Digital Pictorialism
I have moved away from my original path with this assignment. I had originally
intended to create idyllic images and then add an element that didn’t
fit within the concept of a picturesque scene. It was suggested by someone
who looked at my early work that this was perhaps what the pictorialists
might have been doing if they had access to the digital technology we
have today. This led me to thinking that perhaps I was looking at this
task from the wrong perspective. So I decided to continue using pictorial
images taken using a digital camera and “processed” using
digital media but to juxtapose two images to create a meaningful content.
This content, or more precisely, lack of content was one of the fundamental
ideals of pictorialism. They made images from entirely aesthetic values,
creating beautiful images of form by voiding them of content.
As I have been taking digital photographs of a pictorial style for over
a year now, I revisited my collection and tried to find images that could
be used to create diptychs. It was interesting to see how different combinations
of images yielded different meanings. Especially as the images by themselves
have no real meaning and are entirely aesthetic. However by combining
them it prompts the viewer to ask, “Why have they been put together?”
thus constructing the missing content in the mind of the viewer.
I plan to argue that the work I have created is digital and also critical
of the pictorialist movement. The images themselves would not exist if
it were not for digital technology, they were captured through a digital
camera, stored on a digital memory card, downloaded to a computer, colour
corrected, re-touched and composed in Photoshop, then transferred to a
CD and finally printed from another computer. The images would never even
have been captured if it were not for the digital camera, as I take it
everywhere with me which would be much harder to do with a traditional
35mm SLR. I would go as far as to say that digital cameras and digital
technology in general, is definitely going to create many more artistic
images.
Digital imaging frees us from so many barriers that have always been preventative
within photographic practice; we no longer have to pay for our images
– after the initial cost of the camera, computer and memory cards
it’s free however much you use it, we also don’t have to worry
about other people seeing personal images – as our computers are
our own darkrooms we have completely removed societal censorship from
photography, nor do we have to wait for our images – again as we
process our own images we get instant gratification from the them. What
this freedom will yield remains to be seen but I am certain that we are
only just seeing the beginnings of what will be a monumental change in
photography.
In my work I have tried to use images that juxtapose binary opposites
but still show a logical connection. For example in “Connected”
I have used the iconic image of a London phone box within it’s urban
environment and next to it there is an image of telegraph poles stretching
away into the distance within a rural environment. This piece works on
many levels; I think that the first immediate reading is supposed to make
the audience question the way we have intruded on nature by placing these
poles in an environment in which they do not belong. There is also an
element of irony in the way that nature has encroached on my image of
the urban environment, as the branches of the trees are arcing down and
pointing toward the phone box. Another reading, which is perhaps based
on my personal viewpoint being somewhat of a technophile with a humanist
leaning, is to remind the viewer that these two distant locations are
actually, physically, connected. This is something that we take for granted
and we just expect that we can phone anyone, anywhere, anytime but this
system was built by the human race and it is truly amazing. The third
meaning, which is heavily connected to the second, is about Globalisation,
the fact that it no longer matters where you are (within the first world
at least). The image of the field was taken on the Isle of Thanet, outside
a windmill in the middle of nowhere, yet they still have a phone and access
to the Internet. I hope that the viewer will make the connection from
the phone box to the telegraph pole that this could be just the beginning.
Once everywhere was just fields, now we have overcrowded cities which
are spilling out into the semi-rural environment and it’s important
that we don’t let it run out of control.
In my second piece “Captive” I have tried to raise questions
about what it is that really constrains our life within modern society.
The chain link fence and the barbed wire, although man-made, are so prevalent
in the modern world that I’d argue we almost see them as natural,
as if they had evolved from the hedgerows and wooden fences of the past.
The office block on the right, however, is very much man made, the use
of glass and steel and the thick metal tubing containing it, makes it
appear quite a sinister space. The associations with chain link fences
tend to be quite negative, images of prisons, army bases, concentration
camps and dystopian futures like that of Orwell’s Big Brother. Keeping
this in mind I like the way that in the image on the left we are looking
through the fence to the bright blue sky which inspires hope, this contrasts
with the office block on the right which is a big black monolith wrapped
in what appears to be the very same chain link fence. When we look through
the gaps in the “fence” around the building all we see is
blackness, our view cannot penetrate the surface and it hides it purpose
within this impenetrable shell, this is not an image of hope but that
of secrecy and repression. One final connotation from the image is to
question the purpose of the fence, is it keeping us out or something else
in? The image on the left to me is the more honest of the two, it is a
fence, it is there to define a boundary we are not supposed to cross.
The right hand image, however, is far subtler, this oppressive black office
block becomes a symbol of all the big faceless corporations, with all
their rules and regulations, the dress code, the pecking order, the uniform,
all of these things are utilised to make us conform. Some may argue that
this conformity is only enforced during work time but it is not, it is
so engrained in us that we accept that men wear suits, shirts and ties
and women where blouses, skirts, dresses and high heels, and it is never
questioned. Even within social occasions we retain the same dress code
because this is the way it is “supposed” so be. My last comment
on this image is that I like that fact that the fence on the left could
easily be broken down in a few minutes, yet the image on the right, that
many don’t realise is a barrier would take years to break down,
if it is ever possible to break it down at all.
The idea of barriers and fences is also relevant to my next image “Power”.
This image is about how we construct barriers in our society and the power
struggles that result from that. The image on the left is of a fence post;
it’s a very crude fence, made of poles and barbed wire. The fence
is broken which would imply that the pole no longer has a use but it is
still marking the edge of the farmer’s land and it creates an invisible
barrier between itself and the next post, which I would feel uncomfortable
crossing. The image on the right is of two pylons, which are connected
by high voltage cables high above London. They are not broken and if they
were, they would be fixed within a day at the most, unlike the fence that
has been broken for years. The pylons physically support the flow of power
across the country and could be seen as a symbol of an industrialised
society. Much in the same way that the demarcation of land was used as
a representation of the power of the landowner, thus the fence post could
be seen as a symbol of an agricultural society. The contrast between these
two images is further enhanced by the beautiful, idyllic serenity of the
image on the left as oppose to the impending threat posed by the dark
clouds on the right.
In the final piece from this collection “Tracks”, I have tried
to make the viewer question the way that our industrialised civilisation
cuts through nature. The image on top is an almost perfect winter landscape,
until you see the tarmac showing through the tracks in the snow. The lower
image is the antithesis of the idealism problematised by the first piece.
It is a symbol of an industrialised society, the railway track, the concrete,
the metal are all images of modern day life. The tracks in both images
follow the same sweeping curve, which helps to show that the two have
a connection. As I mentioned above, the top image is “nearly”
perfect as a picturesque image, except for the tracks. They would fit
within the picturesque ideal, if there were a single set of tracks or
perhaps foot prints but as they are heavily worn they belie the “natural”
sense of the scene. This image shares similarities with “Connected”
as it is also about the way we are encroaching on nature to connect the
world. In the top image this has been done using tarmac, to put a road
through a woodland, in the lower image the same thing has been done using
a railway track, both of these are other forms of networks built by the
human race to bring us together.
In all of my pieces I have tried to contrast the natural with the man-made,
the beautiful, with the ugly. I felt it important to create strong contrasts
between the images as it enhances the meaning created. I feel these images
are some of the strongest I have created, as I have to think a great deal
throughout the selection process about what I am trying to say. They are
quite personal to me too, as they all reflect my journey through life,
in a very literal sense, as they are all places I have been, but also
within my photography and I feel I have grown through the images I have
produced.