Beginning my personal investigation
I chose to begin thinking about my personal investigation by carrying out some practical exercises, combined with a bit of background research. I used the PhotoPedagogy resource 13 ways to begin a photography personal investigation to select some starting points.
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I was initially drawn to this exercise because I liked the idea that I could use my camera to rediscover the area where I live but from an increasingly close vantage point. I thought this might help me see everyday things in a new light, worrying less about the subject matter than about my relationship to it. I decided to carry out two photoshoots, the first one made before I looked at any other photographer's work and the second after I had done a bit of research, using the suggestions on the PhotoPedagogy website to help me.
Photoshoot #1:
Pictures taken with a digital SLR and equivalent 50mm manual focus lens. Hover over the thumbnails to reveal the relevant focal lengths.
This shoot took about 45 minutes in the late afternoon. I worked pretty quickly, not too worried about finding unusual subjects but concentrating on my focal lengths. I pre-focused the lens and, once I'd identified a subject, moved my body so that image came into focus in the viewfinder. The light was fading and I found it a real challenge to focus correctly at the shorter distances because I needed a wider aperture.
Research: Guido Guidi
I am interested in the work of Italian photographer Guido Guidi because he seems to be able to create captivating pictures out of very ordinary material - ordinary buildings, walls, roadside dirt and everyday objects.
I have chosen some of my favourite Guidi images and arranged them, like my pictures above, in order of their decreasing distance from their subject. It is interesting to notice how the photographer gives as much attention to a small tuft of grass as he does a large villa, parked cars or plastic crates. |
Wherever you look, there is something to see. |
Research: Tim Carpenter
Carpenter is an American photographer who, like Guido Guidi, make pictures of the everyday. I particularly like the series Local Objects, the way he moves towards and away from familiar subjects in an attempt to mke a satisfying picture of them. Here' a screen recording of the sequence from his website:
Photoshoot #2:
These pictures were taken with a 6x4.5 medium format rangefinder camera and a combination of Ilford HP5 and XP2 Super400 film. I prefocused the lens at 1m (its closest focusing distance) and moved backwards and forwards to bring the image into focus. They were all made within a one hour walk near my home. It was a pretty overcast day so I was forced to use a wide aperture setting of f/4.5 or f/5.6 which created a shallow depth of field and made focusing even harder. You can see that several pictures are not well focused. This task was a real challenge but I am pleasantly surprised by (most of) the results. Although I wouldn't like to be permanently restricted to a close focusing distance, it was really interesting to be reminded that moving closer to a subject radically alters your relationship to it. Even the most mundane subjects can look strange and fascinating when viewed at very close quarters and in shallow focus.
Further Research: Jackson Whitefield
I discovered the work of Jackson Whitefield on Instagram.
Jack Whitefield is a British artist born in St. Ives, Cornwall in 1991. Themes which run through his work include geology, architectural ruins, folklore, process and language. While his choice of media and interests are diverse, his inspiration is rooted firmly in his immediate surroundings. Always allowing his environment to lead his immediate enquiry his approach to making the work is more about reacting and engaging with the subject rather than seeking out ideas that were already formed in the mind.
-- Palm Studios website
I'm particularly drawn to Whitefield's photographs of mundane objects, often shot at close range like the examples above. I also like the idea that the meaning of the work comes from the artist's engagement with these materials rather than being imposed on them conceptually. In this way, the act of photography becomes a form of open-ended interrogation of the environment rather than a means to illustrate a preconceived idea.
Further Research: Martin Amis
I've also recently discovered the work of Martin Amis, specifically his book This Land. I've chosen the following images from the book because they focus on details in the landscape from close quarters. In the book, these are juxtaposed with more expansive shots but it's these close-up pictures that appeal to me most.
Further Research: Andrea Simonato
When photographing I try to keep an open mind to whatever I come across. What I look for in a subject is to catch its enigmatic character, what it seems to be hiding rather than what it lets you see. Photographing in black and white helps me to abstract reality more easily by creating a sort of parallel world that is precisely that of the photographic narrative itself. Il Malocchio creates a conceptual frame for my work, as it is inherent for me to explore the mysterious side of things. |
Simonato's photographs of rural Italy have an eerie quality. The title of his book Il Malocchio translates as 'evil eye' and relates to pagan folklore about a malevolent spirit which brings bad luck. The pictures, made during the pandemic, depict empty buildings, broken objects, seemingly abandoned villages and decrepitude.
