This week we will be looking more closely at the concept of altered landscapes.
You will be developing a set, sequence or group of final images to print and display
You can choose from natural, romanticised, urban and altered landscapes for your final outcomes
You may choose to employ a range of creative techniques (digital and traditional) to create your environments…
Photographing changed, changing or altered landscapes
Creating altered landscapes by combining a range of images in Adobe Photoshop
Explore panoramic landscapes
Using cut-n-paste techniques and printed matter (from photos, magazines, print-outs, newspapers etc)
You may already have a range of suitable images to start your designs…but will need to conduct a range of photo-shoots to ensure that you have enough high quality images to work from:
Here are some examples to help inspire your ideas…
Tanja Deman
“Tiny Planets”
David Hockney inspired “joiner” photographs
3-d / dioramas
Dafna Talmor’s Constructed Landscapes
Felicity Hammond
“Joiners”
Beomsik Won
Surrealist approaches
Jesse Treece
Sammy Slabink
Geo-political observations and comments
Krista Svalbonas
Paint directly onto photographs, as in these works by Gerhard Richter:
Gerhard Richter has painted over 500 of his own photographs (with many more works discarded): commercially printed images that are overpainted with spontaneous gestural smears, using leftover oil paint applied with palette knives, squeegees or doctors’ blades. In the examples above, the thick painted lines divide the composition and inject colour into what is otherwise a rather drab interior scene. The paint disturbs the viewer – shatters the illusion that we are quietly observing a scene – pulling our attention to the tactile surface and smear of texture in front of our eyes.
Combine paint and photographs digitally, like Fabienne Rivory‘s LaBokoff project:
This project by Fabienne Rivory explores interactions between imagination and reality. Selecting photographs that represent a memory, Fabienne digitally overlays a gouache or ink painting, introducing an intense vibrant colour to the work. Students might like to experiment with this idea by creating a photocopy of a work and applying ink or watercolours directly (watery mediums will not ‘adhere’ to an ordinary photography surface).
Overlay multiple photos from slightly different angles, like these experimental photographs by Stephanie Jung:
Stephanie Jung creates stunning urban landscapes, overlaying near-identical city scenes that have been taken from slightly different angles, at different transparencies and colour intensities. The repeated forms (buildings / vehicles / street signs) suggest echoed memories, vibrations of life; the ebb and flow of time.
Cut out shapes and insert coloured paper, as in these photographs by Micah Danges:
These landscape photographs by contemporary photographer Micah Danges have separate photographic layers and incorporate stylised abstract elements. The simple strategy of cutting pieces out of a photograph and adding layers of different paper can be a great technique for high school photography students.
Make an photography collage using masking tape, like Iosif Kiraly:
Whereas the previous photomontage montages involve precise trimming and arrangement of forms, this collage has an informal aesthetic, with visible pieces of masking tape holding it together. This can be a great method for shifting and moving pieces until the work is well balanced and cohesive. Iosif Kiraly’s work explores the relationship between perception, time and memory.
Photograph a single scene over time and join the pieces in sequence, like these composite photographs by Fong Qi Wei:
These photographs are from Fong Qi Wei’s ‘Time is a Dimension’ series, and show digital slices of photographs taken over several hours at one location. The shots above show a seaside in sunrise, with the images organised together in a way that shows the changing light conditions.
Inset scenes within other scenes, as in these photographs by Richard Koenig:
Richard Koenig hangs a print and rephotographs this in its new location, creating intriguing illusions of space within space. Perspective lines within the two images are aligned to create optical confusion, so the viewer is disconcerted and unsure about the separation of the two spaces. His work often features intimate, private moments inset within generic, impersonal, public environment.
Take close-up, tightly cropped scenes, creating abstract photography from surfaces and pattern, like these works by Frank Hallam Day:
Frank Hallam Day carefully selects pieces of hulls from wrecked ships in West African harbours. Peeling paint, eroding metal and horizontal water lines take on the linear and textural qualities of an abstract painting: a commentary about the influence of time upon humanity’s technical achievement.
Experiment with slow shutter speeds at night, blurring lights, as in the abstract ‘Sightseeing Tunnel’ series by Jakob Wagner:
Photographer Jakob Wagner took a five minute tunnel ride in an automated car through a tunnel in China, creating vibrant, abstracted, long exposure, night photography that conveys the motion and changing light conditions along the journey.
Essential Blog Posts This Week…
Research Altered Landscapes…
Develop a Case Study about a chosen photographer (plus analysis of a key image)…show how this has inspired your final ideas and process
Your images, process, editing, selection, final outcomes and evaluation
