Globalisation

The dictionary definition of globalisation is:

1.	the process enabling financial and investment markets tooperate internationally, largely as a result of deregulation andimproved communications
2.	the emergence since the 1980s of a single world marketdominated by multinational companies, leading to a diminishingcapacity for national governments to control their economies
3.	the process by which a company, etc, expands to operateinternationally
Session notes: globalisation can be associated with mulitiplicity & diversity. also uniformity and homogenity. paradox term first used to describe political and economic changes in the 80s gone on to include social and cultural associations Term first derived from Marshal Mcluhan 1970s, globalisation replaced internationalism 1st world countries loaned millions to 3rd world countries structural adjustment loans allowed multinational companies to trade without considering individual states Documenta 11 - production of art. cultural drive of globalisation today Fredrick Jameson - if everywhere is connected how can you be given an individual space, can't conceptualise the given space you live in Andreas Gursky - large scale images distinctive for critical look at effect of capitalism & globalisation people often tiny against huge backgrounds of machines etc Simon Starling - investigated historical processes by which objects and situations are created often focuses on how we transform raw materials into usable objects task: For the task this week I decided to explore the work of the parisian photographer who lives and works in Morocco Yto Bararda, as I've seen a couple of her images before and have found them quite beautiful. Top image: Yto Barrada, Hôtel Ahlen, Tangier (2006), from the ‘Iris Tingitana’ series Bottom image: Yto Barrada, Field of Irises, Tangier, 2007 "In a  documentary vein, colour photographs trace the contest between iris tingitana (Moroccan iris) and encroaching commercial developments outside of the city (‘Iris Tingitana’, 2007)." The work formed part of an exhibition in 2009 called 'face of our time' "Face of Our Time presents the work of four artists aligned for their shared interest in making pictures about the current condition of our world. Yto Barrada looks at the transformations occurring in northern Morocco as the area becomes a tourist destination and the local culture is disrupted." The images work really well as a series, seeing a photograph of the irises next to one showing dug up ground really highlights what is really being lost when these hotel complexes are being built. I really like the square format of the images, the look very beautiful. The photographs are taken in a very factual and objective way. I think this adds a responsibilty to us as viewers as we can form our own opinions of what is happening. I believe most people would see that this is bad and maybe it might cause some one to act upon this and could potentially change something. I think the aim of the project works and results in beautiful images that will raise awareness about something that we might not ordinarily see.

Repetition

Session notes:

aim: to examine how photographic practitioners have used repetition since the 1960s as a mean to examine the structure of visual experience

John Berger - painting and reproduction

virgin on the rocks by Leonardo da Vinci

even on google images all differ slightly, quality/style of reproduction etc

Walter Benjamin says after seeing reproductions 'one can go to the national gallery to see the original and discover what the reproduction lacks, or forget about the quality of reproduction, and when you see the image reminded that it's a famous painting, of which one has seen a reproduction'

original no longer valued for what it uniquely shows

unique simply for what it is.... the original of a series of copies

rarity - confirmed by it's price

Dan Graham, photographer and makes installations

'photo conceptualism movement' project: phot essay

instamatic camera, went and made photographs of the kinds of houses people live in

mechanical limitations

almost deskilling the photograph

(but surely still skill in creating a powerful/good image based mainly on composition)

Ed Ruscha - 26 gas stations

sunset strip, milk etc

repetitive structures

Thomas Demand - relates most to Baudrillard

takes images from mass media, makes large scale models purely to photograph them

Roni Horn - you are the weather

Task:

The task for this week was to consider repetition and create our own series of images.
I decided to photograph some flowers in my room. To standardise the images I photographed the same flowers at 4pm every day. I was going to do it for a week but I did 8 days instead to make an even number, this means it could be made into a grid or displayed in another way.
I purposely didn't use a tripod, I just held the camera in roughly the same place every day. I like this because it creates subtle differences within the images.
I like the photographs as if you look through them quickly you might think they are all exactly the same but then you look closely and see little details such as more leaves have fallen onto the table, the colours of the leaves have also lightened as the week has gone on.
This was an interesting project as it meant I looked closely at how the flowers changed with time, something I wouldn't have noticed as much if I hadn't been photographing them.
This is a project that could be continued for a very long time. It would look interesting to have a vast amount of images as an individual becomes less and less important and noticable and the focus becomes simply the differences between them.
I chose to end it at this point because after this the flowers will start to really die and I didn't want to photograph this because I wouldn't have liked it aesthetically.

