Environment, The City

Initial Ideas


For this section of the environment unit, we are again required to pastiche one of three images, and then come up with three images of our own. For the conceptual approach for our own three image we have been directed to our own representation of the 'urban space'.

I have begun rather unclear as to what approach I would like to make for an 'urban space', but my starting point very much revolves around London and particularly, London at night. I have chosen this as my starting point as I have always had a fascination with large cities, for me London in particular as it was the one I visit most frequently. As my Father was born and raised in London, and my Grandparents still reside there, I visited London most frequently as a child, always fascinated buy the city, and the treasures it held, but not just the surface, material attractions. Despite how frequently I have been to London growing up, I never really went to the tourist attractions, as my Father was raised in central London those sites held no appeal to him, so we always explored different sections of the city when I visited my Grandparents, and as a I child I loved in particular to gaze out of the car window on the journeys home, at night, as it never seems to sleep.

This notion of childish wonder began my idea of exploring London, particularly at night, but the idea had no direction, just a vague visual style, but the work of Rut Blees and her series Luxemburg was briefly shown in a lecture and her visual style was incredibly striking to me.

She shot all of her Luxemburg series at night using very long exposures in order to draw on the ambient lighting only of all the different sections of the street, lamp posts, window lights etc.
She took the entire series in Swansea, yet they are barely recognisable as a representation of that specific place. She explored both the minute details in areas, and in other entire flat blocks, but her use of lighting and the colours she drew upon transform them into something else entirely, almost like a dreamlike version, or a parallel universe of the places she visited.

This visual style where the ordinary urban space becomes this beautiful, vivid and fairy tale world was an idea I found most appealing, as it followed my starting notion of the fairy tale, the fascination, but not in the rose tinted childish manner I began with, but a more solid idea of a parallel world we take for granted.

As much as this visual style has inspired me, and the message behind it however, I still find my idea merely a notion, an attempt at 'something pretty' and nothing more unless I could define my fascination, so I turned away from London, and looked at the other cities that fascinated me.

I have visited several other cities, and again felt fascinated by them, but I found myself thinking of fictional cities more and more, the most predominant ones that came to mind was:

Fritz Lang's Metropolis

Katsuhiro Otomo's Akira

Ridley Scott's Blade Runner

I am drawn to these fantasy cities, all of which depict a future city, they all fall into the Sci-Fi genre, but as I thought about these crazy, dense and future cities, I began to realise, that in today, these cities are very much in existence, there is no difference between them when you look at them from this distance, if you view them at night the cities atmosphere can appear alive with the bright and wondrous artificial lights coming from every possible direction, they are appear quite stunning, but they are all essentially the same, and that applies to our current cities as much as these Sci-Fi cities.

London

New York

Tokyo

Upon realising this I question even more what fascinates me about these cities, they all appear rather similar, they all have a 'magic' and atmosphere to them, particularly at night, but why? If they are all so similar surely one would get dismissive after a while of them? 

I began thinking of the why, I loved these fictional cities, mainly because of the story set within them, and as I love the story I begin to love the city in which it is set, and gain almost a familiarity to this city through. 

Thinking back to London I began sectioning off in my mind where I had been, what do I love most, and why?

I enjoy wondering around the typical places like Oxford street and Covent Garden, but I always found exlporing the alley ways filled with record shops in Soho far more fun and intriguing.

Andre Kertesz


Today (Wednesday 17/11/11) we where given a lecture on the 'The City' by our environment tutor Steffi Klenz, looking at photographer's and their different responses to the city, starting from the earliest of city photographers.

Many of these photographers had works quite intriguing but the first I will look into for my project is Andre Kertesz, a hungarian photographer, or to be more specific photojournalist, who fled hungary immigrating to Paris and then in 1936 to the United States out of fear of the growing Nazi persecution of Jews and early signs of WWII.

This photograph, Meudon, was taken in 1928 during Kertesz' time in France.
Kertesz was a particular type of photographer, as stated at the start of Daniele Sallenave's book on Kertesz, it states:

"An idea in vogue has it that the artist must necessarily be in opposition to his language, that he has to force it, constrain it, and twist its syntax in order to mould it to his own design. However, another definition of art is perhaps not only possible but more accurate- that the real artist is someone who has been able, through patient work or with immediate insight, to discover the profound nature of the language he has chosen and its laws, and to fully exploit its forms of expression, from the most obvious to the most hidden." 


Kertesz was very much a product of this second type of artist, as with this photograph Meudon, the location intrigued him, and he knew he could see something there, it was a lower class and poverty ridden area of Paris. Kertesz came to that area and that location on many occasions and waited great lengths of time, until he understood it, until he saw what he was looking for, the right moment.
Much like Kertesz' other works such as his "New York" taken in 1947, he utilises the straight edges and angles of buildings to create this image of confusion or something unnatural. This confusion and oddity applies to much of his choices in framing and the way he tiers pieces at different perspectives, for instance the train and train track does not appear any further away in perspective than the buildings themselves, as he links the edges of the housing to the train track to subconsciously join the items together in the mind of the viewer.
The oddity also extends to the man in the foreground, as it is clearly a poverty ridden and depressed area, as we can tell from the dirty buildings, the destruction and rubble in the background, and the absence of life or 'hustle and bustle' reinforces that this area has nothing. yet contrasting there is this man in the foreground, in a full suit, well kept and a top hat, we ask, who is he? why is he here? he does not fit into frame as this story of the deprived lower class area suddenly has it's most prominent inhabitant a gentleman? contrasting again to what his attire signifies he is carrying some large form of package, we do not know what this is as it is wrapped, but it is large and cumbersome, and surely a man of wealth would not burden himself with this package? If he has purchased something large and expensive surely it would be delivered?
We cannot answer these questions, but they are clearly present, and that is the essence of this photograph, and Kurtesz' style, he captures the unusual, the complex. Life is a very varied experience, and with the amount of people that inhabit a city the life of the entire city will be incredibly varied and unusual on a day to day basis, and that is what makes Kurtesz so intriguing, he sees and captures these stories, in glimpses of complexities which is a language most adept to describing the nature of a city.

