Assignment 5 – message or study?

I’ve been a bit tardy in writing up my thoughts on Simon’s feedback for Assignment 5 – mainly because its been a particularly busy few months but also because it raises some questions which I’ve not fully resolved in my own mind even now as I head for assessment.

The practical stuff first – I’ve corrected a couple of images in terms of horizons and alignment as he suggests and replaced a near duplicate image with one from a different location. I’ve not sought images of the same location with stormy seas or skies – that feels like a separate project. On reflection, and following on from my Assignment 3 shoot I think I prefer the comparison images under similar conditions. The final set is shown on the page tab at the top of the blog.

The are, however, two bigger questions that Simon’s comments raise. Am I trying to convey a message or am I simply studying something? And, do I include an artists statement and what should it say?

These images interest me – or more accurately the locations do. When I started I wasn’t sure why – I just knew they did. As I’ve noted in a previous post, I feel they fit with assignment 3 but I certainly can’t fully define the attraction. So the set had no message – it was, if you like, a presentation of my research.This does not feel unreasonable in the context of a single module in a course that lasts about a year. It seems to me perfectly legitimate to regard photography in this manner as a form of research, and IIRC Caruna and Fox make a similar point in one of the course books. The assignments can surely be a launch pad as well as a destination.

However…I think I agree with Simon’s point that some supporting text would be useful – and I’ve spent quite a lot of time pondering that in the interminable car journeys that form a chunk of my life. The result is the supporting text that accompanies the final image set, but it has a caveat. It’s my current best statement of what I feel the images are about but it may be that as I take more of them it changes.

That’s the best landing I can manage at the moment.

Making sense of my portfolio submission and assignments 3 and 5

Not unusually I have been having a bit of a crisis as assessment submission time approaches. This particular version of the landscape course effectively commits you to a course of action early in the proceedings – which can be a bit challenging if you feel you’ve developed in the interim and the work you started with may no longer feel “true” – even if you acknowledge its benefit in moving you towards something that does. A warning – this post is going to be long and rambling because I am trying something unusual for me – putting my thinking down in words.

After a somewhat hare-brained start – spurred on by the general enthusiasm for the Olympics – I rapidly picked up on my interests in perspective and memory that I was starting to develop in People and Place. From early on I picked an interest in perspectives that led me to think about Japanese paintings, and that in turn led me to thinking about seasonal symbolism in classical Japanese art and literature. This seemed a solid starting point – here was something I could use my camera to investigate, and that might form an interesting structure for later assignments. I struggled however, to find a clear path from those classical images to modern photographic practise. Reading around Japanese photography it became clear that there was actually a gap in that path.

While I was reading around Japanese photography trying to find a bridge I also did something I’ve not done properly in my previous course – acquire and digest some of the recommended books. In the process I discovered Sugimoto and Hatakeyama – the first attracted me for his philosophical approach, the second for his measured investigation. Both make extensive use of very similar images taken in series either to make a point or investigate a subject. My course for Assignments 3 and 5 was set.

In parallel however I continued with my explorations of fukei – landscape images with a hint of time passing through – based on symbols from early Japanese literature. And now we come to the crunch – I have three strands of work to present for assessment – in a format that only really admits two (portfolio and four seasonal images from same location) – and preferably one. If there’s something I’ve learned in the last few months its that presenting multiple ideas in a single piece of work is likely to lead to confusion and dilute whatever it is I’m trying to explain or explore.

Seasonal symbolism

I’m undoubtedly quite pleased with some of these shots – it’s still a subject that interests me but it poses a genuine difficulty which I’ve touched on previously. Without the background it looks like a collection of pictures of flowers, leaves and other figurative material without any obvious cohesion. It may have meant something to the mediaeval Japanese courts but for me it’s become more of an academic exercise which helps me better understood the poetry and art, rather than a subject in itself. I did consider producing the images on Japanese paper, but I feel this risks descending into simple pictorialism – which would be OK if that were my intent, but doesn’t feel convincing if it’s a desperate attempt to shout “Japanese”.