I really like the way Simonato composes his images, often at close quarters. The objects almost look like conceptual sculptures or the remnants of a strange performance. It's hard to believe that he photographed them as he found them. He seems able to find the extraordinary in the ordinary, the marvellous in the everyday. |
PLANFollowing the success of photoshoot #2 (above) and my further research, I plan to continue to make black and white, close-up photographs of my local area (maybe even just the road on which I live) with my medium format camera. I want to study the textures of objects and surfaces at close range and isolate them slightly from their surroundings using shallow focus. I'm keen to see if very ordinary things can be made more enigmatic simply by being photographed.
Less is more:
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Photoshoot #3
These pictures were made with a 6x4.5 camera and Ilford XP2 Super400 film with the lens pre-focused to 1m. There's a big light leak in the fourth image (not sure what caused this) and the last image is a mistake. It was a cold day and the shutter was sticking so this shot was unintended.
Photoshoot #4
As before, these pictures were made with a 6x4.5 camera and Ilford XP2 Super400 film with the lens pre-focused to 1m.
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This exercise appealed because I wanted to experiment with various ways to compose my photographs and I liked the idea that pictures can be subdivided into smaller frames
Photoshoot #1:
These pictures were made with a digital SLR and equivalent 50mm lens at a busy indoor market.
Research: Harry Gruyaert
There is no story. It’s just a question of shapes and light. |
I admire the way Belgian photographer Harry Gruyaert organises his compositions. There is often a lot packed into the frame. He tends to use wide angle lenses and suck in a lot of information. It seems to me that he organises many of his best images by looking for pictures within pictures - framing devices - to compartmentalise the space. The people in his pictures are often contained by windows or doorways and landscapes are seen through the frames of fences and barriers.
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I particularly like the images in the following book which have been gathered together to illustrate the photographer's interest in the relationship between people and thresholds.
This book brings together images by Gruyaert from many places and many stages of his long artistic life. To make each one, he has stood with his camera at a threshold of one kind or another. A window. A doorway. A screen. A reflection. In other words, these are images made at those complicated yet poetic points between worlds. For centuries, painters have been fascinated by thresholds, and for a number of reasons. A pictured threshold can imply a narrative while leaving everything suspended and unanswered. |
Research: Lee Friedlander
Analysis:
This is one of my favourite Friedlander photographs. It's also an example of how the photographer uses various framing devices - pictures within a picture - to describe a scene so that the viewer is reminded that they are looking at a photograph rather than simply a window on the world.
Lee Friedlander often uses the windscreen, rear view or wing mirrors of his car in his photographs. Like many other American photographers before and after him, Friedlander criss-crossed the USA in his car, documenting the state of the nation. Friedlander's way of seeing is usually ironic, sometimes downright humorous, but always self-conscious. As in this image, he often includes himself in the picture by way of a reflection or shadow. Here we also see his Leica rangefinder and the picture records the circumstances of its own making. Friedlander is looking with both eyes but one is behind the viewfinder so that two separate views are implied - one 'natural' and the other mediated or framed. And yet even the 'natural' view is framed by the windscreen of the car which is out of shot. Perhaps the photographer is suggesting that there is no such thing as a 'natural' or unmediated way of looking at this point in history.
By 1969, most Americans would have owned a TV set and a camera. Kodak had made it easy for everyone to make photographs, promising "You press the button, we do the rest" and releasing the Instamatic in 1963. Approximately 650 million people watched the Moon landings which took place in 1969, the same year as this photograph was made. But it's not every day that you encounter an 80ft high brontosaurus so it's no surprise that Friedlander was tempted to stop the car and make a photograph. But why stay in the car?
