Jeff Brouws (born 1955) is a self-taught artist and photographer. He took lots of typology photographs of America’s rural, urban and suburban landscapes. He used typology photographs to document the characteristics of the nation. He takes influence from the New Topographic movement and the writings of cultural geographers. He is the author of seven books and his photographs can be found in major private and public collections including the Whitney Museum of Art.
My Favourite Photograph
In this photograph Brouws used the fluorescent lighting from the motel to illuminate his photograph. This created contrast between the bright motel sign and the dark and dramatic background. It appears that a deep depth of field was used as the whole of the photograph is in focus. The photograph is generally quite dark so a low ISO of 100 or 200 will have been used along with a slower shutter speed of around 1/25 to let enough light into the lens.
There is lots of use of colour in this photograph – the bright red in the motel sign catches the attention of the viewer and it contrasts with the dark blue of the clouds. There is a wide tonal range in this image which makes it even more dramatic and interesting to look at. The photograph has lots of texture in the clouds which makes the photograph more realistic along with the 3D effect that the motel sign in front of the clouds brings. The central position of the motel makes it clear that it is the main focus of the photograph and it gives somewhere for the eye to be led to.
This photograph is one example of Brouws typology work. He worked to show the differences in the same style objects. He showed the diversity of structures all over America and the different cultures that could be seen. This helped to open the viewer’s eyes to each others differences and respect each other more.
Bernd Becher (1931-2007) and Hilla Becher (1934 – 2015) were German conceptual artists and photographers that worked as a collaborative duo. They are best known for their typologies of industrial buildings and structures. They are the founders of the ‘Becher School’ and influenced generations of documentary photographers and artists. They have been awarded the Erasmus Prize and the Hasselblad Award.
My Favourite Photograph
In this photograph natural daylight will have been used to capture it. You can tell because of the soft tones and natural contrast within the photograph. The photograph is slightly over-exposed as can be clearly seen in the background so a slightly higher ISO such as 400 or 800 may have been used along with a potential shutter speed of 1/20-1/80. A deep depth of field has been used at the whole of the photograph is in focus.
There is no colour in the image as it is a black and white photograph. This shows that the viewer should be looking at the details of the subject instead of colours. There is a wide tonal range, ranging from the contrasting shadows of the structure to the over-exposed background. There is clear texture in the structures which makes the photograph more realistic to the viewer and gives it a slight 3D effect. There is pattern and repetition in the beams of the structures which makes the photograph more aesthetically pleasing for the viewer.
Bernd and Hilla Becher would document architectural structures all over Germany. They took photos of similar typologies and would make compositions of them all together. This is just one example of the work that they would do. They captured the pleasing aesthetics in the buildings deemed ugly and showed the country that there is more to it if they look closely. The Becher couple documented all sorts of structures and worked to open the countries eyes to what was right in front of them.
Psycho-geography is defined as the study of the specific effects of the geographical environment, consciously organised or not, on the emotions and behaviour of individuals. The creator of the psycho-geography group, Guy Debord, said that the definition has “pleasing vagueness” meaning that the term can be applied to a wide range of situations.
Snow Hill Psycho-Geography
I will be looking at snow hill for my area of interest. Snow hill has some history behind it; in the 17th century it was the eastern limit of St. Helier and was called La Pompe De Haut because of the public pump found there. In the 19th century a theatre was on the site. Between 1873 and 1929 it was the terminus of the Jersey Eastern Railway which ran trains from St Helier to Gorey. The building of the Harbours in the middle of the 19th century used huge quantities of rock for infilling between the outer walls of the harbour and much of this rock was taken from the area now known as Snow Hill car park.
My Archival Image Response
We visited Snow Hill on the 18th January and took archival photographs of the area. There is lots of history behind the area as it has been for used for multiple things such as a railway station and a cable cart station so it was an interesting place to use for comparisons between the new and old. This showed us how much the area has changed and how the past often gets forgotten.
General Photos of the Area
We took some photographs of the area just to show what Snow Hill is like now compared to what it used to be. It is obviously a lot more plain and run-down now as seen in the photographs below.