Cereal Field

I started this in response to the exercise which required me to shoot from the same location once during each season, but over the year it has developed into more than that. In an interview for SeeSaw magazine Jem Southam describes his working strategy as follows: “Once fixed on a site, I revisit it regularly, and gradually assemble a body of work that is a response to a slow absorption of the site …” He then adds some references to other research and discussions with people at the site which are less relevant to my experience here, but the initial sentence captures quite a lot of what I feel about this group of photos. In an artistic sense this is my field...I’ve watched it change and grow, I’ve recorded it’s development over the course of the year – and in some ways it’s like a clock marking of the passage of the year (and the seasons of course) with its subtle changes and differences. What would be a more fitting way to represent the four seasons in my portfolio?

Four seasons photo

This developed out of my interest in Japanese art, and my discovery of a genre of Japanese paintings which show  all four seasons in a single image – sometimes a pair of images across two folding screens. Over the course of the year I have assembled sufficient images from exactly the same location – I recorded the position of my tripod using the joins in my patio slabs - to spread the seasonal changes across a single image which can also be read as a simple allegory of the progress of life. This feels like an ideal way of presenting the “four images from exercise 15” even if it is a somewhat creative iteration of the precise brief.

So far so good – but what of the assignments – do they support this development?

Both assignments consist of series of similar shots which could be considered typologies in the Becher mould – given the similarities of presentation and content. I do not see them in quite that way. As I understand it the Becher typologies are about similarities and often reflect the modernist idea of form following function.

Wave studies

These are very consciously about difference. I was using photography to explore – challenge even – the ideas I picked up from Sugimoto’s work about the constancy of the sea and its link to the past. There are not intended as a typology in the Becher sense, because I would maintain that they demonstrate continuous variability, rather than consistency – and in any case waves have no function, so in one sense the form is of little relevance. In another sense the form is everything, as without the variation in form at the intersection of land and sea these photos would all be identical.

Triple point

I struggled a little for a subject for Assignment 5, but found myself drawn back to the coast.The “triple point” of the title , the visual point where land sea and sky meets represents in some way the limit of man’s environment. Sometimes this limit is totally natural, sometimes it has had structure or function forced on it. Again I would see the series as a study of the differences in form that can be found around the limit.

Where is this going?

I believe I have talked myself in to a position where I can say with some certainty that the work I have produced in the latter half of this course has been focused on difference – differences in wave forms, differences in land forms and differences in nature brought about by time and sometimes the action of man. Interestingly, from this end of the road I think I can understand how I got here. The two series for assignments 3 and 5 seem to fit quite well with the cereal field series – even the 4 seasons image can be seen as an extension which merges the individual differences into a single image.

All this seems to talk to the ideas expressed by Liz Wells among others at the seminar I attended in Newcastle months ago, about landscape as a documentary practise. How I take these ideas forward into the documentary course I have yet to work out.

Assignment 5

Assignment 5 now added to the line up.  Mods to Assignment 3 next on my hit list.