Developing Ideas

As I have searched for a clearer idea of what it is about the city I wish to capture, I have slowly come to the realisation that not a lot has changed. Looking at the work of Alfred Stieglitz in the 1930's, particularly his "Looking Northwest from the Shelton" , cities have not changed much at all for a long time, they are simply a bit denser and taller in areas, so much like I noticed there is not much difference between the cities of the past, present and future. They all contain tall buildings that alone may look staggering, but with as many of them as close together as they are, they lose all value and meaning, but then the presence of more skyscrapers means the presence of more people, does that mean we lose meaning in this too?
This is an area that would end up touching on post-modernism too much and the concept of this project would have to completely change, but then I thought, what of the people?



Going back to Ridley Scott's Blade Runner, and the street scenes I particularly love the cross culture element, or even "pan culture".There is the Japanese geisha advertised on the skyscraper, there are future versions of the London Punk, or the coined phrase "cyber-punks", you can see Hari Krishna wandering the streets, and if you watch a few documentaries about this film, you will discover that there is also an invented 'city speak' used in this film that is a mixture of German, Spanish, Japanese and a little Hungarian, which is a result of globalisation and the cross culture element ever present in a modern world all blending together.
This was an idea I would really like to explore, that 'pan culture' that is happening alongside these huge cities.
There have always been many different cultures within cities as a result of immigration, which is still a large issue being addressed in England at the moment which has been going on for quite some time, is it good or bad?
For my project though I want to stay clear of the politics and not look at immigration as such, but more out of globalisation, I want to capture that same mad form of cross culture we see in Blade Runner, where different elements of different cultures are all slammed together like it was common place, as though they where all one culture, some would argue that this means the cultures lose their individuality, but I personally see it as a form of acceptance, the culture doesn't change much, it just sits next to another almost, like in the movie still above, the punk walking alongside the Hari Krishna's like there is no difference between them.

In trying to find this unusual cross culture element, where the out of place becomes common place, I will be shooting in Camden Stables Market, London.
The reason I am choosing this location is that, albeit something of a tourist attraction, it is an area crammed with subcultures.
I want to specifically look at the Market Stables as it used to be a hospital for stable horses, and has overtime adapted into a market area, the stalls are all mismatched and darted down what would have been large ramp ways, arches or individuals stalls for horses, and any permanent market stalls have very much adapted their merchandise around their sections and not altered them, so there is a real sense of contrast between the new CD's of fashion on display on old Victorian walls. The cultural aspect intrigues me as well, as the market stalls are predominantly fashion based, but chain companies are not allowed to set up in the market area, which has resulted in a mismatch of your tourist "I love London T-Shirts" next to traditional Indian scarf's and furniture next to extreme Gothic clothing. The area has spurred much in the way of sub culture particularly with the "Gothic" or "Cyber-Punk" groups, overtime it has become quite a tourist attraction and some of the eccentricity and sub culture move away with this, but it still maintains this eccentricity in any new developments to the area and so it is a perfect location to capture this idea of a muddled cross culture.



I went to Camden first with my DSLR, to get a feel for the area and try for some digital test shots to find the best shots to portray my cultural mismatch I want to capture.

I tried finding areas where there where strange samples of different cultures, and styles that did not seem to fit, but yet where all placed together.

Contact Sheets


I returned to Camden on two occasions, shooting hand held on ISO400 Fuji Colour film, with a Bronica SQ-B.

In truth I had many problems with motion blur, as my film was simply not fast enough to shoot handheld in Camden Markets, however it was a compromise made to help my photography go fairly unnoticed as I was able to 'shoot from the hip' around the markets, generally not disturbing the crowd.
Much of my selection was a variation between which shots that where not subject to motion blur but also which ones that seemed to frame my idea of the mismatch culture the most.

My final three shots were the following:

Looking at my idea of the cultural mismatch of a city, and the random chaos that forms them, I picked locations where the where the most oddities in architecture around the market and food court areas. With the first frame it was the contrasts, and 'cut and paste' nature I loved about it, the old Victorian street clock next a set of traffic lights, the traffic lights also being mounted on an alley wall where there are no vehicles to require them. The old stable doors on the left that had become small shops for various clothing, but retaining the intricate designs on the big stable doors.
In the second frame, I chose this location for the chandelier above all else, again it is an alleyway market in Camden, I liked the general mismatch of products on display here, the typical tourist London T-shirts opposite an Egyptian art stall, all crammed in an underpass valley, and the chandelier being the most contrasting aspect, in all it's extravagance, illuminated what would otherwise be a dank looking underpass.
The third frame was a shot taken in one of the many food courtyards, with every type of food of the world displaying their neon signs next to one another. The focus I chose for this shot was of course the Indian themed seating area, that looks more like it belongs in an elaborate garden, yet it is smacked next to countless cheap fast food stalls.
In truth I would have liked my colours far more saturated and in a higher contrast to emphasise the idea of the cultural 'wonders' the city holds, but in terms of my film choice I had to go with a faster film to enable the handheld aspect of this photography.

The Body

Initial Ideas


This unit, The Body, aims to explore the representation of the human body, specifically at portraits.
Answering first of course, what  is a portrait? A portrait can be made in many ways, both abstract and simplistic, but, fundamentally it must represent a likeness to the person or subject, be it a visually simplistic likeness to facial features, or if it delves deeper into portraying this persons inner person.
A portrait is not just a simplistic recording of a persons appearance, as it uses much of the same principles of still life, the same use of semiotics can be applied to the portrait to tell a deeper and more complex story of the subject.
This can complicate portraits even further, as it then means that the likeness to the subject does not necessarily have to be through the subjects physical appearance, the subject can be visually obscure and their likeness be told through the mise en scene depending of course on the personality of the subject and the intentions of the photographer.