Most visitors to the famous Wall Drug Dinosaur mark the occasion by making a photograph like this. Not Friedlander. He parked the car in front of a DEAD END sign, obscuring the dinosaur and deliberately frustrating his (and our) view of the spectacle. Presumably he could have left the car and made a more conventional, tourist type image, perhaps including some hilarious forced perspective. Friedlander's joke is more subtle. This dinosaur is a "dead end" in more than one sense. By including layers of framing devices within the picture - windscreen, rear view mirror, signs and fence panels - the photographer is drawing our attention to the way that photographs change our relationship to reality. In the middle of the 19th century, the camera enabled millions of ordinary people to memorialise themselves and their loved ones, previously something only rich people could afford to do through commissioned paintings. By 1969, cameras had made it to the moon and back, showing us an image of our our own planet and reminding us of its fragility. Friedlander's photograph of this fake dinosaur, behind what appears to be the incursion of yet more man-made construction, from the seat of his gas guzzling car, could be read as an amusing but tragic elegy to the natural world, a memorial to the fast disappearing American wilderness. Typically, Friedlander implicates himself (and us) in the whole process.
By 1969, most Americans would have owned a TV set and a camera. Kodak had made it easy for everyone to make photographs, promising "You press the button, we do the rest" and releasing the Instamatic in 1963. Approximately 650 million people watched the Moon landings which took place in 1969, the same year as this photograph was made. But it's not every day that you encounter an 80ft high brontosaurus so it's no surprise that Friedlander was tempted to stop the car and make a photograph. But why stay in the car?
Most visitors to the famous Wall Drug Dinosaur mark the occasion by making a photograph like this. Not Friedlander. He parked the car in front of a DEAD END sign, obscuring the dinosaur and deliberately frustrating his (and our) view of the spectacle. Presumably he could have left the car and made a more conventional, tourist type image, perhaps including some hilarious forced perspective. Friedlander's joke is more subtle. This dinosaur is a "dead end" in more than one sense. By including layers of framing devices within the picture - windscreen, rear view mirror, signs and fence panels - the photographer is drawing our attention to the way that photographs change our relationship to reality. In the middle of the 19th century, the camera enabled millions of ordinary people to memorialise themselves and their loved ones, previously something only rich people could afford to do through commissioned paintings. By 1969, cameras had made it to the moon and back, showing us an image of our our own planet and reminding us of its fragility. Friedlander's photograph of this fake dinosaur, behind what appears to be the incursion of yet more man-made construction, from the seat of his gas guzzling car, could be read as an amusing but tragic elegy to the natural world, a memorial to the fast disappearing American wilderness. Typically, Friedlander implicates himself (and us) in the whole process.
Photoshoot #2:
These pictures were made during the last week of December with a rangefinder camera, a combination of 50mm and 35mm lenses and Ilford XP2 Super400 film. Whilst I wasn't always thinking explicitly about the Pictures within pictures task, I had been looking at the work of Gruyaert and Friedlander and so I feel their influence may have rubbed off.
An edited sequenceI wondered whether I could create an exhibition-like presentation of particular images, selecting those that responded to the Pictures within pictures brief. I wanted to see if it was possible to suggest a kind of abstract narrative by arranging the pictures on a virtual wall. Scrolling down the page would reveal each of the pictures in a specific sequence. I was partly inspired by this display of images on Chrissie Dalziel's website (The Earl of Birds), especially the way they appear on a phone screen.
The title and typeface of my exhibition is sampled from some graffiti in one of the photographs not included in this sequence. |
A mobile exhibition ...?
I'm not sure why but I began to imagine this exhibition in a mobile form, with the text and images worn on t-shirts. If I had the resources, my plan would be to have the title of the exhibition printed on the front of several t-shirts and each of the images printed on the backs. The t-shirts would be worn by willing participants as they went about their everyday lives and be seen by whoever came into contact with them. I like the provocation of the title since it invites a response. Only when the person wearing the t-shirt had passed by would the viewer be able to see an image and think about their response to it. Here's a simple digital mock-up of what the t-shirts might look like:
Photoshoot #3:
These pictures were made in early January 2024 with a rangefinder camera, 35mm lenses and Ilford XP2 Super400 film. I have attempted various ways of making pictures within pictures, concentrating on windows, mirrors, reflections, apertures and other kinds of framing devices. I noticed that I took many more landscape format shots with the 35mm lens than I did with the 50mm (mostly portraits format shots).
