CTS Assignment 2 Reflection

Assignment 2 has been about preparing a literature review and dissertation proposal and the hardest part of this has been to decide on the proposed title for my dissertation.

I want to write a dissertation which has some relevance to my Body of Work and while moving from BOW Assignment 2 to BOW Assignment 3, I decided to make a radical change. Until this change was fully resolved, It became difficult to resolve the way forward for the dissertation.

Now I have it.

My BOW subject involves photographing panoramic scenes, relating to the Manchester Ship Canal and its influences, either with or without people.

I have researched Artists who have created similar work or who have used techniques similar to my own proposed techniques and have concluded that my Literature Review will look at two of these artists / photographers, Bill Brandt and Nadav Kander.

As my research has moved on I have become more and more interested in the work of Nadav Kander to the point that I would like my dissertation to feature him in depth and I have entitled my Dissertation “The Long River – A Metaphor for Constant Change”.

The biggest problem I have had so far is the amount of time it has taken to come to this conclusion and so now I need to move on quickly.

It has been worthwhile taking time over this decision and I do not feel that the reading and research I have done (which is no longer relevant) has been wasted. It has certainly been interesting but I have now moved away from dreams, Freud, Surrealism and “The Loneliness of the Soul” which is where I was for the last Assignment.

This work was extremely ambitious and I may pursue some of these ideas at a later date but my heart and soul were not in it and they are in the work I am doing along the Manchester Ship Canal at the moment. It has taken a while to discover this new found interest and I do not want to lose it.

The literature review for this assignment was not particularly exciting but I did get an opportunity to improve my research skills, using Google Scholar, The UCA Library etc. and to improve my writing skills and referencing. These still need some further improvement.

I am looking forward to getting on with the first chapter of the dissertation where the work starts to get more challenging and I am trying very hard to link Contextual Studies with Body of Work.

Featured Image Courtesy of Nadav Kander

CTS Moving Forward to Assignment 2

Since BOW Assignment 2 which falls in line with the work completed for CTS Assignment 1, I have made a radical change to my proposed Body of Work.

Assignment 2 showed composite photographs of people demonstrating “The Loneliness of the Soul” within the landscape, some along the banks of the Manchester Ship Canal. During further visits to the canal, I have become interested in large engineering structures, particularly the bridges, and the juxtaposition within the landscape.

My career was involved with the design of Buildings and Structures on a large scale and so I have always had that fascination.

So for BOW Assignment 3, these photographs will feature, with or without people as the focus.

Whilst researching artists and photographers whose work is within this category, I have become interested in two in particular, Nadav Kander and Bill Brandt, and these two photographers are the subject of the Literature Review section of CTS Assignment 2.

Kander’s project (Yangtze – The Long River) and Brandt’s scenes of the Industrial North inspired me to this decision together with the fact that both are excellent portrait artists and so I can continue my research of facial expression.

My Dissertation Proposal then goes on to detail more work investigating Nadav Kander under the title “The Long River – A Metaphor for Constant Change”.

I then plan to parallel this work with developing my story of The Manchester Ship Canal.

Featured Image courtesy of Bill Brandt

CTS Tutor Feedback for Assignment 1

The first sentence of the feedback for my assignment 1 is pretty damning. it reads “This is not an essay”

The part of the question which I think I have misinterpreted according to my tutor is “Write a 1000 word essay that relates your Body of Work to an aspect of visual culture described in Part 1″.

I have tried to go beyond this brief by bringing in other aspects of visual culture and expanding beyond what has been asked instead of providing a simple essay showing whether my work relates to Modernism, Postmodernism or whatever.

I understand that this has left me with an incomplete piece of academic writing but I believe the activity has been worthwhile.

What I have learned from this is to drill down into much more detail about a smaller (targeted) subject, to explore in great depth and to say what I believe, not what I think the reader and the viewer want to hear or see.

