Criticizing Photography

The reading by Terry Barrett is more or less an overview of the theoretical positions about photography that are found today. The article is broken up into discussions on Realism and Conventionalism, Modernism and Postmodernism, Marxist Theory and Criticism, and Feminist Theory and Criticism. All of these theoretical positions are found mixed throughout photography, some add to other theories and some will always oppose them. This article and these different theories help one understand the purposes behind these different types of photographs and gives insight to their historical connection. My particular favorite was the discussion of Realism and Conventionalism and the discussion of the trustworthiness of a photograph. It made me wonder if with the easy access of photoshop today do people still view photographs as trustworthy. 

Project Artist Statement

Artist Statement

The premise of my current body of work is to seek out the beauty in death. I attempt to photograph these animals in way that humanizes them and portrays them as beautiful rather than grotesque as we normally view road kill. In addition to creating an image that alters our perception on beauty, these road kill images are an attempt to make us focus on something that is often overlooked. These images forces us to look closely at the animals we kill. I hope that when people see these images that they not only see the beauty but also the brutality within that beauty. 

The inspiration for my work came from seeing the body farm images in Sally Mann’s book What Remains. I was fascinated with how she was able to capture something that was so gruesome and depict it in such an elegant way. Her work was bewitching and as much as I wanted to look away I was so enticed that I couldn’t stop looking at them. Her work evoked a lot of thought and emotion and I wanted to capture those similar feelings in my own work. 

Death is a universal topic that has forever fascinated and enticed humans. Our culture today often suppresses discussion and images of death. My images were created with the intent of evoking emotion and thought in regards to death and its beauty.  

Artist Statements

http://www.susanallbert.com/index.php#a=0&at=0&mi=1&pt=0&pi=1&s=0&p=-1

Susan Allbert has an overall artist statement in her info section, she also has small more or else artist statements before different bodies of work.

http://factorprize.org/ViewArtist.asp?pid=6&id=412

I included this one as well just because I love Sally Mann.

Extra Credit Assignment

(1)f/5.6 1/80

(2) f/11 1/200



(3)f/22 1/40
(4) f/5.6

(5) f/11 1/200

(6) f/22 1/40


















(7)1/250 f/5.6

(8)1/60 f/9

















(9)1/15 f/22

(10) 1/15 f/22

Who cares about Books?

The essay, Who Cares About Book? by Darius Himes is focused on photography books. He views books as an important part of history, specially in regards to photography. He says in the essay that we are now entering a new golden age of photo books. With devices such as blurb we skip the editing and publishing process and put the artist in control of the development and make of the book. Books provide a tangible way to share artwork from those across the world and to those who wouldn't initially go to a gallery. A book also allows you to tell a story in a very different context than that of a gallery. I personally found this article very interesting being that it is extremely relevant to the work we are doing at this particular moment in the class. I know when I was looking for books for our previous assignment that there is a connection to a book that there isn't to a computer screen. The question was addressed in the reading but I'm curious what others think of whether photography books will be a thing of the past due to the accessibility of internet or if they will remain an important aspect of the photography world.

Remembering and Forgetting Conceptual Art

"Remembering and Forgetting Conceptual Art" was a panel discussion moderated by Charlotte Cotton contained that participants Sarah Charlesworth, John Divola and Shannon Ebner. The article was focused around the question "What does it mean in this day and age to declare oneself a 'conceptual photographer'"? To me this article was a bit confusing to follow. However, I think the article made some really good points. One aspect of the article that I found particularly interesting was discussion of the art institutions and their interdisciplinary and non-interdisciplinary programs. I also was interested in the discussion of engaging in photography reflecting cameras, or pictures. The article was full of interesting aspects of art being inquiry and how subdivisions and schools categorize it and try to figure and articulate current art/photography.

overkill

IN-CLASS ASSIGNMENT

Build-A-Photo

Influential Contemporary Artists

Sally Mann

Adam Morrigan

Peter Lippmann

Portfolio Project Portfolio: Deteriorate

                Time Erodes Us All

                For my portfolio project I want to center my images around the idea of deterioration. This idea sort of stemmed from looking at Sally Mann’s work Body Farm. When I first saw the images I thought they were grotesque and hard to look at. However, at the same exact moment I had a hard time tearing my eyes away from the photos. I was just so fascinated at how the bodies deteriorated, just like the old fruit that falls from the tree onto the forest floor. Humans, fruit, plants, in the end we are all going to rot, deteriorate and decompose. Thus I decided to photograph that inevitable element deterioration. I intended to keep this project rather broad for two reasons. One of which was because I wanted to show how deterioration eventually affects everything, food, houses, corpses, ect... The other reason I decided to keep it broad is to allow room to discover along the way. Some future photographs I hope to make are of animal corpses (most likely from road kill). I also want to gather food and take pictures of the gradual process of it decomposing. In addition, I plan to visit old abandoned houses that are rotting away and photograph their deterioration. I hope the images reveal a sense of beauty, or even just a fascination into deterioration. I want to explore something that is often thought of gross. I tend to like pictures that showcase a sense texture and hope that I can capture the falling apart texture of deterioration. As Meg Rodoff says “Time erodes us all.”

Response to "A Picture You Already Know"

This article takes three different artists (Amy Adler, Alex Slade, and Penelope Umbrico) and takes an interesting look at repetition as it relates to photographs. Before this article I had never given much thought into the repetition in regards to creating series or work. I've consider repetition as a compositional aspect of photography in regards to composition. Our past project in class had me thinking about repetition in style, specifically in regards to what my personal comfort zones were in order to create new rules that opposed those comforts (indoor photography, color photography, ect...). However I had never thought of how we are brought up in a way in which the repetition of photographs is almost an expected thing, we are taught to make series. I was particularly found of the statement in the reading that said "It's something that you don't encounter as much in other mediums; you're not expected to make series in painting or sculpture in the same way," I think that is a pretty interesting point. After reading this article I'm not sure if I am certain why one photograph can not stand alone but needs to have other things in relation, I think it would be a very interesting discussion topic and I actually look forward to talking about it in class.

Twinkle

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