Tableau Photography can be seen as a ‘Visual Fiction’: 

Tableaux ‘vivants‘ have been around for tens of centuries. The recreating of famous scenes and paintings was a popular pastime and in our contemporary world,  the digital age  brings us new stories and narratives that can be created with the revival of the tableau photograph.

A “tableau vivant” is a French phrase meaning “living picture.” Before photography was established, it was a popular pastime to re-create scenes from famous paintings at parties and other social events. Participants would dress up, use props, appropriate backgrounds and poses to re-stage the original image, to almost ridicule or mimic, encouraging more audience interest and participation. This technique saw large radicalisation, as people were going against traditional norms to suppress different emotions within photographs.  A good example of this is included in Goethe’s series “ELECTIVE INFINITIES” where the Count in the story suggests:

“There are many well proportioned people here who are certainly capable of impersonating the movements and postures of paintings. Such tableaux demand a great deal of troublesome arrangements, I know, but they produce an unbelievable effect.”

Since the time photography came about, ‘tableaux vivants’ have remained a popular method to recreate old paintings as photographs and to create new narrative scenes in a tableau style captured as photograph. Early pioneers of the tableau photograph were David Octavius Hill and Robert Adamson who, in the 1840’s, created many staged portraits of famous men of the time. They also staged images of local fish wives, fishermen and working people.

The Revival of Tableau Photography, 1970s 

The 1970s was a time of experimentation in photography, showing a rise in the use of performance art and photography among women. Photography almost acted as a ‘sanctuary’ for women, as their liberation and freedom grew from being able to experience art forms that men originally performed instead. Cindy Sherman is a good example of how women began to express themselves through photographs in the public domain. Cindy Sherman’s “Film Stills” series dating from the late 1970s to early 1980s are all narrative tableau constructions that create archetypal women from B movies: posed, staged and lit to convey meaning and message.

Sherman starred in every image, turning herself into an art form. Sherman still creates tableau scenes that use herself in the image in a managed way to expose a character or tell a story.

Bernard Faucon is another example of the revival of tableau photography, and differently to Sherman, uses mannequins in his tableau photography, giving his work a surrealist edge. The line between fact and fiction becomes increasingly blurred as some of his images used a mixture of real people and mannequins; making the viewer look deeper into the image to discern what is real and what is not. Faucon’s career took off in 1976 with his exhibition “Les Grandes Vacances.”

This work explored themes of childhood, with the children being replaced with mannequins who play with the elements fire, earth, water and sky. Faucon was obsessed with childhood and in 1995 his obsession came to an end as he retired from photography stating, “I had to eventually make true my claim to finish, my obsession with closing. This became The End of the Image.”

Contemporary Tableau Photography: Ryan Schude

Contemporary artists and photographers have used the tableau to create stunning imagery that reflects modern society and has an underlying narrative. The use of theatrical or filmic lighting adds to the effect of the images. Ryan Schude is a great example of how tableau photography as an art form has allowed him to manipulate any situation in a ridiculed way. Schude’s American lifestyle allows him to play in versitile scenes, as America is known for its variation in scenery, as well as its reputation to always commit to its vibrant character. In the words of Aline Smithson of “LENSCRATCH”,  Fine Art  Articles,  she describes Schude as “creating new photographic worlds by combining a mixture of humor, chaos, constructed environments, and ironic fun. Ryan is a photographer who does it all, producing commercial, stock, editorial, and fine art imagery ” . Below are pictures from his series “TABLEAU VIVANTS“. This series surrounds a range of images surrounding the abnormal lives of people in American Lifestyles.

Appropriation – The action of taking something for one’s own use, typically without the owner’s permission.

The idea of appropriation in art, is to use already existing objects and images, and recontextualising them to give them a completely new meaning. It has been a concept used by photographers and artists so that they can give something that has no meaning and give it a meaning by presenting it as art, or giving something that already has a meaning a new one. It allows us to question these pieces, and think to ourselves ‘what is art?’. Are we able to blatantly use someone else’s art, and not change it, but consider it our own?

An example of this is Sherrie Levine’s ‘After Walker Evans’. In 1979, Sherrie Levine rephotographed Walker Evan’s famous picture of a sharecroppers wife and didn’t manipulate or change the image in anyway, and stated that it was her own piece. Talking to Arts Magazine in 1985 she said ”The pictures I make are really ghosts of ghosts,”. With this mindset, we have to try and think of the truth and fiction behind her work. Some people describe it as innovative, as she was able to take a photograph of a photograph and call it her own photo, because in essence it was. Other people such as the estate of Walker Evans, believed it to be copyright infringement, so bought the whole collection to prevent anyone else from doing so.

Developing on Levine’s work, in 2001, photographer Michael Mandiberg set up the websites aftersherrielevine.com and afterwalkerevans.com and made the photographs from each one of the projects available to download in a high resolution format, so that it is possible to print the images out at exhibition standard. This is to develop the argument on how information, art and a number of other things are becoming easier and easier for us to access within this digital age, and making us think about how easily art can now be created. With this idea of a developing digital world, in 2015 Mandiberg created the project ‘Print Wikipedia’, where he  printed out the 7,473 volumes of Wikipedia as it existed on April 7, 2015. Mandiberg says there are two reasons to why he created this project, the first of which was because he had his own personal interest on wanting to know how big it really was. The second reason behind this project was because Mandiberg usually works with found materials, and tries to see what the smallest move he can make that will transform them. So with ‘Print Wikipedia’, it was taking a text form in a database or website, and turning them into books, which Mandiberg felt that the transformation was enough that the meaning of the information became different.

For my project, I’d like to take inspiration from these appropriation artists by using material that is accessible online and incorporating it into the idea of my project. For the project I want to explore the online personas of politicians in Jersey, compared to what they are actually like in real life.

“Most photographers seem to operate with a pane of glass between themselves and their subjects. They just can’t get inside and know the subject.” – W. Eugene Smith

Documentary photography 

I have chosen to do some more research on Eugene Smith because he is one of the most well known documentary photographers. He’s work  links in with the exam theme truth which is an area I am considering exploring  in my project.

Eugene smith is an American photojournalist photographer he is known for his dedication to projects and ethical standards. He developed photo essays into visual forms. His most famous work includes: World War II photographs were he was on the front line documenting the effects of war, the clinic of Dr Schweitzer in French Equatorial Africa and he joined the Magnum photo agency in 1995 where he began his project on the city of Pittsburgh. Smith began his career by taking photographs for local newspapers.

In January 1972 he was attacked by employees from Chisso Company in Japan near Tokyo in an attempt to stop him from publishing photographs of the effect of Minamata disease. Although he survived this attack his vision in one deteriorated which stopped him from working for a period of time. I think this shows a lot about Eugene’s work and how much he is willing to show the world the reality of some situations. Which could upset quite a few people. I think this links in to a quote from the exam book by TS Elliot which says ‘ Humankind can bear only so much reality…’  I think this situation puts the quote into context. This also brings back the ethics and standards of photography which questions where the line of photographing is and what should and shouldn’t be photographed.

Eugene Smith Magum photographs-  http://www.magnumphotos.com/C.aspx?VP3=CMS3&VF=MAGO31_10_VForm&ERID=24KL5347YF

Eugene Smith also produced a famous photo essay about the Country Doctor which is something I looked at for my personal study. From this I found that Eugene photographed the Dr’s  work life and personal life with his wife and children as well as his patients and surroundings therefore he spends a lot of time photographing his subjects and gets to know them well so he is able to produce photographs with an intimate perceptive which gives the viewer more of an incite and allows them to make a connection to them.