An edited sequence
I really enjoyed creating the previous edited sequence so decided to make another using the pictures from photoshoot #3. Again, I found a title in a handwritten sign featured in one of the pictures. This sequence represents a kind of journey (to the midlands and back) in which the unifying compositional thread is pictures within pictures. People only appear as disembodied limbs, in pictures or as objects. It begins and ends with a sign. I think the overall tone is quite sombre, maybe even a little sinister. I like the way that a sequence of (factual) photographs can suggest a (fictional) narrative. This reminds me of the grey area.
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A multimedia exhibition
I wondered what it would be like to present a slightly larger selection of images as a sequence in a slideshow format. I also wanted to use some sounds to accompany the pictures. I used Photoshop to create the slides (1920 x 1080 pixels) and iMovie to sequence them and add the soundtrack. I found a recording of a camera shutter and wind on on Freesound.org and a strange sounding piece of music on Ubuweb. I'm really pleased with the resulting video (below) and keen to develop this as a way to showcase my pictures in the future.
Further Research: 'Pataphysics
I found out about 'Pataphysics (the apostrophe isn't a mistake!) from a random search for a soundtrack to my slideshow (above) on Ubuweb. By chance, I happened across a folder of music called 'Pataphysics Compilation. Inside I found the music by Ramuntcho Matta that I used for my film. I didn't know much about 'Pataphysics but found the name intriguing (that weird apostrophe) so decided to find out a bit more. I now realise, of course, that Ubuweb might be named after the character Ubu Roi (King Ubu) from a play by Alfred Jarry, the inventor of 'Pataphysics. I quickly realised that trying to get a grip on exactly what it means to be pataphysician might be quite challenging. According to leading academic, 'Pataphysics is:
a playful and satirical (and, of course, French) philosophy that mocks the conventions of science, religion, and philosophy. It revels in absurdity and paradox, intentionally defying traditional logic and embracing contradictions. |
I found this article about Dada 'Pataphysics which helped to explain the application of pataphysical ideas by several artists and included this quotation from 1915 by a photographer:
We are living in the age of the machine. Man made the machine in his own image. She has limbs which act; lungs which breathe; a heart which beats; a nervous system through which runs electricity. The phonograph is the image of his voice; the camera the image of his eye … After making the machine in his own image he has made his human ideal machinomorphic. |
I also discovered a 'Pataphysics Flickr group. Unfortunately, I found the images here to be mostly digital composites and pseudo-surreal Photoshop experiments (and therefore not very interesting). Might it be possible to practice photography pataphysically, without resorting to digital trickery? I'm not sure where to go next with this but I'm planning to read up on 'Pataphysics and try to find a way to incorporate some of these (absurd, playful, paradoxical) ideas into my investigation. Who knows where that might take me...?!
Exercise #11: Dream CityImagine that your nearest city (or a more distant city you may have visited) only existed as a dream, perhaps the kind of fantastic city written about by Italo Calvino in his book Invisible Cities. Photograph this dream city. There are no restrictions about how you might interpret this assignment, so use your imagination. How can you use factors like the time of day, colour, movement and details to evoke the mood of your imaginary, dream city.
Think about how sequences of photographs can create a new reality from an existing one. |
I really like the idea that photography is capable of creating a kind of parallel reality. A photograph is perfectly suited to describing the surface appearance of things. But can it also be used to suggest imaginative and fictional spaces? I decided I needed to do a bit of research before tackling this particular exercise.
Research: Luigi Ghirri
photographs become our impossible landscape, without scale, without a geographic order to orient us; a tangle of monuments, lights, thoughts, objects, moments, analogies from our landscape of the mind, which we seek out, even unconsciously, every time we look out a window, into the openness of the outside world, as if they were the points of an imaginary compass that indicates a possible direction.
