Tuesday, 29 March 2011
+2.5cm
Keeping on the theme publications I have been experimenting a little bit with books of my own. The results of which can be found below. The book +2.5cm follows in the footsteps of many of the publications i have been looking at recently in that it is fairly minimal in design and simple in content. As such I am not going to make any attempts to explain it but rather just present it before you for consideration.
Tuesday, 22 March 2011
BOOK
One thing that i am always very conscious off is the context in which my work appears. Where my work will appear, how it will be presented and in what form are questions that are never far from my mind. In many ways this contextual awareness is the cornerstone upon which my practice rests. In the project i am currently undertaking the exploration of the photographs ontology is motivated by this desire to embrace the situation that is presented before us.
So how these images will come to be presented is not insignificant. In fact it is arguable that the method of presentation is just as important as the work itself. Simply put without it we would not be able to see the work. Therefore the choices i make in this area will go a long way to defining the success of the work. And the choice that i have made is to present this project in the form of a book.
This is logical enough decision and books are photographs are an extremely common sight. But what concerns me is how can to use the format of a book to enhance the strength of my book. It should not just be a vessel to transport my images from place to place. Rather it should be an event in itself and each page should accentuate the concepts that informed the photographs.
As is often the case it is usually a good idea to see what other people have done so I headed to the library to look at how other artists had used the book. The first problem I had was many of these 'artist books' are not to be found on the library shelf. They are often released in small runs and will usually find their way into collectors hands or occasionally into a libraries special collection. But after some searching i struck a rich vein of literature concerned specially with artists book.
Admidst this i found a numer of wonderful works. One of the most striking was Andre Tot's Night Visit to the National Gallery. In this publication we have what is ostensibly a guide to the national gallery collection complete with illustrations. However as the title suggests this visit takes place at night so, naturally enough, all the images are black.
Maurizio Nannucci produced a number of interesting works but chief amongst these was the book with two spines. As you can well imagine such a feature means the book is impossible to open. Lucian Bartolini Come Fetiche allows us to open his book but when we do every page is blank. However each page has a gilded gold edge setting up intriguing dialogue between the surface of the book and its contents. Herman de Vries' White goes a step further and is completely blank and is nothing but white from front to back.
If I have dealt with all this work briefly that is not by mistake. In each case the artist is making a simple, pithy statement that raises more questions that it answers. What runs through each work is an attempt to draw our attention to the physicality of the book and consider the book as a sculptural object. It is not just a tool to present information but an object in its own right. Illusion is cast aside in favour of revealing the material constraints that are implicit to how we engage with art. There is an honesty here that I find compelling. Also there is a playful, exploratory tone to the work that not only reveals the physicality of the book but also celebrates it. There is the suggestion that the book is actually enough by itself and that we should enjoy the fundamental properties that form any publication.
This tone is in keeping with the concept for my own project. I am trying to playfully explore photography and draw attention to the process of looking at an image and how we derive information from. It seems only logical that this exploration be extended onto the page. After all it is usually here where we see the majority of images. So lets not assume this space as a given but critique it as well.
So how these images will come to be presented is not insignificant. In fact it is arguable that the method of presentation is just as important as the work itself. Simply put without it we would not be able to see the work. Therefore the choices i make in this area will go a long way to defining the success of the work. And the choice that i have made is to present this project in the form of a book.
This is logical enough decision and books are photographs are an extremely common sight. But what concerns me is how can to use the format of a book to enhance the strength of my book. It should not just be a vessel to transport my images from place to place. Rather it should be an event in itself and each page should accentuate the concepts that informed the photographs.
As is often the case it is usually a good idea to see what other people have done so I headed to the library to look at how other artists had used the book. The first problem I had was many of these 'artist books' are not to be found on the library shelf. They are often released in small runs and will usually find their way into collectors hands or occasionally into a libraries special collection. But after some searching i struck a rich vein of literature concerned specially with artists book.
Admidst this i found a numer of wonderful works. One of the most striking was Andre Tot's Night Visit to the National Gallery. In this publication we have what is ostensibly a guide to the national gallery collection complete with illustrations. However as the title suggests this visit takes place at night so, naturally enough, all the images are black.