Due to the urban landscape and the development of humans and man made landscape soon forming the way In which we can travel and the directions in which we are now only capable to go.I want an industrial landscape full of urbanisation,perhpas this would be done thought out the use of combining old fashioned images of the area in which I am in now and the way in which this contrast to the current continuation of modernisation and the contrasting enforcement of time and the evoltuion of buildings.
Due to this I will be taking my shoot in the centre of town accompanied with old black and white image and how it has diversified overtime to become the landscape in which we live today.The images I will be using can be seen here:
I will visit all the locations on king street in order to correctly find and accompany these photos in their official situation to which they were originally taken. I chose black and white photos due to the larger historical impact for the overall image, and also the lines and stutter within the images due to the history of wars in jersey.
This is the beginning of the street in which I will find suiting image and replace them in the new scenario, this will be accomplished by the direct angles and correct placement, it will be easier due to the common areas and the well known areas as a whole.
As well as more urban shots around town I also wanted to show edited comparison of jersey as seen as above, although I wasn’t able too capture many as there was a lot of wind to the print image itself wasn’t able to stay straight without support.
Here I wanted to edit the images In both black and white and also colour to show the Morden comparison and then also present the similarities of the town and present the only diversity of time.
wihtin my images I also wanted to demonstrate the focus within the hand and the black and white image and then the attraction of light and colour and a lack of focus to draw attention to the composition and the matching lines that once would occur down that street.
Psycho-geography is a hybrid of photography and geography that emphasizes playfulness and “drifting” around urban environments. It has links to the Situationist International.
Psychogeography was defined in 1955 by Guy Debord as “the study of the precise laws and specific effects of the geographical environment, consciously organized or not, on the emotions and behavior of individuals.”
Another definition is “a whole toy box full of playful, inventive strategies for exploring cities… just about anything that takes pedestrians off their predictable paths and jolts them into a new awareness of the urban landscape
The originator of what became known as unitary urbanism, psychogeography, and the dérive was Ivan Chtcheglov, in his highly influential 1953 essay “Formulaire pour un urbanisme nouveau” (“Formulary for a New Urbanism”).
The idea of urban wandering relates to the older concept of the flâneur, theorized by Charles Baudelaire…and is similar to STREET PHOTOGRAPHY
PETAPIXEL definition of PsychoGeography CLICK HERE
What will you see on your journey…and how will you respond and adapt to it ???
Koyaanisqati : Drawing its title from the Hopi word meaning “life out of balance,” this renowned documentary reveals how humanity has grown apart from nature. Featuring extensive footage of natural landscapes and elemental forces, the film gives way to many scenes of modern civilization and technology.
Superflux : explore over-surveillance and the prospect of intrusion in our everyday lives…has the concept of psycho-geographies evolved into something dystopian-like and Orwellian (1984- “Big brother”)…governments, town planners and the authorities design how we live, where we live and essentially control popluations of towns and cities.
Marcus Desieno creates de-humanised landscape photography by hacking surveillance camera networks…but avoids privacy problems normally associated with urban and residential areas…
What you need to do…(3-5 blog posts)
Research thenDefine, describe and explain what Psycho-Geography is…
Choose an (urban) area of Jersey that you are interested in exploring
Find the area on google maps and zoom in so that you can make a screen shot to add to your blog post.
Add the “street view” too if you can
Find as much information and images online as you can about the street / area you are exploring and include these in your blog post
Add any archival information that you can too (see below)
Then go to the area and explore on foot…photographing everything you can, and all that appears of interest to you at that time. Photograph up, down and across…creating a film or time-lapse is good too as is drone footage / imagery…
Record the time, date and place of your journey in your blog post
Add any thoughts, feelings or emotions you can about the place your are exploring…and as you develop a connection and familiarity with the place/ people / buildings etc.
Refer to Mishka Henner and Edward Burtynsky (aerial photographs) and The Boyle Family in your blog post…and discuss how they interact with an area and create art / photography inspired directly by the location and its uses / functions.
Analyse and evaluate your process…show your selection, editing and presentation of final images.
What Are Archives?
In the course of daily life, individuals and organizations create and keep information about their personal and business activities. Archivists identify and preserve these documents of lasting value.
