdF1StI8Y/s400/01_OCA+meeting+in+Bristol_20110709_Bristol_8694-003.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">M5 Somerset : photo made without my looking through the viewfinder</td></tr>
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Thanks to Teresa Milk from Torquay who arranged a meeting of students at the Royal West Academy in Bristol. This is how at 10.30 a.m before the gallery began to fill up, 7 of us (3 men, 4 women) found themselves around a table sipping away at their bevvies and chatting.<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgM61PZWa7jT_CsDnG8v8uIwLvKitCGsLL2jIX2ItlWRr-ehI91DnIvVyZfu9Cj415aWMtdRplea4QPa8fqFywVtM3hrq-xh12zg5TSALT76MpJglcvCTUJY5Dzr0qreBCQzmSiVFDStWoH/s1600/03_OCA+meeting+in+Bristol_20110709_Bristol_8710-019.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgM61PZWa7jT_CsDnG8v8uIwLvKitCGsLL2jIX2ItlWRr-ehI91DnIvVyZfu9Cj415aWMtdRplea4QPa8fqFywVtM3hrq-xh12zg5TSALT76MpJglcvCTUJY5Dzr0qreBCQzmSiVFDStWoH/s400/03_OCA+meeting+in+Bristol_20110709_Bristol_8710-019.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The RWA in Bristol with Charity, a statue installation by Damien Hirst, standing outside</td></tr>
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I was not sure I would be able to come until more or less the last minute. I had also had reservations about meeting in an art gallery. I am not one of those photographers who wants their work to be taken seriously as art rather I would like it to be accepted as photography; "photography for photography's sake!"<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPd97WpQ2ybkhggYa2iZXVSgSLHviU4o0EUStytjIZv2VDoA7JxG34hP75XMqHQtzb1QW3HoofiLEv5840CBRMcGU-eLc5RlKgOjTqa2w4iFNuqRhuzYcbt49g2Go2DabD3JX28No5f94C/s1600/02_OCA+meeting+in+Bristol_20110709_Bristol_8700-009.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="255" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPd97WpQ2ybkhggYa2iZXVSgSLHviU4o0EUStytjIZv2VDoA7JxG34hP75XMqHQtzb1QW3HoofiLEv5840CBRMcGU-eLc5RlKgOjTqa2w4iFNuqRhuzYcbt49g2Go2DabD3JX28No5f94C/s400/02_OCA+meeting+in+Bristol_20110709_Bristol_8700-009.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">no sign for photography magazines !</td></tr>
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Before I arrived at the gallery, I dropped into Smiths, the newsagents, and was struck to see there was no actual mention of photography in their extensive shelves of magazines; the current term is "imaging". This further stirred my concerns about photography as a medium.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEin3R973SVfUxQAA3mAUOEEAj_G8Fklvnxpi6whZi8ENPh2Qmw3gjSV44gVVPKbmH9As2Q4OnCv_JPyvfAWQJEyHT6g3kJdZXzN7iGsIDN57r7p-W08BD1kIGzmc0gwhDVhG0dVWldcVS1V/s1600/08_OCA+meeting+in+Bristol_20110709_Bristol_8766-075.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="301" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEin3R973SVfUxQAA3mAUOEEAj_G8Fklvnxpi6whZi8ENPh2Qmw3gjSV44gVVPKbmH9As2Q4OnCv_JPyvfAWQJEyHT6g3kJdZXzN7iGsIDN57r7p-W08BD1kIGzmc0gwhDVhG0dVWldcVS1V/s400/08_OCA+meeting+in+Bristol_20110709_Bristol_8766-075.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">a piece of art work in the academy that did interest me!</td></tr>
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What would the day be like without a tutor to give some input? It was slightly haphazard as we lost each other on more than one occasion but the RWA is not a big place and there was a natural gravitation towards Papdilo, the cafe there!<br />
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Tutors in fact were one topic of conversation. Are they really worth the course fee? Do they earn their keep? It seems tutors do vary quite a bit in the way they respond to their students. There was a feeling that tutors do not go in for personal communication with their students over the practicalities of doing a course and personal issues the students might be facing over caring for a senile parent for instance. Tutors can also be rather brief when commenting on the work of students. Personally, I have got on fine with the tutors I have had although one did send me an introductory letter for a course different to the one I was doing!! I find it has taken me time to get into the mode of studying again.<br />
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A part of the course is keeping either a log book or an online blog. At first, I found the software difficult to handle and still find Blogger a bit tricky. Wordpress can be a good alternative; this software is available for download and so one does not have to be online all the time.<br />
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Tutors had another criticism thrown at them concerning their criticism of contemporary artists! Martin Parr is a leading UK photographer yet gets criticism as does the doyenne of landscape photographer, Charlie Waite. One can find oneself accused of being too commercially orientated rather than producing one's own work and finding style rather than borrowing it. This strikes me as a bit of a conundrum. I remember once being criticised for producing commercial images that were being used to advertise a holiday; I did not tell the photographer that I had actually made the photographs before the idea came up for the holidays and there were also in black and white, not a usually a choice for for holidays. The photographer happened to be well known and widely respected so I took the criticism on board in a kind of respective way but found myself questioning it too. I guess if you have a Marxist outlook then anything that looks like it might sell is considered inappropriate.<br />
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One topic that drew me to the day was UVC (Understanding Visual Communication) a course that I have considered doing. This sounds really interesting but I wonder about studying Mark and Freud; what about Darwin whose thinking is becoming more relevant as science continues to verify his theories? Both Mark and Freud have been discredited by those who have followed in their footsteps. UVC seems intellectual though and not really in tune with the more intuitive approach of photography which happened thanks to scientific theory not aesthetic theorising. Liz Wells writes, "Theory informs practice." yet without practice there would be no theory. Still, UVC is clearly a fascinating line of study and as a photographer I feel the need to understand theory to some extent.<br />
