Evaluation

I have photographed the world around me in the style of William Eggleston and other photographers that I have researched. This lead me to create a series of images that told a story and showed just how messy the world around us really is.

When I started photographing for this unit I didnt really have a theme or a real direction. I simply went out to experiement styles from other photographers. As time progressed a common style started to rise from all my images which looked at an urban life. It was at this point I started to look at how I could make this into a story. This reminded me that in my proposal I stated that I would like to create a book. This is how I whittled down my selection and organised them into the story.

I tried to keep the equipment I used to a minimum to keep it as simple and as true to what was actually happening around me as possible. I feel that this was the only way to document my story. I used an Olympus OM-10 with a 28mm f/2.8 lens and kept a very versitile FujiFilm Superia 400asa at hand. I then used Boots film developement services to develop the images since as I only have a black and white darkroom available.

The only problem I encounted was when I had finally decided to make a book that I was very stuck for time before the deadline day. To overcome this I used the prints I had already got and I bought a photobook so that that they would just slide in. However because of the story I was telling it felt like my own adventure was in a book and I could keep adding to it. My life didnt just stop when the book stops which is why there are empty slides at the end of the book.

My biggest influence has been William Eggleston. I was largely influenced by his observation and the subjects of his work because he can make the simplest of objects into anything he wants it to be. I also admire how strict he is on his own images because he will only ever take one image for any one thing. This is something I have also tried to replicate however I did take more than one a couple of times. I also tried to replicate the type of garish colours that Martin Parr can create. In some cases I was able to replicate however this wasnt always the case.

Overall I am very pleased with my final pieces and how they all link together because I have never tried to produce something of this standard and this quantity. I have only produced a maximum of 8 however 30 was a very big push for me. I kinda wish that I had taken more images so that I could use more or have stronger images. I am going to continue to take these images which will increase my own experience, personal gallery and my visual eye so that I can frame an image better than what I can currently.

Forth Roll

Looking at all of my strongest images I dont feel like I should whittle them down if I want to make a book. I have a round number of 30 that will make a good quantity of pages. 

Mark Power

Power, born 1959, first stumbled upon photography as a boy when he discovered a homemade enlarger in his attic. However studied fine art until he gained a job in editorial and charity markets when he classes himself as a photographer. Since 1992, Power has been a Professor at Brighton University. This lead to long term projects that he set himself; alongside large scale commercial  commissions.


This is Poland during December in 2004. the power lines and roads in this image all point towards the building to the left. There is only part of the building that is visible however it feels like it is important. I want to know more about it. There is also a Christian Cross on the corner about what looks like a bus stop that is encased by a heart suggesting that religion is loving and kind. This is contradicted however by the wires. The wires are enclosing this whole area, it looks like people are captured in this space, they are in religious trap. A model has been used under the cross looking out into the road suggesting that he himself may be a prisoner or because he is so close to the cross he may represent the temptation to join a society/group. The surrounding area and background of the image looks dead, it looks dull which emphasises that this whole area is entrapment and the only thing that happens here is withering and dying. The exposure of this image is also very strange for this time of year. the background shows a haze in the air; however the sky above this foreground area must be clear. The shadow under the buildings roof shows that the sun is quite intense, but there is barely a shadow behind the bus stop, as if this has been purposely done to make it look more attractive.

 

Again, Poland is the setting for this image however it was taken in February 2005. A couple of months have really changed the overall appeal of Poland and the exposure Power has used took advantage of snows reflective abilities. He has balanced the exposure of the sky with the reflection of the snow, which has only left some objects visible in the frame. The items consist of benches, trees with supports, lamps and a Dalmatian. To me this would suggest that it is a park with a pathway and the dog is the only thing that can navigate in the baron land because of his sence of smell. A path is also created by the other items. The trees are placed in a very organised fashion suggesting that they are where they are for a reason, however the benches show that there is a different path which leads to more possible confusion. All the trees and the benches are almost in a perfect line just under the centre of the image. The centre lamp looks like it is an enlargement of the one to the right because of its identicle appearance and distance from the camera. White may also have been used to hide parts of the image that Power didnt want to show the audience. We start to ask again what is he hiding from us? Similarly to the image above.