Maurizio Nannucci produced a number of interesting works but chief amongst these was the book with two spines. As you can well imagine such a feature means the book is impossible to open. Lucian Bartolini Come Fetiche allows us to open his book but when we do every page is blank. However each page has a gilded gold edge setting up intriguing dialogue between the surface of the book and its contents. Herman de Vries' White goes a step further and is completely blank and is nothing but white from front to back.
If I have dealt with all this work briefly that is not by mistake. In each case the artist is making a simple, pithy statement that raises more questions that it answers. What runs through each work is an attempt to draw our attention to the physicality of the book and consider the book as a sculptural object. It is not just a tool to present information but an object in its own right. Illusion is cast aside in favour of revealing the material constraints that are implicit to how we engage with art. There is an honesty here that I find compelling. Also there is a playful, exploratory tone to the work that not only reveals the physicality of the book but also celebrates it. There is the suggestion that the book is actually enough by itself and that we should enjoy the fundamental properties that form any publication.
This tone is in keeping with the concept for my own project. I am trying to playfully explore photography and draw attention to the process of looking at an image and how we derive information from. It seems only logical that this exploration be extended onto the page. After all it is usually here where we see the majority of images. So lets not assume this space as a given but critique it as well.
Sunday, 13 March 2011
keeping things moving
So we finished up last time with a sense of direction. The basic premise of the final project had been decided upon and I had some idea of where to go next. To briefly recap my project is going to be about blank spaces. But this alone is not going to be enough to form a body of work as it just too broad an area. So my notions about what constituted a 'blank' space had to be defined a bit more rigorously before I could start making some images.
The decision I came to was that these blank areas had to be spaces where you would usually expect to see information presented. This is why the projector screen worked but the home made screen did not. So I began to think of the sort of places where you could expect to have information given to you. One of the first that I thought of was a sandwich board. These are often outside shops and inform people of the latest offers and other such things. But what set me on course to using a sandwich board was this image from Open Empty Spaces
It helps that a piece of paper has been pinned to the front of the board and it is this I think that really gave me the idea to make my own sandwich board. I thought I could make a similar board but just use a white piece of paper on the front. So that is precisely what I did. After a trip to the DIY shop to buy materials and a few hours work I had my very own sandwich board. With board made the next questions was where do I take it? This is an important question and the locations where I place these objects will go a long way to defining the nature of the work. What I decided to do was to take the board down to the hight street and place it outside a row of shops. I wanted the board to look like it could plausibly be there. Having a blank notice on the board is unusual in itself and i did not want to accentuate the oddness of this by putting it in some location where you would never expect to see such a thing. The reasoning behind this was that i want the viewer to be able to take something from the images that invigorates their perception of reality. If the image felt totally contrived this would direct the viewer somewhere beyond reality. But by presenting a location that is relatively familiar at least one aspect of the image should be easy to relate to.
When I set about photographing the board I initially wanted to have a straight on shot so that only the front of it was visible. This was the composition that I had used for the projector screen and one which I felt worked well. It really helped focus attention on the centre of the frame and blank space found there. But when it came to the board I was initially not convinced by the sraight on shots that I took. It felt like it was not clear enough what this object actually was. With a projector screen we are used to seeing straight on but this sort of board is something we usually view in passing. So I took an angled shot as well that showed the side of the board and hopefully made it clear what the viewer was looking at. But now I come to look at the straight on shot again I am not certain that is should have been discarded so quickly. The conceptual aims of the project may be better served by having a consistent viewpoint throughout. This would reinforce the act of looking at a blank, information free, space and possibly be more effective in creating the relationship between viewer and image that I hope for. At the moment I can't quite resolve this issue and I think it will become clearer once more images are made. Something to ponder.
The decision I came to was that these blank areas had to be spaces where you would usually expect to see information presented. This is why the projector screen worked but the home made screen did not. So I began to think of the sort of places where you could expect to have information given to you. One of the first that I thought of was a sandwich board. These are often outside shops and inform people of the latest offers and other such things. But what set me on course to using a sandwich board was this image from Open Empty Spaces
Tuesday, 1 March 2011
the beginning of the end
Things have been fairly quiet on the post front recently and with good reason. February has been a big month for deadlines and these have occupied a large amount of my time. First off was the dissertation and this went in a few weeks back. But last week another deadline came and went. This time it was the rarely discussed research module. Briefly put this module has involved doing all the planning for what will come to be my major project and final piece at Westminster University.