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Reading around one's topic can be rewarding even if one does go off at tangents thanks to the mass of available information on the internet.<br />
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The Landscape module of photography might seem attractive yet it is also demanding. One needs to photograph the same location at different times of the year and even different times of the day which can be very time consuming.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiJ51dxio2yfbgPuiKdI1f_qeyFhcadR-3pu1oAgarVxMXpjjUP2-pRapT-0wt1Zw1JKe6NGBy0N8-BsMI6NC6EggmaYtH8MJESF6pQTZBLoqgeMlGdtI5xRAHqtSQSeGqja6I2_5q3zFsP/s1600/07_OCA+meeting+in+Bristol_20110709_Bristol_8747-056.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="142" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiJ51dxio2yfbgPuiKdI1f_qeyFhcadR-3pu1oAgarVxMXpjjUP2-pRapT-0wt1Zw1JKe6NGBy0N8-BsMI6NC6EggmaYtH8MJESF6pQTZBLoqgeMlGdtI5xRAHqtSQSeGqja6I2_5q3zFsP/s400/07_OCA+meeting+in+Bristol_20110709_Bristol_8747-056.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">OCA student informal meet at the RWA: students from left to right -<br />
Theresa and Dorothy then Ushma, Peter, Sally? and David.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>As the conversation continued, I got up and walked around the room to look at the large format inkjet prints on the walls of buildings at night from different places around the world; the cost of one print was £320 and there were a couple of signs to inform one of this but no sign containing the name of the photographer although a man at the entrance to the museum selling tickets to the exhibitions did mention it to me.<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5XvT6e_uQW4NsiW_pkAAxJY6_VH4k7GJgCggGt1yhtq9pzEyq4XMoMVLA7w2KdEYrok0b2MWjCMaNQv4HR1gDw2YbE1h0HxBs34rXx70hWxuQq1SY8ttUb8QxkfHoYGRls-YvZEUmTWm5/s1600/10_OCA+meeting+in+Bristol_20110709_Bristol_8790-098.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5XvT6e_uQW4NsiW_pkAAxJY6_VH4k7GJgCggGt1yhtq9pzEyq4XMoMVLA7w2KdEYrok0b2MWjCMaNQv4HR1gDw2YbE1h0HxBs34rXx70hWxuQq1SY8ttUb8QxkfHoYGRls-YvZEUmTWm5/s400/10_OCA+meeting+in+Bristol_20110709_Bristol_8790-098.jpg" width="277" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">sign for The Ballroom Spy exhibition</td></tr>
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There was one exhibition I did want to see since it was about dance, a subject I have covered quite extensively in Asia, and also because it also contained paintings of dance; it was interesting to see photographs and paintings hung in the same gallery as part of the same exhibition since the dialogue between these tow art forms has always interested me, largely as a way to define my own photographic practice.<br />
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The exhibition was called "The Ballroom Spy" and was about ballroom dancing and the world this particular form of dance encompasses. A lady on duty at the exhibition told me that the two were good friends and admired each others work; in fact, the artist Jack Vettriano uses the photographer's images to paint from. The photographer Jeanette Jones is a trained dancer herself and uses this knowledge to help her make images that relate to particular points in the dance moves.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9FuypAHgsi382VveMxusYhIovQWJl139bd1MBX7_Are6yDYOIckK_EcSoF4FMITo2udgupvTU7-6sdLQKTxNxeXqR3hovMYPagYEozSg8kxUhWuyW2FlF24FTzs-vqBbFAmJvFINzWbzs/s1600/09_OCA+meeting+in+Bristol_20110709_Bristol_8770-078.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9FuypAHgsi382VveMxusYhIovQWJl139bd1MBX7_Are6yDYOIckK_EcSoF4FMITo2udgupvTU7-6sdLQKTxNxeXqR3hovMYPagYEozSg8kxUhWuyW2FlF24FTzs-vqBbFAmJvFINzWbzs/s400/09_OCA+meeting+in+Bristol_20110709_Bristol_8770-078.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">HABITAT - a chain store that is closing !</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9dU2SQvlscc2V4npkMfLrZESq9bpo_lcCwInXmZ9j15KP2ADlc0DBxeEF_XC4trWZYEjBxrzUGncd669s9iWszYgTxc3e6ZePg0Jj9shhKshr786Ws4JM08aJeIy5cVn_qNtwf04JN5YD/s1600/11_OCA+meeting+in+Bristol_20110709_Bristol_8798-106.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9dU2SQvlscc2V4npkMfLrZESq9bpo_lcCwInXmZ9j15KP2ADlc0DBxeEF_XC4trWZYEjBxrzUGncd669s9iWszYgTxc3e6ZePg0Jj9shhKshr786Ws4JM08aJeIy5cVn_qNtwf04JN5YD/s400/11_OCA+meeting+in+Bristol_20110709_Bristol_8798-106.jpg" width="212" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">the rear view of Charity by Damien Hirst - coins spilling from the collection box <br />
could be seen around the base of the statue and on the pavement outside </td></tr>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgI5VZRH2LC8oor5NuOXHkRNeGk9-KFsnHba_dLW_BzYuXEav3chvkdTzrtMmdDQgtCyArBNfgROWyNq63e-hc24XHsinqwGlBNp0lnMFOKy-grpg-x9xk9xsji9d6bPf6wmY7ZzRYH3EAy/s1600/12_OCA+meeting+in+Bristol_20110709_Bristol_8808-116.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgI5VZRH2LC8oor5NuOXHkRNeGk9-KFsnHba_dLW_BzYuXEav3chvkdTzrtMmdDQgtCyArBNfgROWyNq63e-hc24XHsinqwGlBNp0lnMFOKy-grpg-x9xk9xsji9d6bPf6wmY7ZzRYH3EAy/s320/12_OCA+meeting+in+Bristol_20110709_Bristol_8808-116.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">I started my blog at a cafe further up Whiteladies Road</td></tr>
</tbody></table>AMANOhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18182786264442948736noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6771409720724763428.post-74446096449265159692011-07-11T08:19:00.000+01:002011-07-11T08:19:02.551+01:00Shaw exhibition at Laycock 1 ; Guardian review by Maev Kennedy<span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; color: #333333; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;"></span><br />