Marilyn Silverstone

Silverstone was an English photographer born in London, 1929 and died in Napal 1999. She started to photograph professionally at the age of 26 as a freelance photographer; before this she worked as a designer, editor and producer for a series of films about painters. Silverstone spent many of her years living in New Delhi and Nepal where she practised her photography and religious beliefs of Buddhism.



This is the Hassidic Jewish District of Jerusalem in 1956. Similarly to other practitioners I have researched she has used a small aperture to capture the full detail of the scene. The natural light is from in front and to the left of the camera; causing the shadows to cast diagonally down and right of the image. The light leaking on the left shows that the light is very intense which is proven by the intensity of the contrast of the tones. Lines are made by several aspects of the image; all connecting to each other. The clothes lines are connected to the balconies and the fabric hanging from these lines lead down to ther aspects like the little girl, the path, the boxes and other people. The upper left of the centre is a frame within itself, incasing the very defined model. Not only is he so defined but the black of his turban stands out massively because the surrounding area is very pale. A large number of the models in this image are hidden. Only two of the models faces are visable. this could have been planned; maybe those models are important to Silverstone. However this may be a result of the randomness that is street photography.



This image is called Mine Workers Near the Blast Furnaces. This image is very striking because of the contrast in the tones and the density of the black. The three workers are very light in tone and appear even more so infront of the black. This may have been done on purpose to show the small innocent workers against the large industrial companies with a lot of power. The smoke being expelled adds to a very eerie feeling; which indicates that Silverstone is trying to make the blast furnace into part of an evil company/power. The workers are centralised and you can see all of them; however the blast furnace continues out of the frame meaning that there is more to it than what we can see. Shadows across the ground show an intense light from the left, meaning that the furnace is slightly diagonal to the sun but the amount of smoke would suggest that it is blocking out the sun onto the furnace.

Third Roll

I feel that the circled ones are the best so I have displayed them below.

Rene Burri

Burri is a Swiss photographer born 1933, died 2014. During his career he travelled extensively throughout Europe,  Middle East and Latin America. Burri became a full member of Magnum Photos in 1959 and helped with the opening of the Magnum Gallery in Paris. He also made films for large charity and nationwide organisations to raise awareness about poverty or hardship.

This is the view from the Azarieh building and it was taken in 1981. when I first saw this image I thought that it was three separate images. It was only later that I realised that it was a window frame through the image. The broken glass on the second bar resembles that of a cliff face. and rocks protruding from the sea; especially with the vertical dirt marks creating texture and a sense of depth. A large aperture has been used to capture the detail of the glass, the buildings and the horizon. I feel that this is very important because of the depth of this image. and how one element like the glass can effect the whole view the audience might have. The image has been taken in colour however all the colours in the image are very dull. I think that this was inescapable because of the cloud cover; as seen in the top half of the image, the clouds look very dense and wide. This would create a soft box effect on the whole scene; this also explains the lack of tonal contrast of shadows. However I think that this is important in this image because it intensifies the power that the black bars and glass has on the image. The landscape image of the apartments is very interesting and displays a great amount of detail; however the darkness of the black just separates the image and draws all the attention of the viewers to it. I really admire the use of dull light to intensify other aspects of the image.

This image was taken in 1959, the year he became a full member of Magnum. The monument in the background is the Kaiser Wilhem Memorial Church in west Berlin, Germany. This image reminds me of styles used by Lee Friedlander and Henri Cartier-Bresson. The use of lines to lead the viewer through the image is incredible. If curves through the image so simply and takes you as the audience through all the main subjects like the church and the subject about to jump. This moment has documented this man about to jump for the next pole. It already looks like his balance is not very good by the fact he is holding onto the column next to him. We don't know what is going to happen to him or what is going to happen to him. The background to this image looks very pale compared to the foreground. this is something that could have been done post production; however I think that there may have been fog; which is more likely. It feels like two images have been made from this one because of the central column being so large and the density of material on each side is very different. I really love this image because of the amount of compositional factors and complexity used to make this image. It almost looks as if it has been staged because Burri would have had to see what the model was going to do and set himself up to make sure all the lines match up. This goes to the extent where the right church tower is almost central to the corners of the scaffolding. 

Second Roll

The circled images are the ones below.