-- Luigi Ghirri
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I like the idea of working in parallel series and the surveyor-like, straight on compositions employed by Ghirri. I like the way he incorporates pictures of pictures, commenting on the media saturation of modern life and the way that photography has changed the way we relate to reality. I like his interest in fragments and clues and symbols, as if these are ways of navigating experience in an increasingly complex and shifting visual landscape.
Research: David Hlynsky
I received a copy of David Hlynsky's Window-Shopping Through the Iron Curtain for Christmas. His pictures, taken inEastern Europe and Russia in the years leading up to the fall of the Berlin Wall, capture the uneasy relationship between commerce and communism. The arrangements of signs and still life objects generates surreal juxtapositions - a vase of flowers towering over a tiny pair of shoes, a miniature model toilet on a chequered bathroom floor and empty soldiers' uniforms suspended beneath headless caps. As Martha Langford notes in the accompanying essay, "When it comes to window displays, glass rules, just as it does in photography, sealing objects and emotions off from one another, at the same time heightening interest to the point of desire. The pane and the lens keep things where they belong, but also allow for their translation into the memories and imaginations of walking, dreaming consumers." She places Hlynsky's project in the context of Surrealist documentary photography, referring to Ian Walker's definition:
photography that largely takes place in and around the city, where the banal and the marvellous coexist on a daily basis.
-- Ian Walker, City Gorged with Dream: Surrealism and Documentary Photography in Interwar Paris, 2002
Photoshoot #1: Local Objects
These photographs were made with a digital SLR and 50mm equivalent lens during short walks near my home over the Christmas holiday 2023. I was thinking mostly about Luigi Ghirri's images, the way he looks for pictures of pictures (on advertising hoardings, for example), signs and objects in the urban landscape, using tight framing to isolate them from their surroundings and loosen their meanings. I had enjoyed David Hlynsky's surreal shop window displays and so I also looked out for other kinds of discontinuity or odd juxtaposition, things that seemed out of place or ironic in some way, that appeared to untether themselves from the mundane, as if they were portals to an alternative reality lying just beneath the surface.
Photoshoot #2: Window Dressing
Diptychs
I wasn't particularly satisfied with these pictures. My idea was to try to capture the strange fantasy world of west end shopping, particularly the shop window displays of the boutique shops in Mayfair. I couldn't quite get to grips with the subject matter since shopping doesn't really interest me and I found the ostentatious displays of wealth and privilege pretty alienating. However, I decided to try tp select a few images and arrange them in pairs and threes to see if I could create some kind of odd relationship between them. Here is the result:
Triptych
Photoshoot #3: TV Dreams
I'm not sure where the idea came from to take pictures of a TV screen. It might have been connected to looking at all the shop windows. Anyway, it occurred to me that the images in dreams can seem jumbled up and strangely juxtaposed. In dreams it's possible to jump quickly from one location to another and for characters to appear and disappear without obvious explanation. What if I could appropriate scenes from various films, therefore, and re-arrange them to create new stories? Given that this exercise is entitled 'Dream City', maybe I could construct a sequence of pictures that might appear to be precisely that - a dream of a city. I chose films fairly randomly from a streaming service, set up my digital SLR on a tripod and scrolled through the footage until I saw something interesting. I then replayed it at normal speed and took a photograph. I tried to take only one picture of a particular scene (rather than using the burst mode) in the same way that I would photograph out in the world. Here are the results of my first attempt:
I really enjoyed the process but, on reflection, I wonder whether I should have chosen the films more carefully since they are so radically different in subject matter and visual style. My first instinct was to pair images from different films:
Then I wondered if I could create a longer sequence of images that suggested a dream-like experience:
#1
#2
I really enjoyed this experiment and, if I continued to pursue this idea, I would create a larger set of film stills from which to choose. I would be tempted to choose films by the same director for some kind of visual consistency but select relatively insignificant details and mix up the resulting photographs. It might also be interesting to do a similar exercise with photographs from books and magazines and to create a soundtrack to play alongside a slideshow of images.