<div id="main-content-picture" style="background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border-collapse: collapse; display: block; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><div class="caption" style="background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border-collapse: collapse; color: #666666; display: block; font-size: 12px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">George Bernard Shaw, who frequently posed for his own pictures, often experimented with lighting and early colour printing. Photograph: LSE/National Trust</div></div><div id="article-body-blocks" style="background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border-collapse: collapse; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><div style="background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; margin-bottom: 13px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/culture/bernardshaw" style="background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border-collapse: collapse; color: #005689; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-decoration: none;" title="More from guardian.co.uk on George Bernard Shaw">George Bernard Shaw</a> will be exposed, stripped bare as never before, when the contents of cupboards and drawers, albums and boxes crammed into his last home go on display for the first time – the thousands of photographs that were the Nobel laureate's other great passion in life.</div><div style="background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; margin-bottom: 13px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">An exhibition of original prints will open at the <a href="http://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/main/w-vh/w-visits/w-findaplace/w-lacockabbeyvillage/w-lacockabbeyvillage-talbotmuseum.htm" style="background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border-collapse: collapse; color: #005689; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-decoration: none;" title="National Trusts Fox Talbot museum in Lacock ">National Trust's Fox Talbot Museum in Lacock, Wiltshire,</a> on Thursday, while the guardian of Shaw's photographic archive, the London School of Economics, has mounted an<a href="http://lse.ac.uk/library/shawexhibit" style="background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border-collapse: collapse; color: #005689; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-decoration: none;" title="online exhibition">online exhibition</a> as well. Both have astonishing images, including several of Shaw naked, apart from his whiskers.</div><div style="background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; margin-bottom: 13px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">From 10,000 images, mostly printed by Shaw, Roger Watson, curator of the Lacock exhibition, has chosen a startling self-portrait of the playwright lying on a sofa, lit by a single overhead lamp, naked apart from a strategically placed book. Shaw's long, skinny body could be a medieval tomb carving, apart from the hints in the shadows of a 20th-century background.</div><div style="background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; margin-bottom: 13px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">"It really is a very striking and unusual image," Watson said. "A more conventional photographer would have cropped the lamp out of the print, but to me that makes the picture. "</div><div style="background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; margin-bottom: 13px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Karyn Stuckey, the curator at the LSE who has been cataloguing the vast collection and created the online exhibition, was taken aback when she discovered the image of a naked Shaw bending over to set his camera, reflected in a mirror. "I was ploughing through hundreds of slightly dull prints, and expecting something entirely different to come up next, and I suddenly went 'Whoa, what's that?'"</div><div style="background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; margin-bottom: 13px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Shaw, who took up <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/photography" style="background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border-collapse: collapse; color: #005689; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-decoration: none;" title="More from guardian.co.uk on Photography">photography</a> in 1898, frequently photographed himself nude, and also posed on a beach as Rodin's Thinker for the actor Harley Granville Barker, but admitted "I merely looked constipated".</div><div style="background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; margin-bottom: 13px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Both <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/exhibition" style="background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border-collapse: collapse; color: #005689; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-decoration: none;" title="More from guardian.co.uk on Exhibitions">exhibitions</a> are full of biographical hints for the curious. There are relatively few photographs of men, but many of beautiful and sensuously photographed – if fully clothed – women friends. They include the actor Lillah McCarthy and the even more ravishing Beatrice Webb, co-founder of the LSE with the Shaws and her husband and fellow Fabian, Sidney Webb. His most famous leading lady, Mrs Patrick Campbell, was captured lying in bed. He wrote to her: "I want the lighter of my seven lamps of beauty, honour, laughter, music, love, life and immortality", but the relationship smouldered almost entirely on paper.</div><div style="background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; margin-bottom: 13px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">There are many photographs of his wife, Charlotte. Long before his writing made him rich, Shaw's money problems were solved by marrying the Irish heiress in 1898. One frank portrait shows her looking trustingly straight to camera: on the back he captioned it "nee Charlotte Payne-Townshend Mrs Bernard Shaw" – then crossed that out and wrote "The green-eyed millionairess".