THE SEMESTER IS ENDING

Well, it’s pretty much completely over by now.  I just have one more written final and my crit for photo, which is Wednesday morning.

So.  This semester.  I had some good highs and some pretty uninspired lows.  It started out great for the first half of the semester, but after fall break I just couldn’t get excited about any of the photos I was taking or the prints I produced.  The processes were really great to experiment with though, and I had a great time learning them all.  In the end I got at least a few good prints from each process, but I was so focused on getting the technique down that actually TAKING new photos sort of got lost in the process.  Right now I’m just thinking about all the photographs that have ever been taken and how pretty much everything has been photographed in every way possible, so what am I doing taking more photos that are just going to end up looking like something that’s already been done, probably before I was born.  Or just last week, I don’t know which is worse.   But I think I need to stop worrying about that so much and just start taking new pictures again, otherwise I’ll be stuck in a rut forever.  Overall this semester was a good one, and I enjoyed experimenting with some totally new processes.  I learned a lot about what I do and don’t like about photography, and hopefully next semester I will get a chance to take lots of new photos with a fresh mind.

Atget in the Flesh

Seeing Eugene Atget’s work  at the Eastman House was far different from seeing photographic work in curated exhibits at museums and galleries.  Going down into the archives and seeing the prints unframed and not protected by a layer of glass was much more engaging.  If the 15 or so photos that we got to see (I thought we were going to get to see more than 15 considering how many prints of Atget’s are in the possession of the Eastman House) were instead on exhibit in the museum section of the Eastman House, I probably would not have felt so much like we were looking at the real prints that Atget himself printed and handled nearly a hundred years ago.  When they were so close together that it was clear that some prints had better contrast than others, and some were yellowy and others had a colder tint to them.  It was obvious where he used different papers and different techniques, and the flaws in the prints were  easy to pick out.  Seeing photographs on a computer screen makes them seem far more removed and more perfect, since the flaws are maybe tweaked in Photoshop. Seeing photographs in books gets you closer to the experince of seeing them in person, but being able to see Atget’s work right in front of me was far more gratifying .

For some reason I can’t seem to get this picture to post any larger.  Sorry it’s so small…

This was one of the original prints we got to see.

Final?

Our final project is just a few weeks away, so I’ve been thinking about that a lot lately. The growing stack of failed and successful photos that I have on my desk is really pleasing to pick up and flip through. The prints are all different sizes and different processes and of different subject matters. It’s a messy pile with not much order, but that’s what I really like about it. So I was wondering how could keep this exciting tactile experience a part of my final project and I figured that making a book which forces the viewer to look at only one or two pictures at a time would be very similar. It would be more of a controlled chaos, without the failed photos (unless they are somehow more interesting) but include all the processes we’ve done on varying sizes and kinds of paper (graph paper, colored paper, cardboard, acetate, vellum, watercolor paper, etc). But what would the photos be of? I wanted all sorts of different subjects and moods and I wanted to have a lot of great photos. My best resource for these criteria is my polaroid collection.

Yeah everyone takes them, and they’re a little cliche. But everyone loves them. They’re instant, one-of-a-kind, and vibrantly colored. But if you take all those elements away I still really love the polaroids I’ve taken and I never know how to organize them. I’ve scanned them, posted them on facebook, stuck them on my walls, but still I can’t look at them as much as I’d like. SOO what I’m saying is that I’d like to make this weird book out of my polaroids, and utilize them in a new way rather than letting them sit in a box at home. I’d group them in various ways- according to composition, subject matter, chronology – whatever makes sense and looks good.

What about that idea?

I hate liquid light.

I really do.  It only has worked for me on paper, and  even then its got very low contrast.  On wood, it turns completely black no matter what my exposure time, and on glass is either doesn’t work at all or works but then wipes off as I’m trying to fix it.  Actually the paper prints look interesting because the streaks from the brush marks show up and there’s little bubbles all over the place, but the surface is kind of shiny which sets it apart from other processes.  I don’t think I’m going to be able to successfully print on that glass cube like I had planned, but we’ll see….

On the other hand, I’ve been getting some really good results with kallitype prints.  Nice dark blacks and greys but the whites are really dim, and kind of mottled.  Before I started printing, Margot recommended that I double coat the paper to get better darks, so I did that for most of my prints.  When I tried with only one coat I got clearer whites, but I had to expose it for a little longer.  Worth the wait though.

I wish I had some images to show the comparison, but I certainly don’t have enough energy to scan them right now.