My tutor did not want to see an analysis of my progress to date, he wanted to see an academic essay. Fair comment.

BOW Assignment 2 – Reflection

This piece of work has been more challenging than expected.

Following the review of assignment 1, I was never happy with the conclusion to continue writing stories about the people in my photographs as they were from the initial photoshoot but needed a stronger theme to satisfy my ambitions.

Following a communication with my tutor I was able to sit down and carefully consider my artist’s statement. This is published on a previous blog and allowed me to clear the way forward, identifying the most important concepts I needed to address.

Working from various pieces of research in Contextual Studies, I was still keen on the references to Freud, particularly the influence of dreams on my work. Rather than this being a philosophical study, I was more interested in including ideas from my own dreams to help design my photographs and this I have done, for example wandering the woods and coming up against large manmade structures, a recurring theme.

A recommendation from my Contextual Studies tutor was to read a book by Mark Fisher entitled “The Weird and the Eerie” and also to look at Freud’ “The Uncanny”.

This held my attention for a long time and I have created some pictures which start to describe these concepts. I have also watched a number of films and noted how the weird and the eerie are depicted in cinematography.

I have not arrived yet at a series of photographs which are successful on this theme but I am still working on the idea, possibly for the next stage of this project.

The next influence which struck me was a question and answer session with Nadav Kander, put online by “The Association of Photographers”. Since I have joined as a student member I have found the Association a great help.

The pictures by Kander which I liked were those of lone, isolated people on a wide landscape or seascape background such as the following:

This photograph concentrates on a group of people. Most of his pictures in this style are of a single person and this is what I preferred for my project.

I also admire a number of his portraits so, although I am not producing portraits for this body of work, expression is of paramount importance.

The other strong influence I had for this project was the exhibition of work by Edvard Munch and Tracey Emin entitled “The Loneliness of the Soul”

This picture by Munch demonstrates a powerful facial expression as do some of the portrait photographs of Tracey Emin shown in the exhibition.

Unfortunately I have not been able to visit the exhibition at the Royal Academy owing to the constraints of Covid 19.

It was difficult to replicate these expressions, particularly owing to the lack of access to people (friends and models) so in the main I have used pictures I have made earlier for the people content of my composites.

I started by producing photographs of lone figures in the style of Nadav Kander but slowly adjusted these by coming in closer to see the figure more clearly. This provided the effect I required.

I am not yet happy with the expressions in my final 8 photographs and will continue to try to improve them but for now I must move forward and try to keep on schedule. I have taken an extra three weeks (agreed) to complete this work and must continue to work more closely to a fixed schedule.

I must also continue to work on Contextual Studies and Body of Work simultaneously so that I can draw maximum benefit from the cross feed.

The eight photographs which I have published demonstrate different feelings by individuals who are finding it difficult to cope with the modern day world. Their feelings are not as extreme as in the Munch / Emin series but are more of a social comment on everyday life in the Western world. I think I have been slightly too biased towards women, possibly because I love to photograph beautiful women but I do also address the feelings of the white middle-aged male, children and ethnic minorities.

They have one thing in common which is that they are overpowered by the society that they live in.

My conclusion is that this has been a worthwhile study which, because it has been challenging to the extreme has given me great satisfaction. My quality of work can still be improved and my efficiency of production still has a way to go.

Featured Image – Tracey Emin

BOW Guy Tal Lecture

Gut Tal gave a very informative lecture to the RPS Digital Imaging Group on 26 June 2021. The subject was Creativity and Expression in Photography.

Photography has been considered as a potential art form since the middle of the 19th century (Roger Fenton 1852).

Today the fundamental drivers of this art form are Creativity and Expression.

Guy Tal explains that:

“Adding something of ourselves to our productions is the essence of creativity.”

“Idealising is the essence of expression”

What is Creativity?

“The creative work is a novel work that is accepted as tenable or useful or satisfying by a group in some point in time.” (Morris Stein)

Other terms used are effective, valuable, appropriate, meaningful.

