In this image Kelly makes use of the diagonal shadow which covers a large section of the middle of the image. The image can almost be split into three sections, the far left hand side consists of the wall to the barn, the metal framing creates straight lines which shoot up from the bottom to the top of the image.
The middle section is cast into complete darkness by the shadow. The darkness is contrasted by a white triangle on the right hand side. Kelly's use of strong geometric shapes is very noticeable within this image allowing his photography to be an extension of his paint based work. |
This Herzog image is bright and almost entirely green, with a yellow and red poster just to the right of centre. The man present within the image is almost completely enveloped in a deep black shadow.
A distinct feature of the shadowy man is his defined hat which points out covering up part of the green wall. The shadow creates a mysterious effect and begs the question of who the man is. Herzog is able to create a clear contrast in his work between the bright vibrancy of the colours and the depth and meanings of the captured shadows |
My response to the works of Fred Herzog comes in the form of an old 35mm image of mine that was used in my "City Smoke" photo book project. Upon rediscovering the image I realised the large clusters of shadows within the image are reminiscent of some of those seen in Herzog's photography.
The bright, vibrant colours are contrasted by the shadows that creep around the left hand side of the image. Unlike the shadows seen within my response to Kelly, there are less geometric shadows. The focus within the image is not on the form of the shadows as much as the colour and vibrancy that is paired with said shadows. My only issue with the image is the lack of people within the shot, if there would of been a person hidden within a shadow the image would of been very similar to one taken by Herzog. |
Laszlo Moholy Nagy was a Hungarian artist and professor.at the Bauhaus school. Within his photography and photograms, shadows are frequently seen within his work allowing him to create complex patterns.
The image of the two broken children's toys are a good example of Moholy Nagy's work with shadows. The defined lines provide an interesting composition, without the lines the image would just be of two dolls on the floor. The diagonal lines appear to cut straight through the dolls,. These lines are layered with the shadow of a second mesh fence.The second shadow is a lighter tone. The multiple shadows that layer over each other create an interesting rough texture across the floor. I find this image very interesting due to the surreal nature of the dolls and the spacing of the shadows. The tones of grey vary between the different shadows creating an interesting palette of shades. |
Federico Clavarino's "The Castle" photo book uses a series of images, taken all across Europe to trace ideas from people in a post World War Two world. The book is split into 4 separate chapters in which Clavarino explore different relevant time periods for the continent.
The book opens with a set of film photography and ends with double exposures that follow a man through the streets of Warsaw, which Clavarino in the end of the book employs a gesture of empathy towards the subjects. The black and white images seen within the book convey lots of different emotions. Those in which the subject is a person feel intimate and meaningful. The portraits don't appear to be conventional, in more than one instance the faces are out of the frame. |
MY RESPONSE
I created a diptych response to Clavarino's photography from his "The Castle" photobook. I was inspired by the page within the book in which the artist used his roll of film as the primary subject of the page, I went through my own archive of film images and found a similar image. The second image I felt was similar in style to the imagery seen through the chapters of the book. The fancy style light hanging from the ceiling paired with the raw piece of film is similar to many of the pairings within "The Castle". I was fairly happy with this outcome, I feel as if I was effectively able to create a response to the photo book. |
In 1968 a group of Japanese photographers Yutaka Takanashi, Takuma Nakahira, critic Koji Taki and writer Takahiko Okada published a series of experimental photography books called 'PROVOKE'. The aim of the books is to use the images to express the emotions that couldn't be captured by words that would of been felt throughout the nation of Japan at the time.
The images are rough and often out of focus, despite this the images don't appear off as badly taken, in fact the opposite. By looking at certain images from the books you can really grasp emotions like anxieties and sadness, this was the intention of the groups photographers. The distortion and rebellion of the photographs really set the images apart from the other glossy images being taken at the time, the title of the series of books implies that the images were created in the way specifically to start a new line of dialog about the social issues of the day in a post war Japan. The idea of opening a line of dialog about society passes over into our time, a lot of the emotions conveyed in PROVOKE are even more applicable in our society today. We are all products of the internet, our generation faces a set of new anxieties revolving around social media and technology. YUTAKA TAKANASHI Takanashi was one of the co-founders of the Provoke magazine. His photography continues within the styles seen within the issues of Provoke, often rough, raw and blurry. Alongside the other members of the provoke group, Takanashi was able to break out with an aesthetic of reportage photography that is able to capture a realistic and fair image of real life. |
The first of my final four is y favourite image out of my collection. In terms of style I feel that it is the image that resembles the provoke movement the best.
Due to the lack of light when the image was taken, and the flash, there are big contrasts in the light and dark tones, this is a feature of many of the Provoke photographs. The tree which sits just right of centre in the frame casts a diagonal shadow which drifts into the bottom left corner. My third image reverts back to the rough and raw Provoke style of street photography.
I took the picture whilst moving along a busy street, this caused the image to be slightly blurry however I feel that this is why the image works well. The content of the image is industrial, I feel that this ties in with many of the themes within the Provoke photo books. |
The second image from my refined collection strays away from some of the typical tropes of the Japanese style of photography, however the shadows cast onto the pavement create an interesting narrative that causes the image to be one of my favourites.