These records — and the places they are kept — are called “archives.”Archival records take many forms, including correspondence, diaries, financial and legal documents, photographs, and moving image and sound recordings. All state governments as well as many local governments, schools, businesses, libraries, and historical societies, maintain archives.
Your task
The images above are Archival Images from iconic areas of Jersey…and these areas have changed over time.
Find archival images that correspond to your own landscape photography and contrast and compare. Include any info you can find about the image itself / photographer / time period etc
OR…you may find that you are intrigued by a particular landscape image and want to respond to it and create a comparison / composite image. For this you must conduct a photo-shoot aiming to document the area from a similar viewpoint and edit your images accordingly
OR…you may want to explore the concept of JUXTAPOSING Old and new buildings / parts of Jersey…either by photographing them in situ, or creating a composite image using photoshop
Public archives in Jersey
Jersey Archives: Since 1993 Jersey Archive has collected over 300,000 archival records and it is the island’s national repository holding archival material from public institutions as well as private businesses and individuals. To visit click here
Jersey Archive can offer guidance, information and documents that relate to all aspects of the Island’s History. It also holds the collections of the Channel Islands Family History Society.
Societe Jersiaise: Photographic archive of 80,000 images dating from the mid-1840s to the present day. 35,000 historical images in the Photographic Archive are searchable online here.
Societe Jersiaise also have an extensive library with access to may publications and records relating to the island’s history, identity and geography. Click here
Archisle:The Jersey Contemporary Photography Programme, hosted by the Société Jersiaise aims to promote contemporary photography through an ongoing programme of exhibitions, education and commissions.
The Archisle project connects photographic archives, contemporary practice and experiences of island cultures and geographies through the development of a space for creative discourse between Jersey and international practitioners.
Research and explore how Lewis Bush engages with and photographs the city and its development / over-development.
Click here to check out an interview as he explains how he uses aerial / satellite imagery to home in on secret data stations used in the Cold War and produce abstract imagery influenced by the radio waves of secret information being mysteriously broad-casted.
As cities gradually formed newer building and more industrial sites are formed in order to produce and cope with the necessities that are essential for the growing population,The new trphogrohics tarted to raise attention Joel Sternfeld (born June 30th 1994,)Started his fine art color photographer ,he usually works within large formats of documentary picture from within the united states.He became a highly respected artists throughout his medium for color and his many works in the permanent collection off MOMA within New York City. Sternfeld started teaching at Dartmouth college and teaches photography after he himself learning all about color theory. Sternfeld’s most successful book was American Prospects and explored the irony of human altered landscapes. Sternfeld has many different aspects of exhibitions in order to try and capture and represent people in different manners, furthermore his work was very much influenced by the new trophgorhics,his exhibition was called the American prospects and had many different aspects o human life within nature.
I chose Joel Sternfeld due to his edge of nature but how he looks at the image as if it is a a whole set prepared image.I also liked his color within the image and how it compliments the setting.He has such a wide shot it enables a connection with the whole area of the image and a successful composition.
Mind map
All these images above all successfully convey the theme of presence of people the evolution of society and how nature has a mass significance.He has a clear color variation due to the type of surrounding scenario that the photographer is in.
Best image analysis
This is my favorite image, this is due to the way in which you can see the effect that humans have and a certain type of deterioration to nature you can see the slow development of man made houses falling down and the gradual spread of rubbish mixed within the nature.the composition is interesting in the way of how the tree is closest to the foreground and has a large area of significance. Then you have the petrol station that too is falling down.conceptually he wanted to connote how people use land and then leave and what they leave behind is a constant effect and to the defect of how people abuse nature.
My idea for the shoot
His images have a very strong aspect of planned or at least a strong com-positional aspect,So with my small experimentation of his work i too would want to show these aspects to create a successfully image.I also like his use of color and the way in which it is somewhat removed but also very much present within the large tonal range of colors.Areas In which I could take this work ,All these photos have a strong resemblance to isolation and a removal of presences themselves,due to this I will go to remote areas in which there is a high presence of nature and a lack of city scape of fast moving action.