</div><div style="background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; margin-bottom: 13px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">By the time Shaw died at Ayot St Lawrence in Hertfordshire in 1950, aged 94 – after falling out of an apple tree he was trying to prune – he had accumulated 10,000 prints and more than 10,000 negatives.</div><div style="background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; margin-bottom: 13px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">The house and contents were left to the National Trust. In 1979 the photographs, still uncatalogued and many on mouldering and potentially dangerous old film, were transferred to the archives of the London School of Economics for safe storage. In a marathon joint LSE and National Trust project all have been conserved, digitised – almost crashing the LSE website – and catalogued over the past two years.</div><div style="background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; margin-bottom: 13px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Shaw was typically writing thundering reviews of photographic exhibitions long before he started photograpy. Stuckey and Watson agree that the best were taken with Shaw's earliest cameras, when he was experimenting with lighting and early colour printing, and creating strikingly composed shots that demanded careful planning and minutes of immobility from his subjects, rather than the snapshots he produced when he bought a Leica and began using 35mm film in the 1930s.</div><div style="background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; margin-bottom: 13px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">A handful of his photographs were reproduced or exhibited in his lifetime, but thousands had never been seen by anyone since Shaw last looked at them.</div><div style="background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; margin-bottom: 13px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">"He's not perhaps a first-rank photographer, but he's very high in the second rank, at least in his early days," Watson said. "If somebody brought these in and said they were their grandfather's and asked if we would exhibit them, the truthful answer would probably be no. I'd say they'd be lovely to have, lovely to go through the albums, but I'm not sure how many outsiders would come to see them. But as the work of Shaw, they're a different story entirely. I think people will be fascinated."</div><div style="background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; margin-bottom: 13px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"></div><div style="background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; margin-bottom: 13px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><em style="background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; border-collapse: collapse; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">George Bernard Shaw: Man & Cameraman, will be showing at the Fox Talbot museum, Lacock Abbey, Wiltshire, from 7 July to 11 December 2011</em></div></div>AMANOhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18182786264442948736noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6771409720724763428.post-57827311714157726012011-05-23T09:48:00.002+01:002011-05-23T16:10:17.697+01:00Paul Graham : OCA day at the Whitechapel Gallery 21.05.11<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br />
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</span></span></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-US" style="color: grey; font-size: 18pt;"><span style="color: windowtext;">OCA day at the Whitechapel Gallery for the Paul Graham exhibition<o:p></o:p></span></span></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-US" style="color: grey; font-size: 18pt;"><span style="color: windowtext;">Saturday 21’st May 2011<o:p></o:p></span></span></div></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">had to wait about 20 minutes to purchase a ticket for the Underground<br />
during which time I worked out exactly how to get there<br />
as the direct route was not operating!</td></tr>
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</span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 14pt;">This day with fellow OCA students and Gareth Dent, OCA CEO, was a chance not just to meet other students one knew as internet presences but also to see an important exhibition by the contemporary photographer Paul Graham and be guided around it by Michael Lowton, an artist and member of the gallery staff. </span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 14pt;"><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">view from a tube train - London 2011</td></tr>
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</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 14pt;">In spite of chaos on the London Underground, we all eventually met up outside the gallery and were welcomed by ML who took us straight into the exhibition as soon as we had been tagged with a light blue Whitechapel Gallery sticker.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 14pt;"><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Gareth Dent (right of centre) meets students outside the Whitechapel Gallery</td></tr>