“Creative ideas should be new, useful and non-obvious.” (Dean Keith Simonton)

Other terms used are surprising, unexpected.

We want to strive for creativity because:

“Most of the things that are interesting, important, human are the results of creativity – our language, values, artistic expression, scientific understanding, technology.”

also:

“Creativity is so fascinating that when we are involved in it, we feel that we are living more fully than during the rest of our life.” (Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi)

If your photography is giving you a sense of flow “The best moments usually occur when a person’s body or mind is stretched to its limits in a voluntary effort to accomplish something difficult and worthwhile.”

Technical qualities and aesthetic appeal are not reliable measures of artistic excellence.

Creativity cannot be automated, regulated to algorithms, reduced to stepwise recipes or copied from others. Creativity is based on originality, value / usefulness and non-obviousness.

What is (Self ) Expression?

Expression:

“A mode, means or use of significant representation or symbolism … the quality or fact of being expressive” (Merriam-Webster Dictionary)

Expressive:

“effectively conveying meaning or feeling”

Self-Expression:

“the expression of your thoughts or feelings especially through artistic activities” (Merriam-Webster Dictionary)

Not just aesthetics, not just objective appearances, not just proof that you visited certain places or got lucky to see certain things. Self-expression is about the things you felt. Your subjective inner experiences. It’s about the things you consider not just beautiful or interesting but also personally meaningful.

“IT ISN’T WHAT A PICTURE IS OF, IT IS WHAT IT IS ABOUT” (John Szarkowski)

Experiences

Moods / Emotions / Sensations / Revelations / Discoveries / Learning

These produce an expressive photograph of things but about the above.

What is Art?

Art by formal definition is something created (not something occurring naturally or randomly) by conscious human beings (not by machines, chemistry or computerised algorithms).

Creation is the common denominator.

The process of making an expressive photograph:

Concept/Composition/Capture/Processing/Presentation

The most powerful stages of the process are composition and processing. Concept is slightly less important as is presentation and capture is the least influential.

Composition is the most important.

When thinking about composition, understand the science (eg Gesalt Psychology and Neuroaesthetics).

Cultivate your photographic intuition – practice mindfulness – train yourself to become a divergent thinker – what is your gut feel – take knowledge about art from as many sources as possible – learn the history – consider art in disciplines beyond photography – practice constantly – expect to fail a lot.

What parameters need to be considered when creating a photograph?

Perspective / Framing / Balance the distribution of visual weight to control viewer attention.

Prioritisation: The arrangement of colours and lines is entirely independent of the representation of facts (Ruskin)

Equivalence.

Steiglitz developed the theory of equivalence. The quality that makes photographs subjectively expressive. Quality made photographs powerful.

Steiglitz said “What is of greatest importance is to hold the moment, to record something so completely that those who see it will relive an experience of what has been expressed”

It hovers between the visible and the imagined. (Fenton 1896)

“I perceive the world around me as an experience of emotional and spiritual substance. I record this with my camera. I present the photograph as an equivalent of my response to this world which I wish to share with the spectator.’ (Albert Steiglitz)

‘But only if it means something to him.’ I hope it will mean something to him, but not necessarily just what it means to me.’ (Ansel Adams)

Guy Tal confirms that our work needs to be personal but by making it so we run the risk of people not understanding it. This is a risk we must take. Drive by your own passion and you will receive instant reward.

Visual Metaphors

The meaning of your photo will be very different to the factual elements. Trees may be moody for example. The photograph that demonstrates these metaphors is because of the way it has been structured by you, the artist.

Photographs of a certain subject will be about what the photographer / artist perceives in the creation of his picture (showing his mood etc.)

Photography is not just one thing

“To compete with the painter is not really our destiny; we are on the way to speaking our very own language. With it we will have to create our own literature. You will have to decide for yourself what kind of works you want to create. Reports of facts, essays, poems – do you want to speak or to sing?”