For this unit our subject must be unknown to us, which leaves the portrait incredibly open and potentially difficult to us.
For my model I will be using a musician from the Medway area named Liam Lynott. He is a local Blues Guitarist, who works both solo and with a band named Broken Banjo. I have come to chosing him as my model, as he often plays at local pubs I frequent, and whenever he has played, he has always had bands lined up around him that are completely contrasting in musical style. I get the impression of a man born in the wrong era, as the bands he is surrounded by are quite simplistic and best summarised as 'pop culture', yet frequently this young blues guitarist will get up on stage and play his blues. I almost view it in a sense of purity, it is simplistic in action, to simply get on stage and play, without care for the crowd or from judgement, he is simply a musician, and a musician plays music. This is a concept I would like to explore with my portrait of this musician.

The Motorcycle Diaries


This idea of showing him in simplistic honesty, came entirely from The Motorcycle Diaries, which is a film by Walter Salles based on the journals of Alberto Granado and Ernesto Guevara, Ernesto Guevara would later become known as the revolutionist Che Guevara.
The reason this film has inspired my idea and visual style so much, is that this film is based on a journey Ernesto Guevara took before he became part of the Cuban Revolution, however it is what drove him to revolution. The idea of his journey was simply that of adventure that he shared with his friend Alberto, they wanted to explore their land, and along their travels they agreed to stop at certain areas dealing with leprosy as they where both medical students specialised in this field.
This almost 'teenage dream of adventure' turns into almost a pilgrimage, as he explores Latin America and sees poverty and injustice where ever he travels, his eyes are opened. Throughout the film there are scenes that contain 'moving stills' where they portrait the people he meets, and shows them in honesty and simplicity.

We see these people in snapshots of their life, they presented as though there is not a camera, they simply turn and seem to almost bare their soul, if the camera continued you could almost imagine them turning back to their task and to have the world suddenly snap back to life, as though there never was that pause.
It is this idea of simplicity and honesty that I wish to capture.

Arnold Newman


I was first put on to Arnold Newman when I saw his portrait of Stravinsky hanging on an office wall in the photography department.

Igor Stravinsky was a composer, pianist and conductor, and widely acknowledged as on of the most important and influential composers of the 20th century. His compositional career was notable for its stylistic diversity, he was commissioned by the Impresario Sergei Diaghilev (performed by the Russian Ballet), these where The Firebird, Petrushka and The Rite of Spring. The Rite whose premiere provoked a riot, transformed the way in which subsequent composers thought about rhythmic structure.

As his musical style was so different it has often been said that he revolutionised music and really pushed the boundaries of musical design. This all started around 1910 along with a new wave of art form as well like the birth of cubism, and slightly later on coinciding with surrealism, and Stravinsky himself was once painted by Picasso.
From a mere glance at this photo if you are even vaguely familiar with the works of Picasso (as most are) you can identify that this man whether you know him or not was part of that art movement, and this is simply from the way we see the background and the piano, as the background is not quite natural, it is two different colours, one a very light grey, the other quite dark, but the colours are so solid, and not equal in proportions either that they are obviously not a natural backdrop, the piano becomes part of this as well, as it is more or less a complete silhouette, so we see the light shade, middle shade, and the the piano is the dark shade, so we see a colour spectrum almost from white to black with these three colours. With the angle of the piano as well, if you remove Stravinsky from the photograph, it could blend in perfectly with cubist paintings, and the piano is no longer a piano, it is only recognisable as an abstract shape. This technique is incredibly as it makes us lose our sense of depth and perspective, and the piano merges with the backdrop, but with the presence of Stravinsky leaning on it, we suddenly identify it as a piano, so we know it is a physical object, but it does not appear as such. This loss of depth makes the portrait completely part of that new wave movement of cubism and surrealism, particularly as the abstract shapes take up the majority of the frame, we identify Stravinsky as completely immersed in this style, this alternate world.

This incredible use of the props and the backdrop has expanded my thought process far more about how to show the musical and artist style of my subject.

After seeing this portrait on the wall, I decided to get out his book for inspiration and it was opened with a foreward by John Hayes (Director of the National Portrait Gallery) who said:

Of all forms of art, portraiture is one of the most elusive, and one of the most difficult for any artist effectively to master. This may well sound a paradoxical thing to say in view of the number of artists who practise it. But I think they would agree with me. It is partly that the human face, though of compelling interest to every one of us, remains the most mysterious of all subjects; and partly that, once an artist has achieved a likeness which he thinks credible, the pictorial means at his disposal - design, colour, line, associations - for amplifying that likeness, for defining the individuality of posture, gestures, movement, above all for revealing personality, are severely contained.


This quote I believe quite poignantly summarised the portrait, and the problems one is faced when creating one, as we have many tools at our disposal to enhance this personality, much like the abstract shapes and piano in Newman's Stravinsky, but in creating the photograph you are still squashing something 2 dimensional, and how do we present this 2 dimensional person? For if too much direction is given doesn't that mean that you have forced and constructed what you see of that person, doesn't that make the portrait not a portrait, but instead your own interpretation? Which means you lose truth in the image; there is a quote about individuality from a Japanese Anime known as Neon Genesis Evangelion written by Hideaki Anno, which is that "Every self is composed of two selves, the self which is observed, and the self which observes itself, there is the you in your mind, and the you in the minds of others" and I find myself referring back to this quote again again, and it summarises quite well the issue one is faced with when taking a portrait, do you portrait the them that you see? or will you try to find a way to see the them they see?
Arnold Newman has written himself, that he is 'convinced that any photographic attempt to show the complete  man is nonsense, to an extent. We can only show, as best we can, what the outer man reveals.'