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</span></span></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 14pt;">Paul Graham, (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Graham_(photographer)), winner of the 2009 Deutsche-Borse prize for his contribution to photography as a whole, is a fine art photographer although there is a documentary feel to much of his work. The exhibition is entitled “Paul Graham Photographs 1981-2006” and was described as "a mid-career survey" since the term "retrospective" would have implied that his work is finished which it obviously is not.<o:p></o:p></span></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 14pt;">The exhibition concerns itself with "the idea of looking at things" though obviously this is only one way of considering the work; some visitors might see it in a different light. Personally, I found myself struck by the clever combination of the aesthetic and the documentary allowing one to be both informed by the work and also given the space to wonder about it. Some documentary work more or less forces one to think about certain subjects such as apartheid for instance, while here the viewer although directed towards certain subjects such as unemployment or the American Dream, is not being forced into a particular viewpoint. Graham’s work allows one to reflect. He had actually trained as a micro-biologist rather than an artist.<o:p></o:p></span></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 14pt;">By photographing people watching television, the photographer has chosen to consider his immediate surroundings rather than a far away location. <o:p></o:p></span></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 14pt;">One body of work entitled “A1: The Great North Road” shows Graham at the start of his career, drawing heavily on the work of American photographers who traveled the roads of their country in search of images that might encapsulate America. An obvious influence here is William Eggleston (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Eggleston) who was one of the first photographers to make colour photography an acceptable medium yet the work of a Swiss photographer, Robert Frank, (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Frank) who worked in black and white and created a book about his journey across America is no doubt another strong influence. Paul Graham’s conscious use of colour here with deep blue skies and yellowish buildings red interiors </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 19px;">is quite obvious</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 19px;">.</span></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 14pt;">Another early body of work made between 1984 and 5 and called Beyond Caring was when I first became aware of him as a photographer. There was some talk at the time of Graham’s apparently trivial treatment of such a mundane subject as unemployment with further questions about the odd angles and perspectives this work produced, a result of often photographing surrepticously in government buildings of subjects who would have probably been reluctant subjects. One image that shows a child in pink surrounded by seated unemployed people caused a stir. Graham’s use of colour was considered frivolous in this situation, black and white would be much more appropriate yet Graham has never been the type of photographer to blindly follow in other’s footsteps.<o:p></o:p></span></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 14pt;">The prints we see in the exhibition here are digitally produced; at the time, they would have been produced chemically in the darkroom and would have looked quite different. One wonders how much present day printing influences the impression we now have of these images.<o:p></o:p></span></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 14pt;">Another series of images called Troubled Land (The social landscape of Northern Ireland) made between 1984 and 1986 shows the </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 19px;">natural </span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 14pt;">beauty of this part of the world. However, in each image there is a small area of detail, what Barthes might have considered as a <i>punctum</i></span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 14pt;">, that indicates a disturbing element such as soldiers searching a car; these throw light as well as perspective on the troubles Northern Ireland faced for a long time and has still not entirely rid itself of. In a book, these details are easily missed and this is one example of a gallery bringing out the best in a photograph particularly when a large format camera has been used to make the originals.</span></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 14pt;">“Empty Heaven” is a series of images made in Japan between 1989 and 1995, which are said to contain “ideas of denial and concealment” with hidden signifiers in the work. The “hierachal and structured society” of Japan is mentioned as well as “suppressed memories of the past” evident in a photograph of an atomic bomb explosion. There is a photograph of a girl with a white face, apparently mimicking a Geisha, a tree at night wrapped up and twinned uncomprehendingly with the profile of a man’s slightly acned face … it is not easy to understand what these images are actually about. The superficiality of modern Japan perhaps though the onlooker may not draw such a conclusion since Japan is not an easy society to understand.<o:p></o:p></span></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 14pt;">Ceasefire is a series of images made between 6 and 8’th of April 1984 to record a cessation of hostilities in a European war zone and shows only the sky with clouds; every image though is different with the sun wanly shining through formations of cloud while other images near the end of the sequence do not reveal the presence of the sun at all and are much darker in appearance.<o:p></o:p></span></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 14pt;">New Europe is series of images that record an important part of Europe’s development when it was merging into one very large country rather than an economic union as had been the early idea. There is a touching photograph of a man looking at a modern city with its’ high rise buildings yet it does not take long to notice that this man is missing an arm. The New Europe has come at a price and is not so good as it might be considered as other photographs show drug taking, prostitution and women smoking. A slightly techie discussion took place among a few of us as to how a photograph of a well illuminated pillar with a crown of barbed wire wrapped around it, managed to be made with a dark background; I reckoned it was by using a flash probably at night but possibly by day and while most others thought it was a flash shot owing to the hard shadows, one wondered exactly how the background had been kept in the shadow ... perhaps it was further away that one imagined or the camera was close and a small aperture had been used!?