  

Lee Friedlander

Lee Friedlander was born 1934 in Aberdeen. He then moved to New York and since 1948 he has been taking images of the American social landscape. This is where he would organise lots of information from his surroundings to create dynamic composition out of the chaos of city life. Friedlander has had his work displayed in the in the influential 1967 New Documents exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art. He then had his work in the 2005 Museum of Modern Art catalogue. He has had his work exhibited all over America, especially New York where he had the whole body of work from ‘America by Car’ exhibited. Friedlander also produced a group of self portraits started in the 60’s and revisited in the 90’s.

This image is taken in the style of a documentary in Las Vegas, Nevada, 2002. As if Friedlander is documenting his memories across the roads of America. Friedlander has spent a lot of his life on the road travelling and he was able to capture some of the wonders through his travels. With his incredible eye for extreme composition and wit he could fit huge amounts of detail into the frame of the rental cars he used. The use of light, dynamic lines, reflection and distance is incredible. The whole image is in full detail and every part of the image has something that compliments the other. The contrast from the inside of the car and the city of Las Vegas is huge; this makes the buildings, statues and the frame of the wing mirror stand out. Dynamic lines find themselves shooting all over the image. The bottom window frame goes from one side to the other. The other part of the window frame connects with the line where the door and car interior meet. The traffic light pole splits the cityscape in two where the top of the buildings are in one section and the middle to ground is in the other. Then the reflection in the mirror gives the audience a new perspective, it shows what’s behind the image, where it has come from. There is also a focal point where the window frame, traffic pole and the top of a building meets; this automatically draws the audience’s eyes to it.

The series of 192 images have been displayed in an exhibition with several on one wall and very close together. They were then grouped based on content and not where or when it was taken. Friedlander’s influence for this body of work was due to his own humour and his own view of the world over the steering wheel of a rental car.

This image is titled New York City, 1963. There is a hybrid of the socially engaged documentary style photography to make this image; Friedlander has also incorporated the spontaneous nature of post war street photography. This image was taken in order to document the American social landscape. In his work he refrains himself from making strong social statements in order for his image to simply be an accurate document of the time period.

In this image Friedlander has made some ‘amateur’ mistakes. The models are hidden by the columns and his own reflection is in the glass window. Yet I think that he has taken it at that moment for a reason, to show inequality of men and women and how they should be the same. This is because they are walking towards each other into the unknown space in the middle, even he doesn’t know what would happen in the middle. The clothing of the models also explains the social class of them both. The setting has also framed the models which puts them into their own space, making them defined. The dark clothing is the only thing the two models share. The lighting is all natural and is shown by the shadows by the models feet and the reflection. The clear reflection of himself and the man behind him shows the difference of the intensity in and out of the sun because the man behind him is far more defined.

Unlike other practitioners I have researched so far Friedlander used mostly black and white. This adds a sense of professionalism to his work considering the 'mistakes' that he has made. I think that this is what allowed him to gain some credit for his work easier than others like Eggleston. Eggleston was one of the first to use colour in fine art photography and this documented everything that he saw infront of him. However black and white is an illusion because the world is not B&W; therefore it is not a true documentation. This has convinced me that colour images is the way that I should take my own work.

Trent Parke

Trent Parke was born in Newcastle, Australia in 1971. He is the only Australian photographer to be in the prestigious Magnum group. Parke has gained awards for his photography nearly every year 1996 to 2005. He won the prestigious W Eugene Smith Award for humanistic photography in 2003 because of his journey around Australia. 



This image was taken in Australia in 2006. It looks like this image was taken in a car park to a shop. I think this because of the large number of trolleys, the model in this image is dressed quite formally suggesting that it is her uniform, also there is the car in the foreground. Parke has used the brown fence to split the image in half and make the main subjects stand out because of their light tones. A brown tone is constant through the image from the car, dirt on the ground, the fence, the house and the tree. Blue sky helps the tree and the house define itself against the rest of the brown and grey. On the boot of the vehicle there is a reflection of above the fence creating another distance to the image. I think that this factor may explain why Parke has used a small aperture so that he can get all the detail. The sky looks fairly clear suggesting that only natural light was used. I think that the sun was positioned to the left due to the shadow across the fence and behind the model. Nearly all the trolleys point towards the model which isolates her as the main subject.

This image was also taken in 2006 in west Australia. Parke has used a dynamic contrast of the shadows primarily on the left however there is some under the canopies down the street. This shadow is made by natural light and large buildings that are out of frame. Several colours have been used especially tones of blue and red. A large amount of this image is in focus suggesting that Parke would have had to use a small aperture.