Philip Lorca Dicorcia


Phillip Lorca Dicorcia combines two very different principles in style for his photography, combining the documentary snapshot styling with theatrical lighting like you would expect to see in cinema or advertising creating very powerful portraits.

  He wanted to capture people in their complete natural state, but he also has this idea of drawing emphasis and drama towards them which is a very hard concept to achieve. He began by using family and friends to every day things but in a constructed and controlled environment, but finding these too forced and set up he began a far more difficult task of hiding lights in public urban areas and taking his shots discreetly and out of view, bringing controlled lighting out into an uncontrolled urban environment, to make sure the subject is clear, and emphasised but also so that they could not be in a more natural state as they are not even aware they are being photographed. His most noted work in this style was his series Heads that was done using a controlled lighting mixed in with the standard lights in the New York train station and a hidden camera, in order to catch commuters when they are absorbed in their own world, their own natural 'bubble' state if you will.

As he captures people on their commute he actually captures people in a rather intimate and personal moment, as during a commute most people are not social, everyone becomes separate within their personal space focusing on their journey of A to B and nothing more. So it is a very solitary and honest state of self one becomes involved in as you switch off to being no longer aware of your surroundings.

In capturing this moment Dicorcia captures an incredibly honest state of being with these people.

Reflecting on Dicorica and Newman's work there are elements of both I would like to combine. Phillip Lorca Dicorcia captures people in a natural honest state, which is a theme I want to centralise my portrait around, the idea of simplistic honesty, however Dicorcia uses the same lighting for every shot, and his set up and style is very reminiscent of advertising lighting, and I want something far more naturalistic. This is where I want to sample Arnold Newman's approach, as I first simply looked at his 'Stravinsky' as I was so impressed with the visuals of this piece, however looking over many of his other portraits:

Willie 'The Lion' Smith

John F. Kennedy

You can see that Arnold Newman does not stick to one visual style with his portraits, he instead tailors his entire mise en scene around his model, for instance his 'Willie The Lion Smith' is tailored completely to a traditional jazz scene, with the smokey club, the studio lights in shot, and the stacked bar chairs. The same with his John F. Kennedy, with the powerful low angle on the white pillars of the white house, but with Kennedy himself a more humble and less overbearing figure.

I wish to take this idea of tailoring my mise en scene to my model from Arnold Newman, but also I would like to capture a sense of honesty and naturalism, so I shall combine the ideas of Dicorcia and Newman.

I will tailor my lighting, and setting to something simple that will also reflect on my model being a blues musician, and I will simply ask him to play, hoping that after a short while my model will forget his studio surroundings, and begin to simply play as he would at any street corner or venue, and this will help me achieve my sense of simple honesty.

Posing and Lighting Exercise

As part of our portrait unit we spent two days in small groups practicing lighting and poses, creating different emotions and stereotypes through subtle changes in lighting and posture, experimenting mostly with standard reflectors and soft boxes on Broncolor studio flash systems.

 Utilising a few objects at hand in the studio or from our bags, we created several job role stereotypes, a builder, a waitress, a cleaner and a scholar. We altered our lighting set ups with minor adjustments for every shot, however the main focus of this first exercise was posture and framing, subtleties like the hunched scholar, immersed in his book, looking of his shoulder at the world he pays little attention to. The builder shown through straight body shots, to show a simplicity and honesty, but also a pride in the worker standing straight by his tools, looking directly at the camera.
This exercise was designed to make us think on our feet about how we tailor the posture of our models to suit the intent of the photograph.

Our next exercise was similar to the first however this time we focused on posture and expression without props, and altered our lighting to suit our intent far more. Instead of job roles, this time we focused on emotions, or traits, like pride, sorrow, honesty or arrogance.

We switched back and forth between soft and hard lighting, we also paid a lot of attention to our camera angles, for instance a low angle to create a sense of power for pride, or a high angle for sorrow.

Studio Shoot

On the day of my portrait shoot I decided on experimenting with two different sets of postures on two rolls of film. 

My lighting set up used a prolite with a large softbox as my main light, which was positioned above my subject looking downwards on him. My fill light was also a prolite, however I used a standard reflector attachment and utilised two black polly boards to create a strip spotlight to highlight the left hand side of my subject, this light was set 3 power stops down from my main light.

On my first roll of film I asked my subject to simply sit with a neutral expression and look towards the camera, I leant his hard black guitar case against his shoulder, using my fill light to catch the edge of the case. The idea behind this was an attempt at mimicking Arnold Newman's 'Stravinksy', I wanted a standard portrait shot of my subject looking towards the camera, and tried to silhouette the guitar case much like Stravinksy's piano. I kept the brick wall as my backdrop in order to maintain my idea of honesty, as a black or white backdrop makes this an obvious studio piece, but the wall gives it an ambiguous but everyday setting. I was not pleased however with the framing of these shots, a guitar case proved too small to effectively recreate Newman's 'Stravinsky' and my models expression and posture was obviously too awkward.

For my second roll of film I kept my lighting set up the same, but repositioned my subject so the fill light would catch and highlight his left edge more. For this series I asked him to merely play a set piece as though he was busking on the street, which eventually relaxed my model and he began to play naturally, his expression and mentality focusing only on his music. With him involved in playing I simply shot slowly and steadily as he continued to play, in order to capture a more honest expression and posture from him, which I found to be far more effective.

This shot was my final selection from my contact sheet, as I found my model to have the best posture and expression in this frame. I found I preferred his posture most in this frame, as it is clear he in the middle of playing by his hands and arms positioning on the guitar. I also prefer his expression most in this frame, as his entire face is visible, but he is not looking or focused on his surroundings, he is clearly seen as involved only in the music he is playing. My idea of honesty and simplicity in identity I believe to be quite clear in this photograph, as the lighting is very reminiscent of older style Blues and Jazz musician's portraits, being very soft on the skin with clear texture, but drawing on many shadows in the posture of the musician as well. The brick wall behind works well here as well, as the lighting is unnatural and that of a studio, but the brick wall creates an ambiguity in his location, for instance this could easily be at a venue or practice room that he is playing in. The fact that my model is not focused at all on the camera reinforces my intent as well, as he is simply himself, and his self is simply his music.