A while back i mentioned that this project was going to be take the form of a series of outdoor projections. I actually did a test run of this project in my back garden:
The image is remarkably similar to the digital mock up I had done before doing it for real. Here is where we begin to encounter a problem. My original idea was to pick a series of locations then over the course of a month or so show a projection at each site. Ideally the work was to be encountered in situ and was concerned with creating a dialogue between the viewer
and the space they are in. Ultimately I hoped the viewer would temporarily be given a different perspective on their everyday environment. But when you view the photographs it is no longer possible to have the same encounter. You are not in the place where the projection was shown and it is impossible to have the same sort of reflective relationship with what surrounds you.
In an ideal world this is no problem. People could come and see the projections, or happen upon them, and have the sort experience I hoped for. But the question I had to ask myself is how many people would actually see this work? I am just starting out and do not have the renown required to encourage large groups of people to see my work. But what was more concerning was the fact that this project needed to exist in some form. Either as video of photographs there had to be some form of documentation. Equally i wanted this part of the project to be more than just a document. It had to stand alone in its own right and not just feel like the remnants of something that happened previously. This is where the photographs fell down for me. While I sat in my garden I enjoyed watching the film but the images were just not as interesting.
Before I had even done this test I had had an idea for a related if slightly different project. I knew I would be making a screen and thought that maybe the screen itself would make for an interesting image. This white space in the centre of the frame could act as a sort of void directing the viewers act to the periphery of the frame. What I liked about this idea was that it addressed the process of looking at images. We typically expect a photograph to have its subject clearly displayed in the middle of the frame. Look at newspapers or adverts and this becomes quite clear. So by filling this area with white the viewer would have to read the image slightly differently and consider how they approach the photograph. So before the garden test i headed to the beach with screen to do a few test shots:
As is so often the case there is difference between thought and expression. While this image came close to my original idea there is something fundamentally wrong and that is the screen. Simply put this does not look like a projector screen. Rather it resembles a windbreak but overall its function is not clear. As such it assumes an enigmatic presence and rather than directing the viewer to edge of frame actually becomes the focus of attention. I could not help feeling that something was being hidden from me when I looked at this image. What lay behind the white cloth and why were we not be shown it? As a result I had actually created an image that accentuated the traditional reading of the photograph rather than challenge it!
After spending time with the image it became clear that the photograph was not having the desired affect due to the nature of the screen. What I needed was a screen where the functionality of the object was immediately clear. The viewer had to recognise what the object was used for to prevent it becoming a complete enigma. It would be by giving the viewer a clear and direct answer to what the object is used for that would encourage further exploration of the image. So onto ebay and within days an old fashioned screen had arrived in the post for a bargain basement price. I returned to the beach and did another shoot:
This time i got what I was after. When I looked at the photograph the centre of the frame simply did not have enough information to occupy my attention. This left me with two choices. The first was to explore the space around the photograph. Secondly I could project my own thoughts and ideas onto the white space in the image. In this regard the projection screen acts as a recipient of the viewers imagination. It is this latter part that is of central importance. Having an area of white space is one thing but it is quite another to provide a space that can be activated by the viewer. For example a white door would not work. We would wonder what is behind it and try and see beyond the surface. The reason the projector screen is so effective is because this a place where we would expect to see information. When it is not present we feel a sense of lack and we have to use our imaginations to compensate.
I enjoy photography precisely because it can engage our imagination. Most photographs may not encourage this process but at its heart the photograph is an essentially ambiguous document. It gives us the opportunity to create our own readings and never lets us form a definitive conclusion. This is the relationship that i want people to have with my images and encourage this act of imagination.