I went home (Western Mass.) over break and kept my eyes peeled for some sweet 3D stuff to use for liquid light printing.  My mum and I went to Goodwill and Salvation Army, and I found a bunch of great stuff.  Most of which was clothes.  But I also bought a shiny white glass orb, a porcelain laughing rabbit, and transparent glass cube that consists of 12 pieces of glass. It’s hollow but you can’t get to the inside – on each of the six faces there’s another hinged piece of glass on top, so you can unhinge all sides but still not get to the middle.  So it’s completely useless. I almost put it back on the shelf, but then I realized it would be great if I could print different images on the glass so you can lift one panel and get a different photo, kind of like those kids books with transparencies that you flip over and get something different….. I’m thinking along the lines of portraits of different people on the under layer of glass, and something that alters them on top.  Or maybe all one person with various altering things….

I also got a giant poster map of Rio de Janiero for $4 and I LOVVVE maps so I was thrilled.   Aside from buying things, I had some delicous food and made some chocolate chip cookies to bring back with me.  Also I scanned in about 40 polarids that I’ve taken since the summer.  Some of my favorite photos I’ve ever taken are polaroids.  Actully ALL of my favorite photos are polaroids.  I’ll try and post some sometime soon.

I did a little research as I was trying to think up an idea for my staged photographs, and I stumbled across Tom Chambers on photoeye.com.  His photos are very striking both in their content and their colors and composition.  In one particular series he stages scenarios with a girl in a prom dress interacting with animals in landscapes from the west.  It wasn’t until I read his “about” section on his website that I realized that these aren’t ACTUALLY staged the way I thought. That is, in the picture of the girl standing on a horse’s back, she’s not in a field with a horse.  They are photomontages of other images that Tom has taken and then assembled into the image that he wants.  I admit that some of the awe that I’d had for the photos dissipated when I discovered this, but that doesn’t make them any less staged or less beautiful. Using this approach allows him to create something otherwise impossible-  I’m fairly sure that sheep are terrified of fire, and wouldn’t ever consider eating from a burning pile of hay.  But who knows, sheep are unbelievably stupid….

I’m considering something a little less complicated than this for my staged photos, but it got my gears thinking a little more….

These are questions I asked Margot while I took pictures of her.  Some questions didn’t spark a whole conversation, but some launched us into lengthier discussions…

WHAT ARE YOUR FREARS AND PHOBIAS?

centipedes, silverfish (not a kind of fish, as I learned), and people touching my cuticles

ANY SECRET HABITS?

picking scabs. i have lots of little scars because of it

WHAT MAKES YOU ANGRY?

being told what my feelings are. also, people hurting other’s feelings

WHAT’S MOST IMPORTANT?

family and friends (she knows it’s cliche, but that doesn’t make it less true) also, learning and education. my goal of the year is not to overachieve and push myself too hard

EMBARRASSING STORY?

i once walked straight into a stop sign.

IF YOU HAD TO CHOOSE A WAY TO DIE?

in my sleep.

FAVORITE FOOD?

favorites are hard. but sushi, chinese and thai are up there.  pizza too.

WHERE WOULD YOU LIVE, IF IT COULD BE ANYWHERE?

sterling, scotland.  hands down.

IF YOU WERE AN ANIMAL, WHAT WOULD YOU CHOOSE TO BE?

a tiger.

Margot Margot Margot

Here is a consolidation of the portraits that I’ve taken of Margot over the past two or three weeks.  I’ve gone through about 7 rolls of film, and came away with about 20 that I really love….

Jouni Haapakoski

"Pekka"

Although Jouni’s cyanotypes are not blue, they are nonetheless cyanotypes with a spectacular look.  I could only find 2 sentences worth of information about him – he is from Finland and is a photographer who started experimenting with cyanotypes a few years ago- but I couldn’t resist posting about him because I’m really drawn in by his photos.  His strong portraits make me want to look for a good long while at each of them , perhaps because they have a sense of rawness that many other portraits don’t.  Despite his subjects definitely know they’re being photographed, they still seem so unmasked, looking directly into the camera as if to challenge it to capture who they are.

"Jonna"

"Heimo"

"Tina"

Tina Maas

Tina Maas is an English photographer working in a variety of alternative processes.  One series, Ophelia, is close-up eerie portraits she made with photo emulsion on wax.

Ann-Louise, Emulsion on wax

Margaux, Emulsion on wax

The cracking and speckling that results makes the faces beautiful but also sickly, like death masks.  The yellowish color of the wax adds a great sense of antiquity to the images.

Another series, Objects, are old objects – an iron, a rusty kettle, an old telephone – that have all been printed on with images of dilapidated buildings. 

Prisons is images of cells and hallways of derelict prisons in the United States and England.  The tintype process results in a wonderful creepy feeling. 

Similarly, Family Album is a series of tintypes of family posed family portraits that would have a completely modern feel if not for the tintype, which makes them all particularly nostalgic.  Tina’s photos are a really successful exploration in alternative processes.