“Disinterested in scientific objectivity, I want to transform reality with a poetic conception by relating the unrelated into vision – forcing the viewer to feel what I felt as well as to think what I thought.” (Ernst Haas)

Guy Tal Conclusion

Expressive photographs convey meaning or feeling. They are subjective / created / metaphorical

Self-Expressive photographs show expressed or experienced meaning.

My Reflection

The idea that creative ideas should be new, useful and non-obvious is interesting. I would not have thought of creativity as useful in terms of art although in other media I can see the point.

Expression is put on the same level of importance as creativity and it is expression and self-expression which help in constructing the image particularly at the composition and processing stages of the image development.

Equivalence is a difficult concept to grasp and I’m not sure I have grasped it fully. I think it means that when creating a photograph, try to squeeze as much of the feelings of the current situation into the photograph to give the viewer some essence of your personal experience.

Visual metaphors are also crucial to the photographic artist. There is no point in photographing a tree in order to identify its species unless that is your sole purpose. For your work to be regarded as art you must give the tree a more significant purpose.

During the question and answer session, two books were mentioned which I have managed to purchase.

‘Art and Visual Perception’ by Rudolf Arnheim is a very good theory behind Gesalt Psychology and gives some useful tips on what to expect of the viewer which could influence the way the photograph is constructed.

”More than a Rock’ by Guy Tal is a series of essays on Art, Creativity, Photography, Nature and Life. His philosophy is that making the art is somehow more rewarding that the art itself.

From my own perspective, I am starting to understand that I can only produce good photography if I am fully engaged / possessed by the subject matter.

Credit for featured Image – Guy Tal

BOW Wilmslow in Lockdown

My Artist’s statement described in the previous blog was partly inspired by a project which I completed in April 2020. It was the ideal opportunity to photograph Wilmslow town centre completely void of people and traffic.

I then placed a single woman caricature on the streets in a different location on six individual pictures.

Description of Photos

The character reminds me of a fairly typical local young woman out shopping despite the obvious closure of the entire town. She was photographed by me earlier in the year and, using photoshop I have created a totally symmetrical person to try to describe the exact feeling that I had when I saw her in a dream a few nights before. The pictures have then had their colours inverted which gives the dreamlike quality that I remember. She does not need anybody else around her and has total confidence in what she is doing. She has bothered to dress up, unlike the millions of people in jeans, tee-shirts and walking boots who were all over the countryside at that time. She is true to her identity.

Now that lockdown is over, I still see this person in my mind while I am walking the busy streets. It gives me a chilly feeling.

Forward Plan

My forward plan for Assignment 2 is to study people, probably in isolation and, as the Artist’s Statement explains, to look at the loneliness of the soul. I will consider in detail their interests, concerns, qualities, context, motivations and probably other criteria, but will not attempt to shock or upset the viewer. These pictures may be self explanatory but could more likely require a description, sometimes detailed. I do not know yet how that will evolve.

BOW Assignment 2 – Artist’s Statement

Colin Caygill Artist’s Statement

An exploration of “The Loneliness of the Soul” will be at the centre of this body of work.

I will be studying the complexities of the human condition, in particular, feelings and emotions.

Making straight photographs as well as those constructed in post-production will involve capturing mood by observation and by working with colour, light and darkness.

People are essential in my means of expression.

I am creating Surrealist photographs, enabling me to challenge convention in whatever form it takes.

My manipulation of the human body is key to showing the emotions I am representing. Wide background landscapes and exaggerated perspective play an important part in my work.

My subjects are often placed out of context. I am looking for layers of meaning.

I will consider Surrealism in the context of Post-Modernism (fine art in relation to commercial applications) and Post-Structuralism (investigating around the object).

The interpretation of dreams (Sigmund Freud), looking at how the dream can influence my ideas, will form part of my research.

