The subject, the layout

I will talk about how I will present my work in more detail in this post.

First, one thing that I found when I look at Anthony Luvera’s and Paul Graham’s work is that their important images are printed massively. In Paul graham’s work, the idea of time and movement is a central theme, and the gallery images are put very close together to simulate the split movement of time.

 

I think they exceed the height of a child, which could be about 1.1-1.3m. Their size makes reference to life outside the camera as if it were in front of my own eyes.

In Anthony Luvera’s work, the portrait of his participants are also printed large, but in this particular image of his Residency installation, we can see that the print could be far taller than 1.3m:

 

By looking at the subject against their own photograph, I see that the photograph was printed beyond life size. Anthony Luvera said that the image was raised above eye level to reverse the gaze, that the participant is looking down on the audience instead of being looked down on.

There is an issue with the work that I want to print; there is too much for one subject. It’s not that there is too much produced in terms of the images, but too much potential space in the gallery to take up.

Above is a revision of the anticipated gallery installation for one subject. As you can see, the diptychs are printed much smaller than the facilitated images (red), but added together, the diptychs come close to exceeding the total width of those images. It’s not really the total width that worries me but the idea of power in the subject. That said, the facilitated images are printed on a giant strip to not only allow a lot of images to be viewed in clear detail, but to also give them strength in numbers. I also want to display the strip of images slightly above the portraits to do two things: 1. give an impression of an artifact that was produced by my subject; 2. give a statement that the images are of more importance i.e. should be considered more than my own work. If the subject only produced a total of, for example, 20 images, then displaying them slightly higher than my images should give a sense of priority, even if my diptychs appear to outsize them.

For a start, I will print the diptychs at about 90cm wide each. This will give a total width of 190cm when including the 10cm width that separates the images. I want my diptychs separated only slightly because they have something to look for in close proximity; if audiences were to see two similar images of the subject, that were installed farther away, they may get an impression that the images are simply duplicates with nothing in particular to look for. Keeping the images close together also saves gallery space.

For the facilitated images, I need to be open minded. I should judge how many images can fit onto each row and how many columns are needed, factors that contribute to the final size of the strip. I think that as long as it is displayed just above my own images, then things should be okay. In terms of the overall presentation, I want to display just above eye level, so that there is no straining once viewing. Considering this, I should pay attention to the facilitated images so that they do not end up making the strip so tall that it makes some images excessively above or below eye level.

Portraiture – Paul Graham’s The Present

 

 

With an intention of putting my subjects out into society through my subjective portraiture, I have turned to Paul Graham’s The Present. A form of street photography, Paul’s work focuses on the changing moments of everyday life, but instead of focusing on one perfect photograph, Paul seeks to, what I call, emulate a shift in awareness. His photographs tend to be taken seconds apart from each other, and may even change in terms of the camera’s position. The most prominent feature is the focus, drawing attention to the mundane nature of us thousands. Paul’s work shows values that we can miss in everyday life.

I like this work because it freezes moments in time and expresses movement without actual moving image; the difference is primarily the immersion. The fact that I am presented with what seems to be two decisive yet mundane moments, questions my own moral and social values. The change of our focus in the world around us is very fast and often unnoticeable,  but we control what we look at and what we are interested in. Thus, these photographs seem to be of places that are so everyday and pulled away from the typical street scenes that a photographer may target. These are slices of life, beautifully presented as huge prints in the gallery and positioned typically as diptychs or triptychs close together, to bond the scene and the artist’s control over what we see.

 

Gaining an understanding of this work, I turn to my own. What you see is a picture of my subject stood in front of the camera, in what looks like a public location with people, shops, benches and vegetation. I am primarily combining a sense of freedom and identity in my subject, by not just going into public places but also having paths and some of the sky in the frame. Paul’s work emulates movement in a scene, and I feel that applying a similar approach can strengthen my subject’s identity in society.

To sustain focus to my subject, I will now try to incorporate artificial lighting to contrast them against the background, which I will underexpose only slightly by about half a stop. The light that I will use on my subject will act as a fill-in, not a complete modification. I need to avoid my subject from appearing like a cut out as they will become a distraction and contradict their link with the scene. It’s about keeping a the scene natural whilst gently applying technical modifications to strengthen the attention towards the subject.

Anthony Luvera

Photographer Anthony Luvera is an artist whose work I drew a lot of inspiration from. 

I am interested in his work from Residency. It is a body of work that was created in collaboration with homeless people of Belfast. Anthony spent 16 months working with homeless people, making and editing photographs across Belfast. As you may guess, the installation photograph above is not the contents of a set of photographs taken in one evening but a narrative of progression and trust. At least, that’s what I feel when I look at the authentic large format contact prints to the near-left of the large print.