So this is the project that will form my final project at Westminster University. It will be an exploration of blank space but crucially ones that offer us the chance to project ourselves into the photograph. It is going to be piece of work that will require much finesse and attention to detail. Throughout I am going to have to calmly consider the images i produce an reflect on what works and what does not. This reflexive way of working is not what i am used to and is somewhat daunting. But i am encouraged by the fact that somewhere in this project exists the potential for a body of work i can truly say represents me and my ideas around photography. What could be a more fitting way to end a degree?
A while back i mentioned that this project was going to be take the form of a series of outdoor projections. I actually did a test run of this project in my back garden:
The image is remarkably similar to the digital mock up I had done before doing it for real. Here is where we begin to encounter a problem. My original idea was to pick a series of locations then over the course of a month or so show a projection at each site. Ideally the work was to be encountered in situ and was concerned with creating a dialogue between the viewer
In an ideal world this is no problem. People could come and see the projections, or happen upon them, and have the sort experience I hoped for. But the question I had to ask myself is how many people would actually see this work? I am just starting out and do not have the renown required to encourage large groups of people to see my work. But what was more concerning was the fact that this project needed to exist in some form. Either as video of photographs there had to be some form of documentation. Equally i wanted this part of the project to be more than just a document. It had to stand alone in its own right and not just feel like the remnants of something that happened previously. This is where the photographs fell down for me. While I sat in my garden I enjoyed watching the film but the images were just not as interesting.
Before I had even done this test I had had an idea for a related if slightly different project. I knew I would be making a screen and thought that maybe the screen itself would make for an interesting image. This white space in the centre of the frame could act as a sort of void directing the viewers act to the periphery of the frame. What I liked about this idea was that it addressed the process of looking at images. We typically expect a photograph to have its subject clearly displayed in the middle of the frame. Look at newspapers or adverts and this becomes quite clear. So by filling this area with white the viewer would have to read the image slightly differently and consider how they approach the photograph. So before the garden test i headed to the beach with screen to do a few test shots:
As is so often the case there is difference between thought and expression. While this image came close to my original idea there is something fundamentally wrong and that is the screen. Simply put this does not look like a projector screen. Rather it resembles a windbreak but overall its function is not clear. As such it assumes an enigmatic presence and rather than directing the viewer to edge of frame actually becomes the focus of attention. I could not help feeling that something was being hidden from me when I looked at this image. What lay behind the white cloth and why were we not be shown it? As a result I had actually created an image that accentuated the traditional reading of the photograph rather than challenge it!
After spending time with the image it became clear that the photograph was not having the desired affect due to the nature of the screen. What I needed was a screen where the functionality of the object was immediately clear. The viewer had to recognise what the object was used for to prevent it becoming a complete enigma. It would be by giving the viewer a clear and direct answer to what the object is used for that would encourage further exploration of the image. So onto ebay and within days an old fashioned screen had arrived in the post for a bargain basement price. I returned to the beach and did another shoot:
This time i got what I was after. When I looked at the photograph the centre of the frame simply did not have enough information to occupy my attention. This left me with two choices. The first was to explore the space around the photograph. Secondly I could project my own thoughts and ideas onto the white space in the image. In this regard the projection screen acts as a recipient of the viewers imagination. It is this latter part that is of central importance. Having an area of white space is one thing but it is quite another to provide a space that can be activated by the viewer. For example a white door would not work. We would wonder what is behind it and try and see beyond the surface. The reason the projector screen is so effective is because this a place where we would expect to see information. When it is not present we feel a sense of lack and we have to use our imaginations to compensate.
I enjoy photography precisely because it can engage our imagination. Most photographs may not encourage this process but at its heart the photograph is an essentially ambiguous document. It gives us the opportunity to create our own readings and never lets us form a definitive conclusion. This is the relationship that i want people to have with my images and encourage this act of imagination.
So this is the project that will form my final project at Westminster University. It will be an exploration of blank space but crucially ones that offer us the chance to project ourselves into the photograph. It is going to be piece of work that will require much finesse and attention to detail. Throughout I am going to have to calmly consider the images i produce an reflect on what works and what does not. This reflexive way of working is not what i am used to and is somewhat daunting. But i am encouraged by the fact that somewhere in this project exists the potential for a body of work i can truly say represents me and my ideas around photography. What could be a more fitting way to end a degree?
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