The works of artists Tracey Emin and Edvard Munch describe best my perception of people’s feelings in terms of anxiety and discomfort. My work will express these feelings in a gentler manner to show that we all have anxiety and discomfort without laying claim to such extremes.

I will investigate the work of artists Pablo Picasso, Rene Magritte and Dorothea Tanning and photographers Man Ray and Brassai who all have examples of the work I admire.

My work reflects the way I perceive the world through my eyes. A collaboration of feelings throughout life.

Credit for featured image: Edvard Munch – Melancholy

BOW Memory

Looking at quotations given me by my tutor in feedback for BOW Assignment 1.

What is Memory?

Is memory as Aldous Huxley wrote, a ‘deck of snapshots shuffled and dealt by a lunatic’ (Huxley 1936, p.23)? Or can memory be analysed, defined and appreciated as a valid and essential component of our lives and our history?

‘Memory is not what we personally experience, refine and retain (our core), but also what we inherit from preceding generations, and pass on to the next.’ (Butler p.13)

‘Retrieval is one of the most vulnerable points in human memory, with biased situations leading to failure to recall… which in turn is subject to distortion when we try to interpret our complete memory.’ (Baddeley p.57)

“We have access to the past only via the categories and schemata of our own culture.” (Burke p.99)

“Collective memory simplifies, sees events from a single, committed perspective, is impatient with ambiguities of any kind; reduces events to mythic archetypes.” (Novik 1999: 4)

Memory as visual

“A memory attached to a strong and vivid image is usually more persistent and more likely to be recalled.” (Benton p 11)

“Visual memory is primary. One selects from an event according to various hierarchies of the senses (the visual is usually the primary), in which our values also play a role.” (Butler p 14)

“Oceanic feelings – Freud’s term for the effect of an encounter with the numinous and the ineffable – might help to account for the revelatory power of a particular image and of those strong emotions which well up seemingly from nowhere.” (Samuel p 374)

“Barthes calls ‘punctum’ the power to astonish, amaze and disconcert.” (Samuel p 376)

“Practitioners of so-called ‘art of memory’, from classical antiquity to the Renaissance, emphasised the value of associating whatever one wanted to remember with striking images.” (Burke P 101)

Comment

Starting from here, these quotations give a good introduction to some of the work I will have to do in the future to consolidate my understanding of fantasy and reality, particularly in relation to Freud’s introductory lecture on the ‘symbolism of dreams’ and ‘the dream work’ and how the memory of these experiences can be interpreted into future stories/photographs for my own very personal work.

This research is currently being carried out within contextual studies and then feeds into my current body of work exercises.

BOW Assignment 1 Feedback

Action Points

Tutor

In Etienne-Jules Marey: a passion for the trace by Francois Dagonet, p 148

Quotation

“What the Futurists were looking for in chronophotograms: [were] the language and tools of kineticism: the rejection of Still photography and inert representation, with the false realism of its motionless details. F. T. Marinetti’s [Futurism] manifesto did not appear until 1909 (Marey died in 1904, but Giulio Bragaglia was familiar with and inspired by Marey’s graphic images. His “trajectories” (chronodynamisms) in turn influenced Giacomo Balla, who drew birds in flight and other chronopaintings. These hastened the arrival of the futurist movement (Luigi Russolo, Umberto Boccioni and others). The filiations and collisions seem undeniable: I have borrowed these details from historians of futurism to show the true position of Mareyism within the revolution in the plastic arts, which it partly provoked. I am not offering an interpretation, but pointing out the fact.

P 149
Marey made it possible for the avant-garde to become receptive to new values: instead of escape into the past, the unreal or the dream, there was the double cult of machines and their propulsion (high-speed vehicles, planes, jumps, races). Icarus was replaced by propellers and monoplanes, simple movement by locomotives and even bicycles — it was the regno meccanico. One could hear the beating and hum of Marey’s motors as well as his hearts. This was the double idolatry of powerful machines and their speed – the simultaneous overtaking of space and time!”