Interim Review 3/11/11

The Object

Our first unit given was one called Object and Body, beginning with the object. The task set was to create a still life piece, with a theme centralised on a current issue or topic that you (the photographer) feels passionately about.

The topic I chose to tackle was 'consumerism', the definition of this being: "the preoccupation of society with consumer goods". My first item of research on this subject was a documentary called ‘Objectified’, this was a documentary based on the nature of a products design and manufacture, approaching mainly from a product designers point of view. There was one quote in this documentary however that stuck in my mind, which was: “Make what was now, look like then, so that people want our now”. This made me focus on the corporate backing to consumerism, and that we consume goods at a habitually alarming rate, to the extent when the purchasing of these goods loses all meaning.

After a tutorial, it was brought to my attention that I was crossing into two areas of consumerism, and so I chose to look less at the consumer society as a whole, and more of a statement about our self identity with these products, or rather lack thereof.

I was unclear of my visual style for this piece, until I saw a series of photographs by Danny Treacy called “Them”, which was a series of outfits constructed from strangers clothing.

I took this and decided to use fashion and clothing as my signifier for the consumerist products, as fashion is one of the most prominent and ever changing aspects of consumerism.

Next I looked at the nature of fashion, and decided that a mannequin would represent my consumer, as I am looking at the idea of meaningless or ‘soulless’ behind consumerism, a life size doll would be perfect to show the facade of consumerism.

I lastly needed a reinforcing symbol to the idea of ‘soulless’ and also something to make the mannequin replicate a human more prominently, so I chose an empty mirror frame, as it is a common habit to check oneself in the mirror, but adhering to old folklore, the lack of a reflection signifies the absence of a soul.

Environment

Alongside our Object and Body unit, we were given a unit called The Environment. In this unit we had to create a pastiche to one of three choices, and next to create three of our own images based on our own conceptual approach to representing landscape.

Our lectures began by looking at the birth of Romanticism in landscape paintings, and then in early landscape photography such Ansel Adams’ work on the American landscape.

As we looked at the Romantic movement, I began remembering what I had learnt of the Romantic movement in Poetry in my English A level, and this reminded me of  poets like Wordsworth and Blake, but most predominantly, the work of John Claire. Who’s work was heavily influenced by England’s Agricultural Revolution.

This revolution was described by historian Mark Overton as “The shift to Capitalism in the agricultural world.” The main part of this revolution meant that all land had to be owned, and was no longer free.

I took this and began exploring this idea of an imprisoned land, or quarantine, something wasted as it is unused yet denied to us.

After a tutorial session where I displayed a test shot depicting a broken fence lying on a field, I was advised to pulled back a little and to show these vast denied landscapes more clearly.

I was also recommended to look at John Darwell’s work, ‘Dark Days’.

Looking at his use of the fence as a barrier between the viewer and the land, I decided to adopt this visual concept, but to elaborate the idea of the barrier into something far more domineering and overbearing, so I utilised low angle shots to over emphasise these barriers around the land.

I focused on high contrasts, and giving the fences far more focus in the foreground, but so that you could still make out what the fences blocked, but it has lost it’s detail and life along with it’s freedom.

For my pastiche I chose Robert Adams' 'On Signal Hill'.

Doing my best to replicate this shot, I chose a location on the edge of a hill, in Gillingham overlooking Chatham, so that I had a populated area behind my trees. Unfortunately I could not find a location with actual trees present and an appropriate view, so I actually used a 3 foot high plant shot up close to replicate the trees, and then appropriately angled my camera to proportion my sky, city, and foreground as close to Adam's as possible.

I chose a high aperture of F32 to make sure I maintained focus as much as possible in the foreground and background, and I exposed for the urban area at 1/2 a second to silhouette my foreground. I shot this at roughly 6a.m. in order to use the morning mist to replicate the fog hovering above Los Angeles.

The Environment

This unit will be about investigating and representing the many different conceptual approaches to environment, and the aesthetic traditions embedded within this genre.

As part of this unit I am going to pastiche 2 photos out of a selection of 6, so I will begin by researching and deconstructing each photo so that I can get a clear choice as to which I will go for. In terms of my previous experiences, I am new to environment photography, and will therefore explore a broad range of artists to better my understanding.

Roger Fenton

The Terrace and Park at Harewood House (1859)

In 1859 the Lascelles family of Harewood House, Yorkshire, commissioned Fenton to document the aspects of their house. The house had recently been extensively remodelled by the architect Sir Charles Barry, one hte most significant additions was the terrace to the south front of the house. This photograph shows members of the Lascelles family standing and sitting along the balustrade of their new terrace.

This image at first glance, to me, acts as a show piece, for the perfect upper class and lifestyle. Almost as if it could be an advertisement or propaganda piece, “The lifestyle you could achieve”.

Within this image we have a series of markers to show the vastness of the land in shot, the first being the water fountain in the bottom left corner in the foreground, then central and slightly to the right, the people on the balcony, viewing ‘their’ land, then finally the mountains in the distance, almost in a perfect diagonal line. This is where I get the feeling of the upper class luxury, as the fountain is the first thing your focus is drawn to, as it is the biggest item, in the sharpest focus, and in the foreground, closest to you. Surrounding the fountain is the French garden, on the balcony we have the owners of the house/ guests, their presence on the balcony signifies that this is owned property, and their placement in the centre is what emphasises the vastness of this property, as the perspective shows a large  garden behind them, and the framing clearly states that this is but a small portion of the garden, as we cannot see the whole of the pool the fountain is in, and the balcony trails off in each direction.