Gerhard Richter/ the rhetoric of images

Session notes:

aim:

examine semiotic approaches to image analysis focussing upon key terms such as icon,index,symbol, denotation and connotation

Richard Prince - constructing personas

images involved with image making

Saussaure/Pierce

sign - communicate meaning

signifier - sound/image

signified - concept

arbitrary  - no reason, just is

Barthes - critiqued possibilty image

might convey a non coded message (direct)

system of associations

different elements in an image conspire (work together) to form its meaning

"Barthes suggests that at centre of photographic image, where we expect to find the denoted meaning, there is an absence, which is filled by rhetoric (persuasive speaking/writing) of associations"

depth - levels of meaning

Task:

Gerhard Richter has created numerous pieces of art in many different ways. But my favourites of his are from his 'overpainted photographs' in which he finds photographs and uses oil paints to paint on top of them. I have looked at his work before during sixth form and actually recreated images similar to his by painting on top of my own photographs. (unfortunately I don't have any pictures of this I can upload as they are all at my home in a sketchbook)

betty, 1989, 15x10cm

ohne titel(untitled) 1988, 10x15cm

laret, 1992, 15x10cm

"My concern is never art, but always what art can be used for."Gerhard Richter, 1962


"Photography altered ways of seeing and thinking. Photographs were regarded as true, paintings as artificial. The painted picture was no longer credible; its representation froze into immobility, because it was not authentic but invented." Gerhard Richter, 1964


"Unlike American artists Richter wasn't interested in the purity of art. Idealism had disillusioned him from an early age. Instead he painted images without glory; images that rendered the ridiculous, ordinary; the tragic, ordinary; the beautiful, ordinary. Throughout his career Richter has shrunk from giving a psychological insight into his art, leaving his admirers and critics guessing and at times confused. According to him, his work forms from structures and ideas that surround him, nothing more profound than that." from www.gerhard-richter.com


My favourites of this series are all from the beginning, as I feel the age of the photographs give them a much more vintage and aesthetic look that he loses as he continues the project into the modern day. 
I love the images and even though the photographs are found I don't think this detracts from the art form that they end up being.


I love the image 'laret' at the bottom. I think his subtle addition of blue paint onto the image is magical. I'm not saying in anyway that this is particularly challenging, in fact when I attempted this style with my own images I feel I made some beautiful images that could match his. Also by reading from the quotes I found above, I think it is also fair to say that Richter himself doesn't believe that he is doing anything particularly special or notable, I think he just enjoys what he is doing and the products of this. I feel he is not taking someone else's art (the photograph) and simply presenting it as his own, which is what some practitioners do and a process I detest, Richter actually creates a new piece of art. The original photograph can still be held as art, his images are something new and seperate, where he has made an addition which pushes the photograph even further. This is done with a different medium (paint) and by combining the two I think achieves results the photographer could never have. 


I feel there is also more value behind making new art out of found photographs, rather than someone else's photographs that are widely known and published, as I believe bringing found photographs into the public eye is an art in itself. If this didn't happen these photographs are likely to be lost forever as they are usually discarded, thrown away or being sold very cheaply at car boot sales. Richter is not trying to claim the photographs as his own, but highlighting the beauty of them by adding small detail on top of them. I think he does this very successfully and I love these images. 

