ArtO354 M-W
May 11, 2011
The Photograph as Contemporary Art Response
The chapter that I have chosen to select is Chapter 4, or “Something and Nothing”. It is a chapter that details how things that we typically pass in everyday life, such as normal kitchenware, abandoned, decaying buildings, and other such items of no real importance can become, though photography, fascinating and intriguing objects that can even make you question how you look at the everyday world. These things can be achieved through many means, such as arranging typical objects in an intriguing way, shifting the scale of the object to its surroundings, treating the objects differently than normal and other challenges of the norm. It challenges the idea that there are certain subjects that just are not meant for good photography and insists that it is the opposite, that there is absolutely nothing that is not worth photographing in this world.
This is a fairly recent strain of thought, the conceptualism of still life photography only really coming about from the mid-sixties and onward, corresponding to the post-Minimalism in sculpture. It brings the viewer away from who made the piece and moves them to consider the image itself, such as how this scene came to be, or why is this object being photographed. Just the action of photographing something gives it importance that the viewer will attempt to search out and often manage to find his or her own meaning.
There were many artists featured in the chapter. The artists Peter Fischili and David Weiss created thrown together sculptural structures with items they found in their studio and back dropped these sculptures with unremarkable and dull backgrounds paired with dark and long sweeping shadows. Gabriel Orozco took photographs of discarded sculptures in the trash that he then reinstalled in galleries, those pictures eventually becoming central to the work. He also did a work of photographing a part of a piano that had been breathed upon, leaving that mist that comes from hot breath on a cold surface. Felix Gonzalez-Torres created untitled billboards of bed sheets that still had the impression of the people who slept in it, making this private moment public. The image itself was such a blank slate that anyone could put their own experiences and meaning into it. Richard Wentworth took pictures of urban debris and signs with visual puns, such as redundancies and other things, together often making a much more comic context. He took a picture of car doors wedged into a doorway, which created a plethora of curious narratives such as why they would need to use that method of a locking system. Jason Evan did a series called “New Scent” where he found some sand building up on a drain with water pouring into it, catching a fleeting moment that would otherwise go unobserved. Nigel Shafran’s “Sewing Kit (on plastic table)” used ambient light and a long exposure to create a narrative of how we order our things in our house and such places. Jennifer Bolande had a similar focus on placement with her “Globe”, which was a photo of a globe of the world in the window of a house, taken from outside. Jean-Marc Bustamante did the series “Something is Missing” where he found pictures within the landscapes of the cities he took pictures of. The series’ subject matter was the complexity and dimension of these photos he took. Wim Wender takes pictures of places that tell their own story, as his “Wall in Paris, Texas” shows with the crumbling plaster falling off of the wall, revealing what was underneath. Anthony Hernandez took pictures of buildings and spaces that have outlived their purpose. “Landscapes for the Homeless” showed a bunch of pictures of old tents and temporary homeless shelters on roads and wastelands. And his Aliso Village he visited going to be demolished homes and the house where he grew up in as a child. Tracey Baran’s “Dewey” depicted an etched glass that was wet in a windowsill where it could catch the rays of the light through the trees. Peter Fraser turned a mess of synthetic dust from waste into a picture like that of a constellation. Manfred Willmann’s series “Das Land” seems to be dealing with the drama of area, seeming serene, but with traces of decay such as the torn limbs of a beautiful snow laden tree. Roe Ethridge has a lot of different photography styles, such as a fashion shoot-like one, architectural ones, and found still lives. Wolfgang Tillmins has done all sorts of crazy stuff with his photography, but in “Suit” he took pictures of clothes that were just thrown up to dry or abandoned. The artist James Welling’s series “Light Sources”, where he indeed took many pictures of different lighting, made it so that you could not figure out what it was at first, but the sheer amount of pictures he took of it helped you piece it together through repetition. Jeff Wall’s “Diagonal Composition no. 3” is just a picture of a dingy floor with a mop and bucket, but his construction of it makes you question its significance. Laura Letinsky’s photographs take style similarities from old Baroque still lives. Uta Barth’s series “Nowhere Near” make you sensitive to what we see or not see with our own eyes due to the way she photographed the windows with the view beyond completely blurred. Elisa Sighicelli’s image “Window with Door” depicts a window that shows the outside but has a strong reflection of the inside of the room as well, overlapping each other and creating a strange sense of space. She also tends to create 3D sculptural objects with her photos.
The first artist I picked for this is Brooks Dierdorff. I chose an image from her “Occupant” series. It appears to be a photograph of the inside of a hotel bathroom, from the type of hair dryer that is on the wall. Along with the hair dryer is a glass of water with a rose in it. The inside of a hotel bathroom is not something that is usually photographed, especially with the cheap hairdryer in plain view, but with the rose it creates several questions. Who was staying there who would leave a rose in a glass? Did someone meet their lover? Was it some other gift, or something they found themselves? If so, why did they leave it? Is it a memorial of some sort? The bathroom itself is sparkling clean, without the debris that comes from use. Only the glass and the rose hint that someone other than the cleaning staff had been in there. The rose itself appears new, so it could not have been left for very long. There are many narratives one could pull from this photo, and the inclusion of the mundane item of the cheap hairdryer puts a completely different context to the piece than if it was obviously a home bathroom.
The next Artist is Meg Branlund’s piece “Cast persona”. It is an image of a dingy, neglected corner of a room in an empty house. The lighting makes it compelling to look at, along with the shadow of the person off-camera. The glow is very warm for such an empty, dingy space, which does not make it feel as lonely as such a subject would look with different lighting. The shadow of course makes it feel less empty, but does give an odd juxtaposition. Why would someone be near a place that does not look like it has been lived in for years? Are they scouting it out? Are they leaving? Is it some place they remember from earlier years? I am not entirely sure if this picture is pushing it, honestly, since there is possible human presence in it than just objects, but I think it is an all right example. But it seems abandoned places are actually fairly popular to photograph. I suppose the feeling of emptiness and loss are just things people are drawn to.
This next artist and picture I am quite sure I am pushing it for, because I had forgotten the assignment said that I was supposed to look for color photographers, and this is black and white. Hopefully this is acceptable, because I really like the picture and textures and composition are relavent to color photography as well. If not then, well, I tried. Anyway the artist I chose was Robert Collier Beam. The picture I am offering up for this is one from his series “Est. 1870” which are all fascinating to look at with his sharp small depth of field and the way he uses blur and shadows to obscure half of the pictures and make everything feel so dream like. This particular photo is a bit more mundane than those, just a picture of a saw and barbed wire hanging on a wall with a piece of wood underneath. From the state of everything they are obviously old and have been sitting there for a while. These objects are not exactly something you automatically think of as photogenic, but the textures and the composition of the whole thing makes it interesting to look at. The wood grain is emphasized well, the mottled texture of the saw makes the odd shape of the tool even more interesting and the barbed wire has such a higher contrast than everything else in the photo. Plenty of things could be asked about those who owned these things I am sure, but the part that draws me the most is the rich mix of textures.
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