Assignment 5 – The challenge of style

On the face of it this assignment is fairly straightforward – take a dozen photos in the style of the photographer I analysed for Assignment 4. The question I keep coming back to though is, “What is Hatakeyama’s style?” – so I thought I should explore that a little.
Clearly he makes use of the sublime – if that constitutes a style – in his early works, although it is less apparent in his more recent material – often featuring images which hint at the unknown/unknowable – either by dint of the subject size 9as in his quarry, factory and city images), or location (as in his underground images). He also makes use of stylistic devices – for example in Rivers he uses a 2:1 vertical panoramas with a strong horizontal - or shooting through wet glass for Slow Glass, although not so often that it might be considered a “trademark”. In general his work features a relatively limited – and for the most part fairly muted palette – blues, browns, greys – with very little green or yellow. It also appears to be largely taken in relatively flat lighting – frequently suggesting twilight or at least evening.
Much of his work also concentrates on man-made or altered landscapes – cities, quarries, river channels, industrial facilities – often centring on the interaction of the man made items with the environment, although, as noted in my critical essay there is a sense of detachment – perhaps even scientific study - rather than campaigning. Particularly with his quarries, coal heaps and cement factories there is a suggestion that he prefers elevated shooting positions, but this is reversed in Rivers and Underground.
All of this leaves me with plenty to shoot at stylistically, but what about subject matter. I was tempted to try a series on abandoned mining sites in the Lake District, as it interests me just how many of the now “beautiful” valleys incorporate the result of nature acting on what we might now consider an environmental disaster, but my knowledge is not yet at the stage where I could do that convincingly, and in truth I’m not really fit enough for all the hill-walking required to get the elevated positions. But I am working on it. and wondering if I might be able to weave it into Documentary.
Instead I’m returning to the coast to do a series on the interface between earth, sea and sky. The stylistic devices I’ll be using include the 2:1 vertical panorama with strong horizontals and the muted palette.

Newlands Valley

Needed to get out in the fresh air today so went for a walk with Marion into the Newlands Valley. This pair of shots were taken from the spoil heaps outside the main entrance to the old Goldscope copper mine above Low Snab Farm. I’m toying with some ideas about Cumbrian mines for Assignment 5 so took this as a bit of a recce visit as well as a chance to get away from things.

Both shots were taken with my camera phone. I was a bit dismissive of these things when they emerged, but as an always with you tool for non-critical use they seem pretty useful.

Way out west

The weather looked promising, the clouds weren’t completely flat and featureless, and the forecast was not too bad so it seemed like a good opportunity to get out and just take a few photos. So that’s what I did. Obviously I had a few projects in mind – specifically re-photographing a “well known” image and the wide angle and telephoto exercises – but, for today at least I was not on a mission, I was not in search of a meaningful narrative, I was simply pointing my camera at interesting stuff and snapping away, using the exercises to provide a bit of structure.
My target was Wasdale – to re-photograph a couple of images – via Kinniside Common, which you cross using the fell road from Ennerdale Bridge to Calder Bridge. On the way I planned to stop off at the stone circle on Kinniside Common for another re-photograph. Sadly, by the time I got there the weather had changed it’s mind and I was faced with the featureless sky I feared (three cheers for stratus clouds) but I’ve tried not to let that get in the way.
The photos I’m trying to repeat come from a book called Wainwright in the Valleys of Lakeland, which was his last published book before his death, and is illustrated throughout by photos from a photographer called Derry Brabbs. The first image is of the stone circle on Kinniside Common – I don’t propose to include it, or the others here for copyright reasons, but it is included in my written log and my OneNote archive. To make comparison with my version easier however, here’s a quick sketch of the pertinent bits of the composition:

It’s a 2:1 format panorama, with the horizon just below the third – the sky is blue higher up with cumulus clouds above the horizon, and the hills of Ennerdale are just visible on the RHS above a patch of forest. I chose it because I knew of its location and little other reason. It has always struck me as over-emphasising the prettiness of the location, which i drove past nearly every day for 10 years on my way to work. Initially I assumed it was taken from quite close with a reasonable wide-angle lens.  I had trouble repeating the composition once I was at the site until I realised that one of the stones in the circle is hidden in the picture behind the stone on the far right. Once I’d established that, it was relatively simple to align the RHS stone with the notch in the hills behind, and the centre groups the same. To my surprise it was taken from a distance of probably 50 yards away with a 35mm equivalent focal length of about 60mm – so essentially a standard lens. Here’s my version:

As you can see the joys of a completely flat sky have intruded on the drama, and since the original was taken a considerably quantity of sedges have grown between the camera location and the circle itself. The original in the book looks like it is situated in a lawn. I think the sky is the making of the original, but this is not a viewpoint I would have chosen. In general I prefer to be closer in – for me landscape is as much about detail as it is about vista – and my personal take is here:

This puts more emphasis on the circle and is a truer representation of the surroundings. I tried to reduce the quantity of flat sky and a passing extra cloud and a graduated neutral density filter held in front of the lens to darken the sky somewhat have helped in the respect.
Back in the car and moving on – anyone driving this road needs to concentrate to avoid staring at the magnificent views provided across the west Cumbria coastal plain, which gives me the elevated position I needed for the telephoto exercise. The aim here is to produce a wide variety of shots from a single viewpoint – I’ve perhaps cheated a little as my telephoto zooms from 100-400 in 35mm terms, but since that only represents a cropping option I don’t feel too guilty. All these from the same gate:
There were plenty more options available but this gives a flavour. The three shots of Sellafield show what can be achieved in terms of variety by slight changes in composition or focal length. and the close-ups show that a feel for a landscape can be enhanced, perhaps even conveyed, with more intimate shots as well as expansive views. there are two more shots which I fashioned from this viewpoint – extreme distant views of the wind turbines in Morecambe Bay which feel worth a separate mention simply because I particularly like them. They are essentially different treatments of the same shot – in the larger one of the two I suspect I may be invoking elements of the sublime for the effect

         

Anyway – onwards to Wasdale – an old stomping ground but somewhere I’ve not visited for a while. The next image for re-photographing is a picture of the Wasdale Church and yew trees with a backdrop to Great Gable. This is a classic Lakeland view, which is what attracted me to it as a challenge.  A quick sketch and my response as follows:

      

These are, as near as I can make it, identical. This was much less tricky than the stone circle for the simple reason that the field in the foreground is private, and neatly encircled with dry stone walls, so the shooting position is limited to choosing the location along that wall. The focal length is approx 80mm in 35mm terms. One thing that did cause a little consternation is that the image from the book is laterally reversed – it has been printed backwards! I forgot to take another view from this location, although in truth this is probably the obvious shot. By moving around to the right of the church it may be possible to get a similar angle with Yewbarrow behind, but I didn’t try. I do think the sheep in my shot adds something however.

Homeward bound now, and one more stop for a shot of Wasdale screes. I searched for the best part of half an hour for the location for this shot. I had determined it was likely to be a wide angle shot, but I was convinced it was taken from considerably further away than it actually was. In the end I found the appropriate stand of rocks overlooking the bay in the foreground, and hey presto there it was.

      

The focal length was 24mm (equiv) and the original was shot around sunset so that the screes themselves are bathed in a warm glow. I have not attempted to re-photograph them myself from this direction for the simple reason that I think this angle fails to capture them as the book describes them:

“…tremendously impressive, a petrified downfall of debris without life or movement..” and “An arid curtain of stone extends far into the distance from the horrendous cliff and gullies…”

To my mind this is definitely not conveyed by the image in the book. I will have to return to attempt a better take, but the sunset lighting softens  the cliffs and the wide angle lens reduces them to manageable proportions. I do not believe the feeling of the text can be conveyed within a very short distance of this location. For an alternative then, I cannot address the issues raised in the book, so I have simply turned around and taken a shot up the valley. I have laid down for this shot to make use of the near/far properties of the wide angle.

I think the rocks in the foreground provide a helpful visual link to the hills beyond, and I have tried to include enough sky to give an impression of the scale of the scene. And finally – a slightly more humorous take on a very similar scene, using the same technique.

I guess this is unlikely to win any prizes for tourism photography, but it does capture an unavoidable feature of walking in Lakeland valleys.
So far in this course I have resisted resorting to shots of the Lake District, but this trip out has reminded me what I am missing, and also given me the thought that I might use some Lakeland images for the man-made landscape project later in the course and perhaps, in a similar vein since I have R Adams and Hatakeyama on my short list, as a subject for Assignment 5.