Key characteristics/ conventions : Making photographs look like a painting.
Artists associated: Julia Margaret Cameron, Peter Henry Emerson, Vienna camera club, linked ring brotherhood, photo-secession, Sally Mann.
Some Works:
Peter Henry Emerson
Vienna camera club
The Linked Ring
Methods/ techniques/ processes: Using petroleum jelly/ Vaseline type gel to rub on the lens of a camera to make it blurry, and make spaces in the images look like smudged charcoal. Scratching images.
REALISM / STRAIGHT PHOTOGRAPHY
Time period: 1920’s – 1930’s
Key characteristics/ conventions : Reacting against pictorialism, recording things as they are; without any alterations.
Artists associated: Walker Evans, Willy Ronis, Édouard Boubat,
Some Works:
Walker Evans
Édouard Boubat
Willy Ronis
Methods/ techniques/ processes: Social Reform Photography; origins of photojournalism.
Realism is not so much a style, but rather one of its fundamental qualities. From its beginnings in the 1830s and 40s, photographers and viewers of photography marveled at photography’s ability to capture an imprint of nature. Photography’s capacity to depict people, objects and places realistically made it suitable for trying to record and document individual likenesses, scientific discoveries and foreign places – concerns that were of particular interest for 19th-century Europeans.
The time period for pictorialism was the 1880’s – 1920’s. Pictorialism is an approach to photography that emphasizes the beauty of subject matter, tonality, and composition rather than the documentation of reality. I would describe pictorialist photographs to be very dreamy and reminds me of fairy-tales. They focus on the dream world and oppose documentative photographs. They tend to focus on nature, however they do also feature cityscapes. They also tend to have fog or low clouds which gives it a dream like effect.
Reacting to the widespread commercial and domestic uses of photography for recording people, events and places, pictorialist photographers sought to evoke emotional sensations and states of mind. They depicted commonplace scenes in ways that suggested psychological and spiritual meanings.
Key characteristics/ conventions : Modern Photography is distinguished by a departure from the language and constraints of traditional art, such as painting, and this change in attitude was mirrored by changes in practice. Photographers started using the camera as a direct tool rather than manipulating images to conform to traditional notions of artistic beauty; a convention associated most with pictorialism.
Artists associated: Paul Strand, Ansel Adams
Key works:
Methods/ techniques/ processes: social, political and aesthetic potential, experimenting with light, perspective and developing, as well as abstraction.
POST-MODERNISM
Time period: 1970’s – Present; A rise in consumerism.
Key characteristics/ conventions : Mix of different styles, approaches and art movements. The works favor context and refer to different areas outside of the works themselves. The idea matters more than the work of art itself. The growth of consumerism and instant gratification over the last few decades of the 20th century has also had a huge impact on visual art. Consumers now want novelty. They also want entertainment and spectacle. In response, many postmodernist artists, curators and other professionals have taken the opportunity to turn art into an “entertainment product”.
Artists associated: Andreas Gursky, Jeff Wall, William Eggleston, Lee Friedlander, Cindy Sherman.
Key works:
Andreas Gursky
Cindy Sherman
William Eggleston
Methods/ techniques/ processes: incorporating elements of popular culture as the subject of the image, making use of eclecticism (using a range of sources to take inspiration/ideas from), using collaboration (multiple people working together to focus on the collective effort rather than an individuals contributions to an image), emphasizes context and concept in the subjects, rather than the physical objects, makes use of multimedia (using different medium in order to express an idea).
Plan a response: make use of popular culture, use this as the context for the image – make use of a range of sources (e.g take inspiration from post-modernist artists and influences), make use of multimedia (e.g text within the image), all aspects linked together to portray a concept/emphasize the context/background of the subjects in the image, rather than just the appearance/use subjects themselves
Postmodernism can be seen as a reaction against the ideas and values of modernism, as well as a description of the period that followed modernism's dominance in cultural theory and practice in the early and middle decades of the twentieth century. The term is associated with skepticism, irony and philosophical critiques of the concepts of universal truths and objective reality. Postmodern art questions the notion of authenticity and embraces 'hybridity’, blurring the lines between high art and popular culture. Postmodern photographers are particularly interested in the selective, constructed nature of the photograph. Artists like Cindy Sherman, Barbera Kruger, Edgar Degas and Pablo Picasso are well known post modernist artists.
Jeff Wall is a Canadian born, Vancouver based photographer who specializes in back lit tableaux photographs of the city of Vancouver itself. Wall studied at the University of British Colombia and graduated with a masters degree in photography in 1970. In the same year he relocated to London to study for a post graduate degree at the courtyard institute, studying with Manet expert T.J Clark. He then went on to become the Assistant professor at Nova Scotia college of Art and Design from 1974-1975 and he then became the associate professor at Simon Fraser University, British Columbia from 1976-1987 whilst also teaching at The University of British Columbia.
Wall is renowned for his tableaux reconstructions of scenarios he had witnessed himself that were representative of the political environment at the time. His photos are always back lit and in a cinematographic style, Depicting more of a story through this means. Due to his tableaux style, His shoots often consisted of many people such as cast, crew as well as digital post production workers. Almost all of his shoots are centered around suburban Vancouver, world renowned for the relationship between the suburban environment and the rural environment. Many of the suburban areas have mountainous backdrops and are bordered by forests as well as having a substantial amount of urban architecture, which Wall finds to be a great way of providing contrast within an image.
“Pair of interiors” (2018) shows a man and a woman having a communications breakdown.
Image Analysis
The lighting in this image is warm and dull which is diffused throughout the bright-walled room. All the colours within the room are neutrals apart from what the people are wearing; this contrast is showing the difference in interest during this candid conversation. Also, reflected within the images is the photographers decision to stand in the middle to make an emphasis on the split of connection. The overall composition of the image is an uncomfortable feeling of divide and the conflict of interest reflected in the lines and colours that oppose to the human figures.