The fountain is in the sharpest focus, as it is the clearest symbol in shot of the ‘glamour’ intended in this photo, as it is of a large scale, and engraved in luxurious carvings and sculptures, centred in the middle of a large pool.

As the people in this photo are in the ‘middle’ of this photo, looking over the balcony we also get the impression that they are overlooking ‘their’ land, as the glimpse of the French garden behind shows that this is more than just a view. Though their land probably does not stretch as far as the mountains in the background, their inclusion in the photo gives a far greater sense of depth, as we have the markers of the fountain, the people, the trees and the lake, and with just a slither of the sky exposed behind the mountains, the viewer could almost feel like they, themselves, are viewing this never ending landscape from a window as much as through a photograph.

Fenton has chosen to favour a smaller aperture as we do not start to lose focus after the balcony, and even then not by much, he has also chosen a wider lens to include as much of the scenery as possible.

Robert Adams

On Signal Hill, Overlooking Long Beach, California

Concerned with human destruction of the landscape of the American West, Robert Adams has for many decades used his camera to mournfully document what he sees as the fallen state of a former Eden. Of his project he has said, “The operating principle that seems to work best is to go to the landscape that frightens you the most and take pictures until you’re not scared anymore.”

The Los Angeles basin, perhaps, one of the most terrifying landscapes to anyone concerned about environmental degradation, was Adam’s focus for several years in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

In this photograph, two forlorn, scraggly trees overlook a smog-choked landscape of urban sprawl. Perched on the hillside, the neglected trees are poignant reminders of what was once naturally beautiful but is now spoiled.

The manipulation of light in this photograph gives off a ghostly effect, utilizing the smog of L.A. and the choice of black and white film, makes the scene almost reminiscent of the horror genre.

He has set up his exposure to favour the shadows of the trees, in order to silhouette them against the white foggy background, so that trees appear to be more cut out of the fog.

The trees stand on thick black grass in the foreground, exposed so that you can recognise more the presence of grass and trees, instead of fully realised trees and grass, reinforcing this theme of death that the photograph generates. In fact looking at the slither of the grey city sandwiched in between black dead trees and grass, and an abyss of endless fog, Adams has transformed this hillside view of Los Angeles, into a scene depicting either the city of the dead, or some form of ghoulish after life.

Joel Sternfeld


As I progress through the Environment project, today we were set a research task, where we have to pick out a photographer, from a list, and research them, comparing at least 3 of their photographs.

Sternfeld.

Joel Sternfeld has taken many landscape photographs, many of which display a certain level of humour, or satire, about our environment, and our attitudes, as people, towards it.
As brief background on Sternfeld, born in 1944 New York City, he was one of a grouping of environment photographers, that really moved the genre forwards, and brought in a new generation of styling, completely different to the firm classic styles of Edward Weston or Ansel Adams. Sternfeld belonged to a 'dead pan' movement, using soft colouring and combining very much a naturalism, or lack of artistic style as some would say, but with subtle elements attributing together to create a certain satire from the image.
Sternfeld himself is best known for exploring an irony behind human altered landscapes in the United States.

Looking first at Sternfeld's Mclean Virginia,

This image has quite a depressed feel to it, as the scene depicts a wrecked land. The first items within the mise en scene our eyes are drawn to are the Farm Market stall, and then the fire behind it, these are the first items to catch our eye mainly from his choice of framing, the farm market stall is the largest single apparent item and horizontally it may be to the left but vertically it is the centre of the image, it is also 'out of place' which sparks a subconscious intrigue. The reason I say the farm market is out of place, is that when you pay attention to the surroundings, the field appears rather barren, with no clear path coming from or leading to this market stall, making it a very unnatural man made element within it's surroundings. We do of course have the burning house in the background that signifies a human inhabitance of the landscape, but as it is sufficiently in the background with no visible adjoining path to the market stall, that both man made elements appear together, yet separate, both slightly out of place, surrounded by nature.
Looking at the arrangement of each item within shot, the viewer gets the feel of a human presence both sucking the life from the land, and also a sense of stupidity, man's folly. The human interference in the natural world is first shown by the Market Stall, as previously stated it is in an unnatural location, brightly signposted with fruit (pumpkins) displayed out front for sale.When we cast our eyes around the market stall, we can see smashed and squashed pumpkins en mass in the foreground, littering the field, the field as well is barren, trees few and fairly small, spaced far apart and lacking leaves, and the grass short, patchy and dried, without any vibrance in it's colour. The most vivid colour in shot, is the fire, the burning house could potentially be the farm house, as little else in terms of civilisation is present. An attempt at extinguishing the fire can be seen, however the fire can be seen to have spread strong in the wind.
All of these elements combine together to show an attempt at man made success, a large house and goods to sell, but we can see that attempting to sell the goods, have raped the land, hence the smashed pumpkins, and the market stall appears barren, with no abundance of business. The old house in the background, the largest man made structure in shot is burning and destroyed showing that these attempts amount to nothing.

This piece conveys a similar cynical message about human altered landscapes to some of his other works such as 'After a Flash Flood Rancho Mirage California' which is part of a series along with 'Mclean Virginia' called 'American Prospects'.