Tutor

I think these (and see also examples below) are representations of dynamism, movement and emotion that lend themselves to the context of what you are showing. What I see as an interweaving of surreal, representational (i.e. not figurative) and abstract work. Images based on imagination and the sense of representing what you feel, rather than what you see.

CTS Critical Reflection of work completed so far within Part 1 – Visual Culture

This first stage of the work has been most rewarding and extremely challenging. It has taken a lot of time and effort to get to understand the fundamentals of the different art movements, particularly Modernism and Postmodernism.

As an engineer becoming an artist, some of the language is difficult for me to follow, even concepts such as pluralism are quite difficult to get to grips with.

When reading Roland Barthes’ “The Rhetoric of the Image”, I took a note of all the words which I did not understand and after about three pages came to a total of 38. At this point I lost control. I pursued this research for as far as necessary, only to discover that his concepts really are quite straightforward. it is a shame that he could not explain these more concisely.

However, the next text I read, written by Richard Howells and Joaquim Negreiros gave me hope as it was clearly and concisely described. I have bought their book “Visual Culture” and find the book so good that I have come across another dilemma which is how to separate relevant research from interesting research. The whole of this book is interesting but I am learning to focus and to spend my precious research time wisely.

I am finding it difficult to put my work into a category as the work often crosses the barrier between the various art movements. I can only assume that this is common and that most, if not all students have the same dilemma. My work cannot be modified simply so that it can be clearly categorised. It must stand alone.

I have taken a while to synchronise my workload between Body of Work and Contextual Studies and for the first part of this course, I focused on Body of Work in order to achieve the submission date. That left me too little time to achieve the Contextual Studies submission date so I asked for an extra month but during this month I have managed to turn around my thinking to a more coordinated approach.

Body of Work goals have helped me to work on research in a more relevant way and in a timely manner.

While going out on a shoot, I carry a small notebook and write down ideas for future project work but more importantly to think about research which would aid these future projects.

It would be worthwhile for my Contextual Studies Tutor to read my Body of Work assignments so that he can input research ideas. Similarly it would be worthwhile for my Body of Work Tutor to look at my Contextual Studies assignments.

Planning is becoming a very important part of my workload. I don’t have an issue with creating a plan but there is often a need to revise the initial plan on a continuous basis. I need to be more strict with myself in allowing the best available periods of time for the most critical / challenging tasks. I have found that a very early start on some days helps to tackle any particularly difficult pieces of work (for instance reading Roland Barthes).

I have managed to extend my research beyond the course material, particularly with reading Freud, Mark Fisher, David Bate and art books relating to Modernism and Postmodernism such as Thames & Hudson, “Modern Art” and Gaiger & Wood, “Art of the Twentieth Century”.

I am continuing to read Michael Fried’s “Why Photography Matters as Art as Never Before” which I started reading while researching for Body of Work, Assignment 1.

I have also watched some of the films recommended in Mark Fisher’s book and listened to appropriate music.

I believe my critique is reaching a new academic level and this is starting to show in Assignment 1.

I have followed some of the ideas recommended by my tutor during our initial discussion but I am quite capable of making my own judgements and finding research material which is relevant to my Body of Work.

Keeping up with the latest technological developments is sometimes frustrating but always enjoyable. I have only just gone on to Word 365 and I am starting to see the benefits of sharing, cloud storage etc.

Photoshop methodology continues to take up quite a lot of time but it is important to find the right balance to achieve technical learning and to deliver a quality product in terms of a photograph or selection of photographs. I am very glad that I understand Lightroom for both picture storage and quick editing facilities, once again with the aim of presenting a quality product.

I am looking forward to the next stage of this course so that I can continue to improve my academic approach to writing. I am finding the two monthly zoom meetings with Ariadne Xenou, Level 3 Theory, extremely encouraging. It is a great opportunity to get together with some of the other level 3 photography students to share views, concerns etc.