The two shadows that fall onto the sidewalk create a narrative of duality within the image, there are multiple examples within the composition that show pairs most obviously being the double yellow lines on the road. The final image of my collection is a combination of the two styles of street photography that I intended to capture on the 35mm roll of film.
My favourite aspect of this image is the way that the shadow falls onto the shoulder of the woman. Once again there is a large contrast in the light and dark tones, the bottom right corner is almost completely black whist the sky out off the window appears completely white. |
Using the 35mm images I created a short zine as a final response to the Provoke movement. I titled the zine "Lost-1" because I feel that it represents the fundamental concepts of many of the pictures within the book. Using photoshop I started to create a template that would help me build my zine. I split a landscape page down the middle and used a grid to place my images onto the document, by doing this it allows me to fold the book correctly. At the start of the creation process I began to thoughtfully place the images together in an order that was conceptual, after creating three pages I decided to start again and place the images into photoshop randomly with no specific order. To me this allows the zine to embody the ideals of the movement and the rejection of typical techniques of building a zine or photo book. I was fairly happy with the final outcome, the result of randomly selecting the order of images worked very well. I feel that to improve the zine I could of used more images, just to bulk out the number of pages. |
Plato was an ancient Greek philosopher who is generally considered to be the father of modern philosophy. One of his most famous teachings was that of the Forms. Plato stated that everything that we experience within our world is an imperfect version of its true form. His teachings are of a dualist way of thinking, meaning that he believed that there is a separate reality to ours in which everything is found in its truest, purest and most perfect form. Due to the constant changes in our physical world, nothing can be perfect, therefore everything that we experience and understand is a mere recollection of its true form.
A simple example of this is that we understand a cat to be a cat because of our dim recollections of what a Cat really is. Plato explained this by using the analogy of prisoners being trapped inside the cave, he states that the prisoners have been held since they were born, all that they can understand of the world are the shadows that are seen on the walls of the cave. The shadows are a representation of what we see in our physical world (the cave). The analogy is also used by Plato to describe how it feels to be a philosopher. He felt that his attempts to enlighten the public were unfairly rejected because of the ignorance of the average person in society. Bellow is an animated video that explains the meaning of the analogy. |
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George Mayer is an American photographer who created a project in which shadows are used to obscure parts of a female models body. The effect of the shadows is a strong sense of mystery, most of the image is covered in the shadow, the small glimpses of light allow us to see selected parts of the form of the woman. Mayer claimed that there are two intimate characters within the image, one being the woman and the other being the shadow.
Through out the images by Mayer there is a strong harmony between the light and the dark, the segments in which there is light almost feels like we are invading her personal space. |
This specific image from the collection is a. prime example of the harmonies between the light and dark.
The left side of the image is a deep black colour, the pale white hand of the woman crosses over from the right side creating a. deep contrast in colour and tone. The split between the black and white sides of the image is not perfectly in the middle of the image, this non-symmetrical composition conveys the real world relationship between the light and the dark, it is not perfectly balanced but the two states can co-exist. The right hand side of the image with the smooth white background allows us to understand the form of the woman far more than the black side. Although her skin is obscured by the shadows the shape of her arm is very defined, we can see the curves where he wrist connects to her forearm. This side of the image feels far more intimate. Out of my research into the project I want to experiment with the ways that shadows can obscure parts of the body. |
For my final outcome of component 2 I want to continue to explore the ways in which shadows can be interpreted metaphorically. Rather than just taking photos of geometric lines created by shadows I want to create a final outcome that explores different observations about what shadows are and how they are understood from a philosophical stand point.
I want to further experiment with creating shadows with projections and how I can creating meaning through this technique. I want to experiment with different distances between the subject and the light of the projector and how that changes the way the shadow will look on the wall, a concern that I have is that the shadow will be uncontrollably large and will obscure the image on the wall. |
VICTORIAN POST MORTEM PHOTOGRAPHY
During the Victorian era there were multiple outbreaks of fatal illnesses. The effect of this was a rise of death tolls, the pride of the era made the rich want to make their deaths appear fashionable. Bits of hair that had been cut from the dead were placed and worn in lockets and rings. Death masks were created in out of wax. As photography became more popular, families opted to have photos taken of their deceased rather than have paintings. The images are unsettling and surreal, the dead person in the image is identifiable because of their strange positioning. I feel that the surreal nature of the post mortem images can be incorporated into my final piece. I now want to explore and research ways the connections between death and shadows. SUBSTANCE DUALISM |
The idea of substance dualism is a theory that states that two different substances exist, one being the physical and the other being the mental. Substance dualism teaches that the two substances live independently. In simple terms the ontological idea states that our minds are entirely separate from our physical bodies. The mental substance also can be understood as our soul.
The French Philosopher Rene Descartes stated that he could be sure that he had a mind because he could think, but he has no way of knowing if he had a physical body. I feel that this could link in with the idea of shadows well because of the separation between the physical body and the shadow that is created by the obstruction of the light. |
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REFINED COLLECTION |
BLACK AND WHITE TEST |