<o:p></o:p></span></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 14pt;">Another set of images called End of an Age 1996 to 1998 are described as a “candid portrait of a generation reaching adulthood on the cusp of the new millennium”. Not one of the subjects portrayed is looking at the camera and while some are sharply defined by well exposed and closely focused images, others are unfocused and present a fuzzy view. All the images are printed very large, filling the walls in this part of the gallery and were photographed in European nightclubs. There is a hedonistic feel to these images and interestingly, they have been more widely used without permission by companies such as Gucci than any other of his other images.<o:p></o:p></span></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 14pt;">American Night, photographs made in North America between 1998 and 2002, is full of innuendo like much of Graham’s work. Here we see over-exposed images containing only a faint impression of detail and yet enough for one to understand visually what is happening in the image; others are printed very dark while still retaining detail. Black and White is a theme here that seems to be under exploration as black people feature in the black images while rich and poor is another subject also under the spotlight. There is an image perfectly exposed of a suburban house which seems to perfectly portray the American Dream though this body of images seems to be as much about the American nightmare of consumerism and racial tension. As with much of Paul Graham’s work, the images are untitled but place names and dates are given such as New York 1998 etc.<o:p></o:p></span></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 14pt;">One might ask with this body of work as to why some images are greatly over-exposed though not with loss of actual detail while others are very dark and some are right in between. There are figures in some images but these are mostly solitary and a few are wheel chair bound, a comment on lives lost in battle zones elsewhere perhaps, an apparently necessary strategy to maintain the “heaven” of America.<o:p></o:p></span></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 14pt;">A “Shimmer of Possibility” is another set of images made between 2004 and 2006 and continues the American theme. It includes the series of photographs made of a man mowing a lawn outside a hotel in Pittsburgh where the photographer was staying in 2004. This was unplanned and yet the session produced a remarkably varied </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 19px;">group of</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 19px;"> images as did another set of a flower vendor in San Francisco (2006) in which the images are by and large unexposed showing him in the street, close up with different facial expressions and also his hands that grasp the flowers.</span></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 14pt;">At the end of the exhibition, there is a collection of Paul Graham’s photo-books behind glass; one wants to take them out and handle them, look again at the images one has seen and see them juxtaposed with others one has not.<o:p></o:p></span></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgP742VRMuzRyfJ9gXit_-aqc12L7AuXgg92wSbLBahhHXH7q1srkO0GJGJU7HW2UKTQzFsCm92a2kGsL_8s-jCxKrtCHsZ3C7uf3YyryBaUU88W0ru4zLlTgFtgau5wqeMeBNl-pWVsInz/s1600/Gareth-addresses-students-in-the-Archive-Room-Whitechapel-Gallery_20110521-OCA-day-Whitechapel-Gallery-London-019-199.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="186" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgP742VRMuzRyfJ9gXit_-aqc12L7AuXgg92wSbLBahhHXH7q1srkO0GJGJU7HW2UKTQzFsCm92a2kGsL_8s-jCxKrtCHsZ3C7uf3YyryBaUU88W0ru4zLlTgFtgau5wqeMeBNl-pWVsInz/s400/Gareth-addresses-students-in-the-Archive-Room-Whitechapel-Gallery_20110521-OCA-day-Whitechapel-Gallery-London-019-199.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Gareth Dent (far right) and other students in the Archive Room<br />
at the Whitechapel Gallery London</td></tr>
</tbody></table><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 14pt;">After viewing the exhibition we are taken to Gallery 5, the Archive Room, and here are a completely different set of photographs by Ian Berry, a Magnum photographer well known for his images of England. These are all in black and white, a sharp contrast to the colour of Paul Graham and a reminder that although they might be considered contemporaries since they worked at the same time for some of the time, they are from different eras of photography. Ian Berry was actually commissioned by the Whitechapel Gallery to photograph the area nearby for a book that never happened although an exhibition did. His beautifully crafted photographs of a time of great social change, hang on the walls of this room and reveal a world that is no longer observable.<o:p></o:p></span></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 14pt;">In regard to Paul Graham's work, that which I found most interesting was not in the exhibition but in a book of his called Film which was published only this year. It is a list of extreme close ups of the crystals of different film makes, qualities that give it its’ distinctive character; the various emulsions photographed are all recorded </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 19px;">by name </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 19px;">at the back of the book. This is not only a very colourful and attractive book with images given full bleed on the pages, it is also a historical document as many of these films have now been discontinued. A book for techies? Hardly, as with so much of Graham’s work there is a curious blending of the scientific and the aesthetic which for me is the hallmark of good if not great photography, a view that I might well be held to account for by those who think it is all about art!!?