Stephen Shore (born October 8th 1947) is an American photographer known for his work as a New Topographic and his pioneering use of colour in photography. In 2010, Shore received an Honorary Fellowship from the Royal Photographic Society. Shore took photographs of the introduction of civilisation and industry to nature and showed how man-made structures were taking over from nature.
My Favourite Photograph
It appears that in this photograph, natural lighting from the American deserts were used to capture it. This helped to create a very saturated photograph that is very eye-catching. A deep field of depth appears to have been used as the corners have not been slightly blurred. A shutter speed of around 1/50 – 1/80 appears to have been used as the majority of the photograph is in focus but there is a moving car in the bottom left corner that is blurred so the shutter speed is not quick enough. An ISO of 200 or 400 was most likely used along with this shutter speed to create a light enough and high quality photograph.
There is lots of colour in this photograph which is partly what Stephen Shore was known for. The saturated colours help the viewer to tell what country the photograph is set in. There is not a massively wide tonal range in this photograph – it is quite a light photograph which matches the colours that it consists of. There is no texture in the photograph but from the setting of it, it is very clear that it is in a warm place.
This photograph by Stephen Shore was taken during the start of the industrialisation of America – the signage and colours are unique to the United State and it is a perfect example of a New Topographic’s work. It shows the should-be ugly man-made structure but portrays it as something aesthetically pleasing.
This photograph is showing the man-made structures over-powering the natural land in America and are symbolic for the New Topographic movement taking over from the Romanticists. The bright colours of the man-made structures are contrasting with the nature in the background and show that change is inevitable.
Sugimoto Hiroshi, born on February 23, 1948, is a Japanese photographer and architect. He leads the Tokyo-based architectural firm New Material Research Laboratory.
He came to be known for his strictly black-and-white, highly stylized photography series. These series show views of the sea, extremely long exposed theatres, photos of scientific display cabinets, wax figures or Buddhist sculptures. Hiroshi Sugimoto sometimes works for several years on these work series. In recent years he has occupied himself increasingly with architecture, furniture design, objects and fashion.
“It was my goal to visualize the ancient layer of human memory with the means of photography”
“It is about returning to the past and remembering where we come from and how we came into existence.”
Although this photo may look plain and simple at first glance; there are many technical elements embedded in the image. Firstly, the smooth ripples in the water mean long exposure was used, Hiroshi Sugimoto most likely paired that with a slower shutter speed and bigger exposure to achieve this smooth and serene effect. Since the sky is rather dark, it’s natural to assume that the photo was taken at night – due to this, Sugimoto didn’t have to worry about overexposing the image as it would have been too dark to begin with. If the photo was taken in the dark, there would be no natural light for Sugimoto to work with meaning he had to rely on his camera and settings. Referring to Ansel Adam’s tonal range; the image seems to be missing the darkest black and brightest white but captures most of the tones in between.
Visual
Visually, I find this photo very pleasing and soothing. The lack of colour doesn’t feel like a disadvantage in this image; in fact, the lack of colour contributes to the simplicity and straightforward nature of Hiroshi Sugimoto’s photographs. By looking at the other photos in this set, it is safe to assume that Sugimoto used a black and white effect on this photo like all others. The photo has two parts to it: the sky and the sea, divided only by the line of the horizon that creates a soft contrast between the dark grey sky and lighter waves. Sugimoto purposely arranged the position of the sea like this in countless photographs to play and experiment with the concept of minimalism.
Contextual
The photograph was taken in 1997, during a time where most people had access to coloured photographs- Sugimoto purposely chose to not include colour in this image. Hiroshi Sugimoto studied art in Los Angeles in 1971, at the time of Minimalism and Conceptual Art – this is clearly evident in his work.
Conceptual
To me, the concept behind the image is to challenge the audience’s perspective and views on what makes a successful photograph. The image, at first glance, lacks the most conventional aspects of a successful photograph. The image is incredibly plain due to the lack of subjects but still able to capture the attention of the viewer and provoke an emotional response. The whole set has a similar calm and harmonious atmosphere it radiates, allowing the viewer to feel safe and at peace – which may not be a feeling we expierence much in our chaotic everyday life.