What I already know after looking at the contact prints is that they have a similar discipline of the photographs I facilitated from my subjects; they are authentic, genuine and untouched. I think it works well with the subject nature, the fact that homeless people tend to be viewed as weak and we look down at them. Seeing the prints on display has a link with the subject’s control, selection and recognition of the way they want to be represented, not the artist.

Anthony had discussions with his subjects all the time, even during the editing process and the final selection of photographs. This essentially means that the large print is a portrait of the subject and how they want to be. Even so, Anthony decided how large the portrait would be, and this was made a global size across his exhibition. Obviously, the portrait’s positioning and size shows strength in the subject; Anthony says that it was done “to intentionally reverse the gaze. It was to give it the feeling that the homeless participant was looking down on the exhibition viewers.”

Anthony questions documentary in his work, but I do not know what of exactly. I believe that as everyone has their own opinion or take on something, they see and document things differently. Essentially, what everyone sees is a genuine representation of themselves, of which as the capacity to be changed from knowledge and life experiences. So for instance, in relation to my project on Autism, people may have knowledge of the condition thanks to Television, and they may feel they should continue to document the social model and its associated contents of a negative nature.

In reflection to this, Anthony’s assistance rather than direction gives more power to the subjects. There are landscape photographs included in this installation photograph and I suspect that these were produced by the participants on display. Anthony handed out lots of instant cameras to his participants and simply asked them to photograph things that are important to them. To photograph things that are important, seems to have intention of facilitating the truth of what these homeless people do, where they live, where they travel to, etc.

So now that I look at Anthony’s work in comparison to mine, I do have a similar approach. I am letting the subject be themselves whilst they have control over their camera, and I have already discussed how I want to handle them with regards to authenticity of the subject’s life. What I am more concerned about is the portrait that I want to produce. I do not want to display a massive print like that of Anthony’s but I still want to keep it a priority alongside the subject’s own photographs. I do have one problem with my portrait, however, and it’s the intrusion of opinion over fact. Despite trying my best to incorporate society into the frame, and manipulating it to focus the viewer onto the subject, it is still not the actual subject. I hope you understand when reading this. There is still the question of size and layout. I do know that, after recognising the value of my subject’s photographs, that I want to put more emphasis on them rather than the portrait. So, I will change the presentation of the artifact to this:

 

With this new layout, I am directing more attention towards the photographs my subject has made, without completely detaching the portrait of my own representation of them. I believe that due to my observations and reactions to the conversions of Autism photography, the reversal of approach in the portrait won’t give an impression of just for the sake of it when the viewers look at it. Both the subject’s photographs and my own representation have a link, and it’s that they do not work like most documentary photographs in the way that the photographer has power over; the portrait of the subject is how I want to empower them as a photographer, but the subject’s own pictures is their world, their vision and their adaptation to the camera as a social documentary tool rather than me making decisions about how I want to represent their life in direct reaction to my research.

I have received my subjects’ pictures

Over the course of two weeks, I have engaged two subjects into taking photographs for one week; I have met one student one week and another student another week. I waited until I received the second subject’s photographs.

The difference between the amount of photographs each student made is substantial:

I feel inclined to edit these photographs as I see that there are multiple documentations of one particular scene; having too many of these photographs in the exhibition may result in repetition. I am trying to prove a point that Autistic people have a life like everyone else and I want to give power through it, so why should there be so many images of the same thing? I could let my subjects edit with me to narrow down the pictures, which would therefore give power to the subject and not me.

Though, after elaborating the approach I used for the subjects and the photographs they make, I don’t think editing is a good idea. These pictures are all based on the subject’s personality, the beholder of the photographic medium as the most accessible in their daily lives. I gave emphasis on the idea of daily life, not anything specific, so that therefore means that what I am seeing is again, based on the subject’s interpretation on the places they go to, people they interact with, people they meet, things they do, etc.

I have never engaged in intimate pictures such as these in their raw, unedited form. People can edit pictures themselves, such as the ones they choose to upload on Facebook; it is an edit of their physical lives. Even so, the camera is technically an edit of the physical world, however the moment of exposure is all down to the subject, and the contents of the photograph can give clues that relate to personal values, what really matters in the view of the subject’s eyes and the life they posses. So, I will not delete any photographs in the sets – I will print and present the lot.

To strengthen the photographs authenticity, I will also display the file names in the final print. Not only will these file names show that the photographs are as is, but will also guide viewers to knowing how they naturally sequence. It’s like presenting the chronological documentation of the subject and disallowing and misconceptions to be made. So for instance, if I were not to display file names, which essentially have numbers that add up, the presentation of images may look like a series that have been grouped by me, the photographer, or the subject. I want to keep the photographs towards a demographic, untouched and honest view of the subject themselves. The photographs show personality and values as they come.