Cindy Sherman - voyeurism/ the gaze

Session notes:
aim:
-examine notion of presences in relation to notions of nakedness/nudity
-define gaze, voyeurism, consider inter-relation in photography
-consider how male gaze generates female roles.. how in turn these construct notions of female identity through case study of Cindy Sherman


Larry Clark - kids, bully    films
project young adolescents into very adult roles


John Berger - ways of seeing
mens presence - promise of power he embodies
things
exterior to the man
shows what he can do for you and to you


womens presence - expresses attitude to herself
physical, aura, intrinsic
her body - how she appears to men
defines what can and cannot be done to her


woman has to construct her presence in terms of how she will be seen by men


men can gain this, money, objects etc
being impressive in the eyes of others


traditionally painting and even photography
painter/photographer male
model female
yet man is seen as creative force


principal protagonist of nude painting, the male spectator, is never painted
women look out of the paintings onto their spectator owners


surveyor of woman in herself is male - turns herself into object/vision/ sight


panopticism, internally looks at herself through eyes of a man - constantly


objectification - process of turning/treating someone as an object, object for use


the gaze - power to look upon others


indexicality of camera/photograph - takes you to the moment




Jeff Burton - mix genres of art/fashion/photography


'interaction with our environment which is saturated by images'












































Task:
Cindy Sherman, in her collection of photographs 'untitled film stills', completely changed the idea of a self portrait. She dressed up as women roles in films and photographed herself in these situations. There are 69 images in total.


'the images imply the very construction of identity is built on a representation'
it is her but represented in many ways, of characters in films. She could choose to be any one of the women she depicts yet none of them might be her true self.
Is there anything women posess that is their own about their own identities?


One of my favourites from the series is number two (1977).

I love the old and grainy quality Sherman uses in this set of images. This is because they are made to appear like the cheap '50 cent' publicity photographs that were common at the time. I find this image really interesting especially when considering 'the gaze'. Here the gaze is less straightforward than in normal photography as her face is actually a reflection. She looks into the mirror, back at herself, but it also feels like she could be looking at us, we in turn are looking at her. is complicated as looking at us would be extra-diagetic gaze but it is more than that as she also looks at herself.  She appears vulnerable as we can see her both from the front and from the back and her face looks wistful, almost questioning why we are judging her. 

The face can also be read as simply looking at her own image, the way she touches her skin seems as if she is almost testing something. Either seeing how she looks in that particular pose, possibly in preparation for using it in future. Or just touching her skin, to prove that she is a tangible object. She touches her skin gently, like she is unsure of herself. 

The towel is also an important prop as it does cover her nudity but at the same time highlights that she is naked underneath it. This again shows her vulnerability as it is suggestive to men even though that wouldn't appear to be her intention as we would assume she is just on her own after a bath or shower.  As a woman viewing this image I would assume she is scrutinizing herself in terms of how men see her and as I fully empathize with this feeling. This reaction again acts as a highlight of how stereotypical I believe the role and life of a woman has become. 

This image and the whole series comment on women's perceived roles within films but also society. Sherman attempts to demonstrate that society is socially constructed and contains 'roles' that we are women are projected into. I have read that Sherman actually discontinued the series because she said she ran out of roles to perform. This in itself demonstrates the point she is trying to make about societies view of women. As a woman I'm sure my reading of this image will be different to a males reading of the same image. I am not a feminist so I feel I have quite a balanced reading. 

Documentary photography

Session notes: 
aim - examine how Walter Benjamin contrasts traditional art forms with mechanically reproducible ones
-consider how this facilitates the development of documentary


1. Q:what does walter benjamin consider to be happening to art at the beginning of the 20th century?
A:are is becoming less authentic because it is becoming reproducible
because of new modes of production in how we make images


2. Q:what is the effect upon notions that are traditionally associated with art?
A:disregard terms traditionally associated with art - genius, creativity, mystery
ideas about 'original'
reproductions become negatives 'fake' 'forged'