Taking Stock - where next?I have really enjoyed exploring these three approaches to photography and I feel ready to try to synthesise my ideas and commit to a way forward with my Personal Investigation. Here are the themes/questions that have arisen and might form the basis of the investigation:
One can show one's contempt for the cruelty and stupidity of the world by making of one's life a poem of incoherence and absurdity. |
Research: Christopher Wood
My online research about 'Pataphysics led me to the artist Christopher Wood and his project Daydrawing. Wood has aligned himself with 'Pataphysics in the sense that he is searching for imaginative solutions and extending our ability to understand the world through the creation of a hyperobject. Making drawings every day (since 2016), Wood has generated a massive archive of images which can't be contained in a single space, especially since they have become distributed by the Internet and are collected by people across the world. Wood seems to be engaging with recent thinking in the sciences (and arts) about the anthropocene and the ways in which humans need to rethink their relationship to 'reality'.
I like the way the drawings are often displayed (as above) in seemingly endless, open grids. Here are some of my favourite examples of Wood's Daydrawings:
Daydrawing is an ongoing long-term project that began on January 1, 2016. I create daily drawings, the accumulation of which, over time, expand into a hyperobject - an entity we can experience directly but is so distributed in space and in time that it does not exist anywhere in particular. The perpetual Daydrawing process proceeds each day with the creation of a new work on paper – and a hyperobject emerges as each drawing is released into the world, resulting in a diaristic, many-paneled entity that stretches through time, space, and beyond our capacity to observe.
I really like the commitment and routine of this project and the way it is slowly building into a massive work of art. I also like the economy of means in the images, all monochrome and made with the same materials, plus the abstractness of the imagery. This seems to invite speculation and wonder. I would really like my images to have some of these qualities. Obviously, this is harder to achieve with photography since it's so wedded to visible reality. I'm not much interested in creating totally abstract images (e.g. chemigrams) so I'm going to have to figure out other ways of making my pictures prompts for the imagination. For example, here are a few recent images that have an enigmatic, slightly graphic, quality:
What is 'Pataphysics?
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Pataphysical Concepts
Clinamen: A clinamen is the unpredictable swerve of atoms that poet Christian Bök calls "... the smallest possible aberration that can make the greatest possible difference".
Antinomy: An antinomy is the mutually incompatible. It represents the duality of things, the echo or symmetry, the good and the evil at the same time.
Syzygy: The syzygy originally comes from astronomy and denotes the alignment of three celestial bodies in a straight line. In a pataphysical context it is the pun. It usually describes a conjunction of things, something unexpected and surprising.
Absolute: The absolute is the idea of a transcended reality.
Anomaly: An anomaly represents the exception. Jarry said that, "Pataphysics will examine the laws governing exceptions, and will explain the universe supplementary to this one." Bök calls it "... the repressed part of a rule which ensures that the rule does not work".
Pataphor: A pataphor is an unusually extended metaphor based on 'pataphysics. As Jarry claimed that 'pataphysics exists "... as far from metaphysics as metaphysics extends from regular reality", a pataphor attempts to create a figure of speech that exists as far from metaphor as metaphor exists from non-figurative language.
-- Source: Wikipedia
Antinomy: An antinomy is the mutually incompatible. It represents the duality of things, the echo or symmetry, the good and the evil at the same time.
Syzygy: The syzygy originally comes from astronomy and denotes the alignment of three celestial bodies in a straight line. In a pataphysical context it is the pun. It usually describes a conjunction of things, something unexpected and surprising.
Absolute: The absolute is the idea of a transcended reality.
Anomaly: An anomaly represents the exception. Jarry said that, "Pataphysics will examine the laws governing exceptions, and will explain the universe supplementary to this one." Bök calls it "... the repressed part of a rule which ensures that the rule does not work".
Pataphor: A pataphor is an unusually extended metaphor based on 'pataphysics. As Jarry claimed that 'pataphysics exists "... as far from metaphysics as metaphysics extends from regular reality", a pataphor attempts to create a figure of speech that exists as far from metaphor as metaphor exists from non-figurative language.
-- Source: Wikipedia
I'm particularly drawn to the notion of syzygy.