</span></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 14pt;">This brings my account to the next part of the day ... the discussion about the exhibition over a beverage, kindly provided for by the OCA.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: grey; font-size: 18pt;"><span style="color: windowtext;"> <o:p></o:p></span></span></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div></div></div>AMANOhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18182786264442948736noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6771409720724763428.post-52348115316588279882011-05-03T12:03:00.000+01:002011-05-23T11:52:43.092+01:00chat with Gareth Dent about the art of photography<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">I have met Gareth Dent, the CEO of the OCA, on a number of OCA study days.<br />
<br />
We discussed the photography course with Gareth saying that the modules aimed to take the student beyond technical considerations to consider photography as an art.<br />
<br />
I don't doubt this approach for a moment yet feel that photography is going too far in the direction of art which allows people to use the medium because it is seen as an easy form of expression. To actually convey one's vision through photography is however not easy since one can not rely completely on the obvious attractiveness of the medium. I mention Steve Edwards from the Open University whose book A Very Short Introduction to Photography considers the photograph as both art and document.<br />
<br />
Studying the character of great photographs is part of the art of photography approach.<br />
<br />
Sometimes photography, particularly modern photography which no longer tries to use artistic conventions, can be depressing and it is the body of the work that needs considering rather than individual images.<br />
<br />
One needs to be aware of entrenched attitudes within the medium of photography particularly one's own.</div>AMANOhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18182786264442948736noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6771409720724763428.post-63978625590631142912011-05-03T11:39:00.000+01:002011-05-03T11:39:55.973+01:00more thoughts on the art of photography<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">I wonder whether the art of photography might be the ability to enhance even manipulate photographs in Photoshop. Here, colours can be altered as well as contrast and brightness.<br />
<br />
However, before one starts to use Photoshop as an artistic tool, one needs to be able to make good quality photographs which can then be worked on in Photoshop.</div>AMANOhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18182786264442948736noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6771409720724763428.post-42083168451377433302011-04-29T09:57:00.000+01:002011-04-29T09:57:43.846+01:00SEEING IS BELIEVING<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">Photography is really a very good example of this maxim, "Seeing is Believing"<div><br />
</div><div>Yet one needs to remember that believing is not actually seeing! </div><div><br />
</div><div>Photographic "truth" is like belief; it is assumption rather than fact.</div></div>AMANOhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18182786264442948736noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6771409720724763428.post-5266641169095673232011-04-20T21:53:00.000+01:002011-04-20T21:53:36.887+01:00OCA competition - Roll With it<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">I decided to enter this OCA competition with commitment; having won the last one, I felt I was in with a chance.<br />
<br />
An early idea that came to my mind was a lamp with a toilet roll as the shade.<br />
<br />
<br />
This was followed by other "still life" pieces<br />
<br />
I wanted to photograph a scene of my mother coming out of the supermarket carrying a load of toilet rolls but she did not want to play and neither did she want me to ask a friend of hers to. I fancied doing a self portrait but this would have meant using a tripod and no doubt the management of Waitrose would have come out to ask me what I was up to and probably to tell me to stop etc<br />
<br />
In the end, I went for an image that one tutor described as "strong work" and a student as "Great Work". There were other encouraging comments from other students. Might it not be the winner? It had to be!! I was aware of my crazy mind going on because somehow I knew it would not be.<br />
<br />
This photoshopped photo of a black woman with a toilet roll superimposed over her face surely has narrative potential (as one tutor remarked).<br />
<br />
It did not however really fullfil the brief and was not what the tutors/judges were looking for. Photoshop had seduced me from the raw experience of the photograph!!</div>AMANOhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18182786264442948736noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6771409720724763428.post-23657380315427668502011-02-23T09:19:00.000+00:002011-02-23T09:19:49.718+00:00further considerations in regard to the frame<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">The photographer, Henri Cartier-Bresson, used to be very strict about composing within the frame; the image was not to be cropped since it was composed within a particular framework of exact proportions. To ignore this might be to ruin the original conception of the photograph.<br />
<br />
There was however, an ulterior motive here. While the frame did constitute a means of ensuring consistency in his working method, it also meant that editors would have to respect his compositions and not make their own interpretations as this might alter the meaning of the photograph from its' original intent.<br />
<br />