From
the 1880s and onwards photographers strived for photography to be art by trying
to make pictures that resembled paintings e.g. manipulating images in the
darkroom, scratching and marking their prints to imitate the texture of canvas,
using soft focus, blurred and fuzzy imagery based on allegorical and spiritual
subject matter, including religious scenes.
Pictorialism reacted against mechanization and industrialisation. They abhorred the snapshot and were also dismayed at the increasing industrial exploitation of photography and practices that pandered to a commercial and professional establishment. The Pictorialists championed evocative photographs and individual expression and they constructed their images looking for harmony of matter, mind and spirit; the first was addressed through objective technique and process, the second in a considered application of the principles of composition and design, and the last by the development of a subjective and spiritual motive.
Artists associated
Julia Margaret Cameron (one of the first socially accepted photographers during this period) – Peter Henry Emerson ‘naturalistic photography’ – book he wrote on the romanticism of photography with rural landscapes and figures within landscapes – The Vienna camera club (Austria) – The brotherhood of the linked ring (London) – Photo secession (New York)
Key works
Julia Margaret Cameron was a photographer in the Victorian era. The bulk of Cameron’s photographs fit into two categories – closely framed portraits and illustrative allegories based on religious and literary works. In the allegorical works in particular, her artistic influence was clearly Pre-Raphaelite, with far-away looks and limp poses and soft lighting. Cameron’s photographs were unconventional in their intimacy and their particular visual habit of created blur through both long exposures, where the subject moved and by leaving the lens intentionally out of focus. – Peter Henry Emerson – In 1889 Peter Henry Emerson (1856-1936) expounded his theory of Naturalistic Photography which the Pictorialist used to promote photography as an art rather than science. Their handcrafted prints were in visual opposition to the sharp b/w contrast of the commercial print.
REALISM / STRAIGHT PHOTOGRAPHY
Time period: 1920s
Key characteristics/ conventions
Went back to photography origins, with detail and purpose not recreating paintings. (closely associated with ‘straight photography’) photography grew up with claims of having a special relationship to reality, and its premise, that the camera’s ability to record objectively the actual world as it appears in front of the lens was unquestioned. This supposed veracity of the photographic image has been challenged by critics as the photographer’s subjectivity (how he or she sees the world and chooses to photograph it) and the implosion of digital technology challenges this notion opening up many new possibilities for both interpretation and manipulation. A belief in the trustworthiness of the photograph is also fostered by the news media who rely on photographs to show the truth of what took place.
Modernism was a broad movement of the first half of the 20th century. The movement rejected the dominance of older movements such as Naturalism and was in favour of new experimental ways of producing art.
DADAISM
In Europe during WWI the Dadaists wanted to break down the traditional definitions of art with the aim to merge art with everyday life. They embraced advanced production, developed mix media practices and engaged with social and political issues. Their photomontages was used to challenge the authority of mass cultural representations used in advertising in the press and magazines
Herbert Bayer – Lonesome City Dweller
SURREALISM
Surrealism was founded in Paris in 1924 by Andre Breton and continued Dadaism’ exploration of everything irrational in art. It aimed to create art which had emerged directly from the unconscious without being shaped by reason, morality or aesthetic judgements. The surrealist explored dream imagery and they were an important art movement within Modernism involving anything from paintings, poetry, sculpture and photography.
Salvatore Dali (1904-1989)Maurice Tabard, 1928
LANDSCAPE
The machine age arrived and Modernism had a profound effect on photography. Landscape photographers moved away from “painting effects” and they began to exploit the medium’s ability to render fine detail. Ansel Adam’s landscape photographs came from his fascination with the natural environment. He would photograph at different times and seasons to explore the effects of changing patterns and intensities of light.
Ansel Adams (1902-84)
POSTMODERNISM
Postmodernism explores power and the way economic and social forces exert that power by shaping the identities of individuals and entire cultures. Postmodernists have little or no faith in the unconscious as a source of creativity. Postmodernism has been criticised for its pessimism as it often critiques but fails to provide a positive vision of what it attacks.
Postmodernism was the name given to the shattering of modernism. In photography this was the direct challenge to the ideal of fine art photography. At the end of 1970s artists began to use codes and conventions of commercial photography against itself. It was also a sign of the of the collapsing of an opposition that had tainted men as artists. The arrival of female artists in 1980s Postmodernism had a huge impact on photography. New aspects of the social and private worlds of women made their way into galleries.
Modernsim was a movement in art, literature and architecture that reacted to the intense changes in technology, society and culture at the time. It rejected the dominance of older movements such as Naturalism and was in favour of new experimental ways of producing art.
Paul Strand
Paul Strand was an American photographer who helped establish photography as an art form in the 20th century. His pictorial studies followed by coolly seductive machine photographs helped define early American modernism.
Post-Modernism:
Postmodernism was created through the dismantling of the modernism movement. Modernism was generally based on idealism and a Utopian version of human life and society and a belief in progress, whereas Postmodernism was born of skepticism and suspicion of reason. It challenged the notion that there are universal certainties or truths. Most art which can be included in this movement refers to things outside of the art world such as social and cultural issues, and looks at the importance of context behind a picture. A photographer which can be related to this movement is Cindy Sherman.
Cindy Sherman
Cindy Sherman is an American photographer best known for her socially critical photography and feminist artwork. She uses makeup, costumes and stage scenery to create tableaus of situations to challenge modern concepts, mainly about the roles of women within society. A lot of her work can be considered postmodernism as the context behind her images are just as important as the work itself.
