Divola is a contemporary American photographer, born 1949. He often takes landscape photographs in different areas of community and looking at the edge between the abstract and the specific. Divola doesn’t tend to use people in his images and will make photographs of the landscape that surrounds them instead. I like the idea of this as it shows the environments that are surrounding us that we can often ignore or not notice but when it becomes the subject matter we are able to completely focus in on the environment around us and share that environment with others. I find Divola’s concept interesting as through is images spectators are able to see different communities environments and are able to compare the differences with their own environment. This would also make some interesting documentary photographs as it is showing how we leave within modern day society.
Divola’s website: http://www.divola.com
About Divola: http://www.getty.edu/art/collection/artists/3775/john-divola-american-born-1949/
Something that I noticed in some of Divola’s photographs is that he makes images of the abandoned places within our community, the places that seem to have been forgotten and disregarded. I find this very interesting as it shows the more negative side of our community and how we are humans will just leave things to rot instead of actually trying to resurrect it and help make it better. I think that I will be able to respond these images in different locations around Jersey and think it will be a fun shoot to do as it is something we are all aware of but tend to ignore for no particular reason. I think that Divola’s work is quite unique for documentary photography in that he doesn’t use people to tell the story, the environment speaks for itself. His work is very abstract and to the point. I like that he doesn’t need to use any people to tell his story and that each of his images work as stand alone ones. They can come across as quite hard hitting with the state of the place he is in looks. Each images looks as if people have come in and destructively ruined this environment which shows the kind of people that are living within that community.
This particular image really interests me as it looks like a beach house with a beautiful view of the ocean and the sunset. I find that this image is beautifully lit as well as looking brutally destroyed. I enjoy looking at this image because of the background sunset. This photograph stood out to me initially because of the sunset but then I looked closer and saw all of the windows have been smashed with glass covering the floor and an old-fashioned suitcase sits open on the ground. This makes me intrigued as I wonder what went on in this environment and who could have possibly done this. One theory I have is that it was the ocean that thrashed against the glass breaking it as the glass is on the inside of the house. Another theory is that people came in and decided to wreck the place. I wonder why there is a suitcase there and that maybe someone living there just left it behind. There is so much going on in this image allowing the spectator to look around as if they are in the room and looking at the environment surrounding them. This image is part of the series called ‘Three Acts’. They are unique to any other documentary photos I’ve seen before and stand out to me as they the photos are not ones spectators would usually expect to see. This image is taken from the series photographed in a condemned neighbourhood bought by an airport to serve as a noise buffer for new runways. The buildings are all destroyed and Divola decided to make images as evidence of violent entries by vandals by shattering windows as well as doors torn from their hinges. After watching some videos of Divola I discovered that he was the one actually vandalising these houses and adding colour by using graffiti which is becoming a popular art nowadays.
“Once seen, the work of John Divola is not easily forgotten.” – David Campany
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rVHw8S_2Xqc
After watching the video above I had a closer look at Divola’s photographic art work and found that a lot of it I could relate to performance photography and the work of Tom Pope and John Baldessari capturing something midair and throwing things around and just capturing it. I also found out that Divola could only shoot those images at certain times of the day so that he could get the right lighting and that he would always revisit the same places and keep on going back to them adding different works of graffiti each time as well as noticing other vandals workings. I found this video very useful and interesting to find out more about Divola’s personal opinion and the message he was trying to get across. I enjoy looking at his work and think that if I was to respond to this I would more likely just visit certain places and photograph them every so often and not touch them to make it more authentic and not to vandalise any of these places any further.