I do not adhere to the method of "framing" photographs when trying to capture images because often, in wildlife, one is just trying to get an image and may not have the option of framing in regards to the proportions of the image. This is probably going to be something one can do better at a later stage.</div>AMANOhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18182786264442948736noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6771409720724763428.post-61051958829870507672011-02-23T09:11:00.000+00:002011-02-23T09:11:48.784+00:00vertical or horizontal<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">When presenting one's work, it is natural to think in terms of the horizontal frame as this is more or less the way we see the world (through two eyes with one eye horizontal to the other); cameras furthermore, are designed to photograph horizontally although one is able to move the camera into the vertical position and make photographs with no technical impediment. The vertical frame is a little more unusual yet since vertical is often the preferred format for media such as magazines and books, vertically designed images are worthwhile making. It is something of a luxury to be able to contribute to a book where images are printed horizontally across the page.<br />
<br />
When designing for the vertical or horizontal format, it is worth considering the way the commonly used proportions relate to each other; the diagram below shows different sizes and proportions together ...<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhyzfLRwhrA-phjkZu7_eg9LQf_valnmP_7FvAum2lC_rskysK0bLW-wnkYvnp2Jtsys76p5mHlUZKWm1E2uYFfrhkAb9FCVgybOsLDxI-tsYvhYEw_xIrGZrMDQBPqBEQCSKK_YMplL7eO/s1600/different-frames.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhyzfLRwhrA-phjkZu7_eg9LQf_valnmP_7FvAum2lC_rskysK0bLW-wnkYvnp2Jtsys76p5mHlUZKWm1E2uYFfrhkAb9FCVgybOsLDxI-tsYvhYEw_xIrGZrMDQBPqBEQCSKK_YMplL7eO/s640/different-frames.jpg" width="450" /></a></div>In the diagram, blue is A4 while red is 10by8, the traditional portrait size.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">The green frames are the 2by3 camera proportions shown in relation to both A4 and 10by8 sizes of paper; they fit quite well but if the page needed to be filled, part of the image would be lost along the top and the bottom.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">If printed full frame then there would be some space between the photograph and the edge of the frame, along the sides but unlikely to be enough for a body of text in the vertical format.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><br />
</div></div>AMANOhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18182786264442948736noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6771409720724763428.post-21596453916508371922011-02-23T07:01:00.001+00:002011-02-23T07:20:04.384+00:00on being inventive<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">Both of the assessment reports for the OCA modules I have done, mention that I lack inventiveness ... was not sure how to understand this remark. Read the following from Osho ...<br />
<br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 14px;">"You will be surprised to know that all that you see has been invented by playful people, not by the serious people. The serious people are too much past-oriented — they go on repeating the past, because they know it works.<br />
They are never inventive." Osho</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 14px;">Does this apply to me?!</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 14px;">Subjects like natural history and the Taj Mahal suggest it does!!</span></div>AMANOhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18182786264442948736noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6771409720724763428.post-36540097811915874062010-12-15T10:48:00.001+00:002010-12-15T10:48:25.046+00:00Woman's Hour : taking a great photograph !?<div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;">Can you learn how to take a great photo … how to pose someone!</div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><br />
</div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;">AJ - looking for the book she came to write; could not find it so choose some photographers she liked to feature </div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><br />
</div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;">Anna - from fine art background likes Thomas Demand</div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><br />
</div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;">can art be taught? good question! can't really teach someone to take a good photograph but can help student to become aware of what a good photograph is and the various ways it can be done</div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><br />
</div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;">need for gut reaction</div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><br />
</div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;">AJ - litle stories, odd photos; subject sometimes comes up with best idea of way to photograph !!</div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><br />
</div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;">need for technical efficiency?! varies from photographer to photographer .. need for for some technical knowledge as per one's approach … pinhole!! … </div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><br />
</div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;">does a photographer need a philosophy? what is that extra quality how one sees the world .. who you are that creates the pictures!</div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><br />
</div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;">advice to amateur .. experiment do not worry too much about the technicalities! </div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px;"><br />
</div><div style="font: 12.0px Helvetica; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px;">catching people off guard</div>AMANOhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18182786264442948736noreply@blogger.com0