Contact Sheets
Final Edited Image In The Style Of Hiroshi Sugimoto
For this image, I first used the lasso tool to separate the sky and the ocean into two different layers and then I simply used the ‘burn’ tool to darken both the sky and the ocean until I was satisfied with the results. It was an easy process but it allowed me to quickly obtain the results I wanted.
Stephen Shore over the past five decades has conducted repeated interrogation of image making, this ranges from gelatin silver prints made as a teenager to his current forms of art on digital platforms. Stephen shore was born in America 1947, and is most famous for his capturing of mundane, unglamorous images. Shore has worked in many forms of photography, from cheap automatic cameras to large format cameras in the 1970s, where he pioneered the use of color before returning back to black and white in the 1990s and 2000s.
Shore’s first survey in New York was to include his entire career, as through the exhibition allowed a greater understanding of Shore’s work. His photography is very much defined by an interest in daily life, a taste for serial and often systematic approaches with a touch of sly humor. Some examples of his work consist of:
The image I found that stood out from the rest of the images taken was called ‘Ginger Shore’. I found this the most interesting picture due to the composition as seen below:
What I loved about the photo was the clear contrast between the subject in the image and the rest of the pool surrounding her, this was also emphasized through the use of the almost yellow pool side placed within the top left of the picture. This placement allows for the viewer to almost instantly focus on what the photographer wants you to notice, the woman. I found the fact that there was a vintage sense from the image made it particularly interesting, this it due to how everything used seemed ‘old fashioned’ such as the swimsuit ect, combined with the warm colors of the bank and water surrounding the subject that really made certain colors pop out.
The use of depth of field used on the swimming pool railings and the backdrop add effect, this is from how there is a sense of contemporary. We can see this is from how the picture seems to be taken just as the woman has stepped into the water, and stares of into the blurred, but obviously different setting seen in the distance.
Robert Adams (born 1937) is an American photographer who was part of the New Topographic movement in which the photographers focus on the changing landscape of the American West. His work first became noticed in the 1970’s through his book called ‘The New West’ and his participation in the exhibition ‘New Topographics: Photographs of a Man-Altered Landscape’. Adams twice received a Guggenheim Fellowship, a MacArthur Fellowship and won the Deutsche Borse Photography Prize.
My Favourite Photograph
It appears that natural lighting was used to capture this photograph due to the natural tones and contrast in the photograph. This allows the photograph to be captured with the right exposure whilst showing a wide tonal range at the same time. The photograph will have been taken with a deep field of depth as the whole of the photograph is clear and in focus. A shutter speed of 1-20 to 1-100 will have been used in order to capture a clear and dramatic image along with a low ISO of 200-400 to keep the image noise-free.
There is no colour in this photograph which allows you to focus on the subjects in the photograph and the message that Adams is trying to convey in it. It also allows more contrast and an even wider tonal range to be brought out in the photograph. There is some clear texture in the photograph, especially in the trailers and the mountains. This creates a more dramatic photograph and makes it more interesting for the viewer. The photograph has a 3D effect as the trailers are clearly in the foreground and get further away as you move towards the top of the photograph, as if it is merging from urban to natural.
This photograph was taken by Robert Adams in the typical style of a New Topographic. It shows the start of civilization and man-made structures with natural objects appearing towards the back of the photograph. It shows how the New Topographic movement was a reaction to the Romantics.
This photograph appears to be Adams’ way of showing that the New Topographic movement is taking over from the Romantics as the man-made structures are at the foreground and the natural scenery is pushed to the background and is not the focus anymore. It shows how man-made structures take over nature and changes it completely into something that it isn’t.
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This is my favorite image, this is due to the way in which you can see the effect that humans have and a certain type of deterioration to nature you can see the slow development of man made houses falling down and the gradual spread of rubbish mixed within the nature.the composition is interesting in the way of how the tree is closest to the foreground and has a large area of significance. Then you have the petrol station that too is falling down.conceptually he wanted to connote how people use land and then leave and what they leave behind is a constant effect and to the defect of how people abuse nature.
My Favourite Photograph