3. Q:how does he consider that these changes transform the way that we come into contact with art?
A:benjamin says our experience of place is transformed by photography
don't have to go places, places come to you
indexicality
'ways of seeing' by john berger




photography, difficult to determine concept of originality
negative produced many times
someone else can even make a print from your negative, even after you are dead
prints by famous photographers often not printed by them, but photograph still theirs


contrast to one photograph, image taken by one person at one time
exact moment can never be reproduced
even this is difficult though, often collaborations/assistants etc
someone can also photograph a photograph


reproduction detaches the scene from the original.
original becomes not about what it shows but what it is (the original)


benjamin says nature(eyes/medium its accomplished) and historical circumstances determine sensory experience (way we see)


don't just see colours and shapes
see things in a way developed from our environment
see according to meaning, meaning contextually created, so see according to what is around us, what we're used to


aura: presence


transcending status of what it is
e.g statue of zeus, thought to actually embody zeus,
but just stone. becomes more than stone


photograph- light on photosensitive paper
but transcends this and has huge value


benjamin says art no longer about religion , magic, beauty
has become about politics


watching a film, thought process continually changing as you are bombarded with constantly changing images
compared to image, you can stand and look at it, and think about it for as long as you like


documentary photography developed and came into widespread usage at time of 20th century benjamin was writing
understood to depict reality, trusted
e.g. documenting the depression, took images to mass audiences
photography understood as trace of actual event (indexicality)


certain conventions such as leaving in edge of negative used to prove authenticity - brassai etc




-Allan Sekula - fish story, about shipping industry
how documentary could be (status of genre)
reaprailed and reapplied
"placed value against capacity of photographic to bring attention to social injustices, but considered that documentary images should reference, the conventions through which they are produced, social frameworks through which they operate..."


we get an interpretation of an image, based on our environment, opinions, often these come from other images!
examining how we comprehend images


video - Hito Steyerl - wants to make us aware of how documentary forms are construced 


























Task:
One of the pioneers of documentary photography and one of my favourites is Garry Winogrand.

These photos are from his photobook 'animals' (1969). A very lovely and amusing photobook which comments on humans relationships with animals in a lightly mocking way. 

"Garry Winogrand was influenced by Walker Evans and Robert Frank and their respective publications 'American Photographs' and 'The Americans'. Henri Cartier-Bresson was obviously another primal influence although stylistically different." (from masters-of-photography.com) You can definitely see the influences of these practitioners in his work.

What I love about Winogrand's work is his ability to capture these moments in time. The photographs work perfectly because of the exact second they are taken. For example with the image above, the woman is moving her mouth in a similar way to a camel, however the alpaca (I'm not exactly sure what animal that is but I assume it's an alpaca because of how fluffy it is) has a straight and very regal face. Again, with the middle image the rhinos stand whilst the children on the fence remind us a lot of monkeys. 

A contemporary photographer I like the work of is David Ellicson.

The style of work is actually aesthetically very similar to that of Winogrand and also Evans and Frank.


“This photograph of peasants is from the village of Valeni in the Maramures region of northern Romania enroute to a livestock market in a neighboring town. Villagers meet on Thursdays to trade gossip, sell animals and enjoy themselves. I was 25, adventurous and in love with black and white film when I checked out of the modern world and lived with a family in Valeni, farming and photographing and savoring the last vestiges of European folk culture. I met the Nemes family in a field while they were making a haystack at the end of the summer and ended up staying for a year. Romania has since joined the European Union in 2007 and the youth from the villagers now spend most of the year abroad in Italy and Spain working itinerant jobs. The EU has strict agricultural regulations and the future of traditional life in Maramures is uncertain. There are now even plans to create commercial farms”.


What I love about this image is how it could easily be from the same time as Walker Evans and Robert Frank because of its timeless quality. And from reading the paragraph above this is obviously what the artist aimed to achieve, showing a culture of the modern day that is in fact living in the past. His use of film aids this as the old masters of photography all used film as it was all that was available before the onset of digital photography. Ellicson shows the indexicality of photography as he transports us into the path of these farm workers who, in our modern culture, we do not come accross. In the same way the masters transported us to those affected by the depression, and Winogrand shows us humans as we might not see them.