"The syzygy originally comes from astronomy and denotes the alignment of three celestial bodies in a straight line."Is this sequence of pictures by John Baldessari an example of a photographic syzygy? Possibly. But is it what's meant by a Pataphysical syzygy?
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Although the examples of photographic puns in this book (and its sequel) are funny, I'm not sure this is what pataphysicians mean by syzygy either! Neither is the Syzygy episode of The X Files going to be much help. |
So, what is a photographic Syzygy?
In 'Pataphysics, a syzygy is "a conjunction of things, something unexpected and surprising." I therefore plan to make a series of photographs which can be edited and sequenced in such a way as to disrupt the viewer's expectations about their supposed order. It might be helpful, I suppose, to establish some kind of order or theme to begin with (that can then be disrupted). This could be formal (e.g. a repeated shape, colour, pattern), thematic (e.g. pictures within pictures) or narrative (e.g. beginning, middle and end). This might also reflect the related pataphysical concepts of anomaly and clinamen. The element of surprise! I also like the idea of the unusual alignment of 3 elements (originally planets) - photographs, in my case. Could a strange narrative be constructed from a sequence of triptychs, for example?
Styrský/Syzygy
During a random Internet search I cam across the Czech photographer Jindřich Štyrský. I was struck by the similarity between Štyrský and Syzygy. Was this, in itself, an example of "a conjunction of things, something unexpected and surprising" or even an unpredictable swerve of atoms (clinamen)? It was enough to spark my interest in his work which turned out to be relevant in other ways too. Štyrský was associated with the Surrealists who themselves idolised Alfred Jarry, the original pataphysician. This coincidence seemed too good to ignore. Furthermore, Štyrský shared his photographs in cycles, choosing the titles randomly to draw out poetic, rather than literal, meanings. The titles of the cycles give some clue as to their poetic potential: Man with Blinkers, Frog Man and Parisian Afternoon. He was primarily a painter and graphic artist and a close friend of painter Toyen and poet Vítêzslav Nezval. Here are some examples of his photographs:
And here's an example of one of his paintings:
I find these images very inspiring. Štyrský photographs real things (there's no manipulation or post-processing tricks) and yet he manages to imbue them with a strange, intensity of feeling. The objects in them, removed slightly from their context by the frame of the photograph, seem portentous or symbolic but with no clear sense of their meaning. I imagine that viewing a sequence of these images would only increase this sense of a mysterious, almost dreamlike, narrative. His paintings seem to reference objects from the real world - mirrors, fabric, architecture, sculptures etc. - but they are collaged together in a non-naturalistic way. I'd like to try to create something similar to Štyrský's sequences of photographs but with the addition of sudden and unexpected jumps into different registers; the anomalous. I wonder if this can be achieved by switching lenses (e.g. from 35mm to 90mm)?
Photoshoot
These two films were sot on a rangefinder camera, using a combination of 35mm and 90mm lenses and Ilford XP2 Super400 film. I was interested to see how changing lenses and focal lengths would alter my way of seeing. I was also thinking about the work of Jindřich Štyrský, especially his ability to make relatively ordinary things seem strange - walls, signs, objects and architectural details - by decontextualising them. I was lucky that on both of the days when I made these pictures, the light was bright, producing strong shadows and helping me to use contrast to abstract the subject.
'Pataphysics and the spiral
In ‘Pataphysics: A Useless Guide, Andrew Hugill says of the spiral:
[D]rawing the spiral in fact creates two spirals: the one that is drawn and the one that is described by what is drawn. This echoes the plus-minus, or that which is and that which is not, in simultaneous existence. In pataphysics, mutually exclusive opposites can and do co-exist. |
I wondered whether I could use the spiral form to present a sequence of pictures. I fund the following instructional video on YouTube for making a spiral zine:
I decided to have a go at making my own version, using a recent set of photographs. I created a template in Photoshop (below), using vertical guides set to 25%, 50% and 75%, and printed two A3 montages which I stuck together before making the folds.