This piece as the title explains, shows the aftermath of a flash flood. From how the picture is organised however, it seems to me, as almost set made as it is structured in three opposing tiers, with almost biblical referencing in their arrangement.
The three tiers consist of, the mountainous landscape in the background, the middle ground of the villa's, and then the bottom, largest tier, in the foreground of a landslide wreck, with a smashed turned over car amidst the rubble.
The reason behind saying that there are almost biblical references, is that the camera angle is looking directly horizontally at the scene, which is how Sternfeld has tiered this photograph. The top section, the mountains, are shown to be completely untouched by man, and distanced enough to appear completely separate from the villas. The exposure and lighting also separates the mountains, as in contrast to the rest of the image, the mountains are very light, and hazed over with a light fog, almost making them seem ethereal.
The middle tier, has much more vivid colouring and contrast in comparison to the mountains, but it remains a muted light. This tier shows a few trees darted through the villas, this make the villa seem to have been cut into the natural space, with a few remaining signs of what was once there. The villas are of an architecture we associate with the Mediterranean, which also signifies perfect sunshine, and often holiday. The villas however are not lit or shown to be particularly glamorous, as mostly outer walls are shown, and the back of an inexpensive car. Other than the care there are no signs of people present at this villa, the muted lighting, and obscured angle at which we see the villas, give a sense of abandonment.
Finally, the lowest and largest tier, that shows the aftermath of the flash flood. We see a landslide, with discoloured grass moving down the left, fading to grey the further down the grass goes. On the right hand side it is mainly smashed rock moving downwards, with the remains of a car swept up in the destruction amongst the rocks. As the landslide has left a fairly clean cut across the road, Sternfeld has taken advantage of this with his dead horizontal camera angle, in order to separate this lower tier from the middle tier.
So within these three tiers, we have the top tier, the mountains in the sky, untouched by man and lit with a 'heavenly' glow.
The middle tier shows us current life, or at least man's attempts at this, carving into the trees with his structures.
The bottom tier, showing destruction and death, with the car amongst the rubble, we see a visual link between the lower 'hellish' tier, and the middle tier where man has carved in his own land in contrast with the natural land, shown in the 'heavens' of the upper tier.

This picture, has very much the same message as Mclean Virginia, using muted light, to take away any vivid colours, and utilising semiotics to subtly suggest that the destruction present in the photograph was a result of humans altering the natural landscape as they please.

These two however quite contrast the mood behind Joel Sternfeld's High Line series, albeit similar messages there is a much more positive and 'beautiful' idea behind the High Line, and it was this series of photos that first sparked my fascination with Sterneld's work.

'The High Line' is an above ground rail track, made in the 1930's to keep the train away from street traffic, that eventually, with the creation of the underground, was no longer needed. It was left abandoned and untouched for around 20 years, before people began to notice what had become of it, which was a natural paradise, suspended above the everyday streets of New York, unbeknownst to the pedestrians below.

Looking at Sternfeld's series, 'American Prospects' I can instantly see why a phenomenon like 'The High Line' would appeal so much to him. As a man who had created a very cynical and satirical series of photographs about man's creation's, particularly man's architecture, and showing examples and giving messages of how it is destroying the natural beauty and order of the world. Then suddenly he is confronted with this marvel, of where nature has adapted man's architecture into a natural beauty, and has persisted this, in the middle of New York City, a place of nothing but miles of a modern world, dominated by staggering examples of man's architecture.

Looking at this particular photograph from 'The High Line' series, we can see a switch in emotion behind a similar message, or rather theme.
The colours in this piece are far more vivid and alive, even in the city buildings. The rail road takes up the entirety of the foreground, and tapers into the horizon line. Be the colours of the building more vivid and less depressed than previous images, they are still slightly washed over, and the colour groups stick to myriad of dull brick reds or paler colours like the greyish building on the left hand side of the rail road, with the sky dull and muted out with cloud. This on it's own would give the image of a foggy and slightly depressing city, however the rail road is in complete contrast to these colour tones, as it is a rich and consist green all along the rail road, with small dashes of yellow where daisies are growing. This shows a lush green and natural pathway, plowing right through the centre of the city into the unseen distance, with the actual rail tracks clear and present in the foreground slowly disappearing into the grass. The rails are intentionally kept clear in shot, as a clear signifier as to what this pathway once was, and also further emphasising the idea of a natural 'pathway' cutting through the city. The reminder that this was once a rail track and the dominance of the tracks position and colour is to clearly show natures triumph in this instance over man, and the idea of persistence, as it has taken one of man's impressive structures, and adapted and conquered it, to it's own will.
As stated previously this shows a similar theme to 'American Prospects' of natural order, what should be, and man's defiance of it, however instead of depicting a depressed and dead scene of what man has done to nature, Sternfeld has found an example, of a more passive but also more prevailing and uplifting message, showing that nature will find a way. It may be still opposed to man or at least his creations in a sense, but the destruction and death has been replaced with life and rebirth, creating a message more of beauty, than that of shame and folly.

My Environment


I have always had a naive longing for adventure and exploration, and find myself very envious of people like Edward Weston or Ansel Adams, that got to explore a largely untouched landscape, and had the 'freedom' to explore such an incredibly vast landscape.
In modern times however there is not much that has not been explored already, and even though there is still plenty I myself could explore, I live in a country where this is permitted within great confines.
This will be the basis of my focus on landscape and environment photography.
For my meaning I am looking very much at the roots of landscape, and of Romanticism. This is because in England a main catalyst for great Romantic era artists was the legal siphoning of all English land, I am referring of course to England's Agricultural Revolution that was a by product of the Industrial Revolution.
The Agricultural revolution in England was to boost the productivity of farmland, and to achieve this, all land was deemed to have a 'legal owner' no land was to be free any more, it was owned either privately or by the Government. This meant acres upon acres of forests and fields in England became fenced off and enclosed, prohibiting the free exploration of English land, summarised in Mark Overtons' words, (BBC History writer) "the shift to capitalism in the agricultural world".
This radical change gave birth to such poets as John Clare, William Blake, and William Wordsworth. Their poetry was predominantly based around this segregation and constriction of their green land they used to be free to, and the rigid, and polluted manufactured landscape that was being erected in it's place.