I was also keen to see if I could construct a spiral shaped montage of my pictures in Photoshop. This proved quite difficult but here's the result:
The Science of Imaginary Solutions
"The science of imaginary solutions" was one of the definitions of 'Pataphysics offered by Alfred Jarry. I've been thinking about this in the context of photography. I discovered the work of graphic designer Julian Montague on Instagram. One of his projects involves creating posters and book covers for an imaginary art gallery. He also invents the identities of the artists who exhibit at the gallery. I particularly like the exhibition posters, many of which feature photographs. Here are some of my favourites:
The book covers are also very convincing:
Not to mention the video documentation:
Scarfolk
Montague's fictional art gallery reminds me of the hilariously funny (and equally disturbing) Scarfolk blog. Created by writer and designer Richard Littler, the blog represents the fictional output of Scarfolk Council and features a steady stream of 1970s style propaganda and infomercials. The tone is dark and sardonic and although the visual style is a mixture of mid-century design and psychedelia, there are plenty of references to issues in contemporary Britain - poverty, migration, racism, inadequate housing, education and parenting, for example.
The world of Scarfolk seems perilous for children and the aged in particular. The combination of pagan rituals, science and hauntology suggests an appreciation for 'Pataphysics and the writing of Alfred Jarry. Here are some of my favourite publications from the world of Scarfolk: |
A response
I really like the idea of using my own photographs to create a fictional world (like the Thorold Gallery or Scarfolk). Designing posters, book and record covers could be the best way to do this. It's interesting that both of the above examples reference the visual language of the 1970s. I wonder why? Perhaps this is a matter of personal taste for the designers, the era in which they grew up and became aware of the visual arts...? I like the idea of re-purposing (appropriating) design from the past and including the patina of age. I'm excited to test my design skills and my ability to invent a fictional world that is believable.
Experiment #1
Posters advertising exhibitions at the fictional Euclid Gallery in the 1980s, also featuring the work of the fictional photographer Paul A. Deakin. I imagine Euclid Gallery as a pioneer of experimental photography, engaging with contemporary scholarship and championing the work of the younger generation.
Experiment #2
Below are various documents relating to the work of fictional photographer (and poet) Paul A. Deakin. Deakin, now sadly deceased, was a close friend of Alastair Brotchie, founder of the London Institute of ‘Pataphysics. He contributed several articles to their journal and read his poems at various events, some of which were recorded and released by Euclid Gallery. Deakin was a shy man but gave occasional interviews about his practice, usually at the gallery. These were popular affairs, made famous by the artist's absurd sense of humour and tendency to turn up in outlandish fancy dress. The gallery published several catalogues of his work, invariably related to his one-person shows from the late 1980s..
Research: The Archive of Bernard Taylor
The Archive of Bernard Taylor is published by Tom Lecky's Understory Books. Various characters appear connected to the story: Peter ward, the first editor of Taylor's archive and The Publisher (unnamed) who seems to be a friend of Lecky's. The book contains a set of photographs, purportedly taken by Taylor, along with small texts (apparently quotations), maps and other documents from the archive. The book is an extremely convincing concoction with a fairly detailed back story and the knowing collaboration of critics and reviewers. It took me a while to work out that it was all an elaborate and very entertaining hoax.
I have lived in the suburban village of Hastings-on-Hudson, just a few miles north of New York City, for two decades, but I had no contact with Bernard Taylor until I attended the sale of his personal effects soon after his death. [...] A local estate liquidator neatly laid out his belongings throughout his home near the elementary school. The house itself had an aura of mystery. From the front, it was a drab mid-century ranch, but growing from the back was a large contemporary addition that served as Mr. Taylor’s library and study. It was there that I found six boxes crammed with papers in varying degrees of preservation. Newspaper and magazine clippings, typed or handwritten notes, and pictures filled hundreds of folders. All of the photographs, postcards, and texts included in this book were found in these folders.
-- The editor's preface to The Archive of Bernard Taylor, Understory Press blog
I really admire the confidence of this fiction and the utterly convincing creation of the mysterious Bernard Taylor as a foil for Tom Lecky 's photographs. I would love to attempt something as complex and sophisticated as this kind of publication, perhaps fleshing out the achievements of my own fictional photographer, Paul A. Deakin.