This may have all happened a long time ago to us, however this law still stands. In England every section of land is owned by someone, therefore technically, nothing is fully open to the public, sure we cut through the occasional field, there are parks and walks through wooded areas, but that land is still classed as someone property, and you cannot simply explore it as you wish. Much land is also completely fenced off, and we are 'not aloud' to walk across it, though much of time, I find particularly in my area, there is no viable reason for this land to be restricted. All I simply see are many green patches fenced off, showing long signs of neglect and abandonment, though someone still clings to it like a greedy child denying it to others.
This law is most noticeable in England to campers, as you cannot legally pitch a tent anywhere other than a designated, and tolled, camp site.
This is quite contrasting to mainland Europe, where most land is free to roam and explore, and you are free to legally set up camp for the night and carry on the next day.
Looking at this law, and the restrictions it implies, I would like to look at the idea of quarantine, or imprisonment of the land.

Jem Southam


Jem Southam was born in Bristol in 1950, and is now one of the UK's leading photographers.
He is renowned for his colour landscapes, beginning in the 1970's and continuing until the present. His trademark style is the patient observation of changes at a single location over many months or years.
Southam's subjects are predominately situated in the South West of England where he lives and works. He observes the balance between nature and man's intervention and traces cycles of decay and renewal. In doing this his pieces suggest the forging of pathways towards visual and intellectual resolution.

Looking at this photograph, Southam careful inspection of detail, and the subtleties between colours and textures is clearly evident. It is a consistency with Southam's work to have his shots with a completely razor sharp focus and a large depth of field so that everything is clear, he also makes sure that everything is carefully lined up and organised precisely.
This comes from his influence from the 'Bechers' as he stated in an interview with  'Seesaw Magazine', in 1975 he switched from colour to black and white film as he did not like the saturations from colour film at that time, and he began to turn to the precise works of the 'Bechers' for influence to carry on his photography.

We can see similarities in terms of the depth of field and the textures they bring out in their photos.
However after a while, in the early 80's he began to switch back to colour, following inspirations from Eggleston's photography.

My Environment


I spent some time using a 35mm film Minolta SLR camera, and experimented with a 28mm lens. At first I simply took some test shots, lining up trees and horizon lines, and creating a frame with bushes, basically getting to know landscape composition.
After a few shots, I began exploring country lanes around my area in Rainham, trying to find some examples of the fields or old farm land that is fenced off, and forbidden.
I was shooting around sunset, unfortunately it was a very cloudy day, and so the lighting is rather dreary, however I felt this helped reinforce my theme of abandonment in certain shots, as the grass and trees had this lifeless colour to them.

As these 35mm where more for a warm up and experimentation I was only looking for a couple of prints from them, however unfortunately in the developing process most of my favourite negatives had scratches right across them, and due to time as well, I made one full print from these and decided to move onto shooting similar photos on a medium format camera.

This was my favourite of my 35mm shots; I was walking through country lanes, when I saw an old rusted fence, with this plane of grass behind it that was very dead looking and barren, so I climbed the fence and began exploring.
It was a plane of dug up earth and grass, and there were a few signs of tire tracks and recent activity in the area, but the majority seemed long since abandoned. At the edges I saw a few pieces of equipment that had been left around, and that people were simply cutting the trees down around the edges and leaving the rest.
The whole placed seemed like this dried up dead field that was having its last signs of life exhausted until it was fully dead.
Amongst the barren plane and collections of tools around the edges there was just one steel gate lying in the middle of the field tangled in barbed wire. It did not seem to fit, it had no place or evidence of where it came from, it was simply there, and this fascinated me so I took several shots of it playing around with exposure time until I found one I was happy with.
This fence door put me onto the idea of documenting these fences and particularly gateways, that bar off forgotten areas, like prison doors.

Developing Ideas


After a tutorial I was advised that my idea of imprisonment and quarantine was not clear enough from my first shots, and that I should try to pull the camera back and show as much of these landscapes as possible, so it is clear that this vast land is forbidden.

In my second attempt at my environment shoots I switched to using a Fuji 6x9 camera as the Bronica I first shot with was fully booked, and I continued to work with ISO100 medium format colour film.

I brought my camera positioning back and experimented with shooting both the fences and through the fences. So that I had a variety where the focus of some shots was this solid, prison like barricade, but then other shots where slightly more subtle in that I shot the landscape through fences and gates, so that the viewer could see this beautiful landscape, but could also see it was behind something, and blocked off.
I shot these at sunset, attempting to use the sunlight to bring out the colours of the trees and landscapes.
I realised however as soon as I had made these contact sheets that I would need to reshoot, as the FUji 6x9 camera uses a view finder focus and not a focus through the lens. As I was not familiar with this function my focus was completely off, so I set out to reshoot.

I decided for the second shoot to switch to black and white film. I made this decision when reflecting on my meaning behind these series of photos, as I was thinking of the emotions I felt when I thought of all this forbidden land, and the loss of exploration, and the most prominent emotion was sorrow, so I wanted to take away the colour from the landscape, to reinforce that the land has lost it's freedom, that there is something missing.

These three are my final prints for this section of the environment that I submitted on my interim review day.
Looking at the three pieces, I love the contrasts and the harsh textures I have managed to bring out in the fences that are in the foreground. Something I was told however by my tutor John that upon reflection I quite agree with, is that the middle picture stands out the most from the other two, and tells the message of obscurity and entrapment the clearest, to the extent where it almost stands out as a separate piece of work from the others. This is something I am taking into consideration for a potential re-shoot for this section of my environment unit.

This is my pastiche piece, that was to mimic Robert Adams' on signal hill as best as possible.
I took the shot on an aperture of f22, with a 1second exposure time at 6am.
My location was the hardest part to choose as I could not find a clear enough hill with the correct view, so I decided to compromise and replicated Adams' two trees with a plant and just positioned my camera to increase it's perspective in the foreground. I was happy with my tiers in this picture however, as I believe I got quite close to Adams' proportions of foreground plants, middle ground strip of urban area, and then this foggy misty, endless stretch for the background of the image.

Photoshop work

I had a little spare time and decided to experiment on photoshop, and ended up coming up with this:

I've always enjoyed my anime's so I decided to convert myself into this style.