Going back to my previous post about presentation of the images, I think it will work. I do not want to emphasise narrative subjectively but objectively.

 

Of course, there’s the issue of the quantity of images and its influence on the length of the row of pictures. Obviously, the more images there are, the longer the row will have to be; it is extremely important that all the images appear to be roughly the same size on the print per student as I, again, want to keep the narrative demographic. I don’t think the actual length of the row of pictures will matter as it is easy to understand that it will need to be larger to accommodate more pictures. However, I stress that the row should not be extremely long as this may contradict the viewing experience of the pictures i.e. audiences having to move themselves constantly as they navigate the artifact.

 

The artifact

My personal concern with Autism is that the media tends to base the condition around subjects’ difficulties. For me, it gives a sense of prejudice, and I want to turn around the notion of approaching and documenting a subject who has the condition. Why are autistic people targeted? What makes their place in mass media so interesting? This is what I question when I make as well as facilitate images.

I noticed that a lot of documentaries and reports of Autism base the subject around education. In addition, and like I said, the subject does not take a primary role with informing audiences of what Autism is like for them. There is so much scrutiny within these documentaries that the context in which the subjects are depicted, plus given information about Autism, gives a message of helplessness and facilitates an identity of weirdness, social contrast and helplessness.

In response to how the media constrains the subject, I gave the opportunity for my subjects to not be constrained, by allowing them to document the everyday lives that they live. I wanted to limit the way I speak to my subjects in terms of what kinds of images I may be looking for, but I am not seeking anything in particular. This way, the output the subjects make is their own, untouched, uninfluenced version of the lifestyle they have. There is no documentation or representation of their difficulties.

I want their photographs to show the individualism of my subjects; it gives an extension of narrative supplied by my photograph as well as text so that any preconceptions about Autism are quickly erased, whilst educating audiences that they should disallow prejudice to control their thoughts based on what detail is supplied about their disability , whether it be based on a social or medical model. The most important thing that I want to achieve with the photographs is a celebration of the subject’s lives, just as much as they reference all of us as everyday people.

I anticipate my presentation to be something like this:

Collection of subject’s photographs

Portrait on the left (green)

What’s essentially happening is that I am giving the subject full control over what they produce, based on what I am looking for within the project contents. The portrait that I want to produce will not be a subjective representation based on what I feel is best but instead will be a picture of the subject in a place that they want to be. I previously did not want to do this as I only wanted them to be outside.

 

 

Simon Roberts – authorial identity

Simon Roberts: Authorial Identity in Photography from CU Photography on Vimeo.

Simon first worked as a photographer for a newspaper, where he took photographs that were then placed under the copyright of those who he worked for. He had once instance where he took a series of photographs of John Prescott and papers selected one photograph out of hundreds that appeared to follow what the news papers were looking for, and in the context of what Simon was working as and who he was working for, was a mockery image of Prescott. Simon also had an instance where he was commissioned by the Sunday Times Magazine to spend a few weeks with John Prescott. He was called mid week when the magazine was coming out and was told that his picture would be on the cover. Unfortunately, the head editor that runs the magazine and newspaper line changed the image to one that Simon did not produce. This was because Simon’s image was too “positive”. Simon worked as a magazine photographer until 2004 and was, until that time, becoming frustrated with the control the media was having on his work but also how limited Simon was in terms of how much he could submit as part of a story; maximum amount of pages was decreasing, page size was decreasing.

Simon’s frustrations caused him to seek authorship with his work. He wanted full control over research and image production and editing.

What Simon did with his projects on We English and Motherland was draw guidance from his subjects as opposed to traveling around and planning his own routes by himself. This meant that the contents of his photographs were not based on his own independent view of the countries but instead referenced native native people. I am mostly interested in We English as it draws upon the common theme of past time, values, demographic and study within the landscape.

Simon hosted a website that allowed audiences to engage with his project We English before it was even released, commenting that he had already acquired a good amount of people he could sell his book to whilst allowing a specific audience to actively engage with the production of his images. People would be able to suggest a place that Simon could photograph based on the contextual information they supply. Simon’s pictures always reference some form of information. For instance, one photograph that Simon made was totally informed by the research that he had done. It was his wife’s favorite spot, it was voted one of Britain’s best coastal areas, but it was also banning certain kinds of people to enter it. It shows not a seaside but a kind of dry, muggy plot of land nearly void of people. There was a wooden fence on the bottom left.

He wanted an elevated view of the landscape, which opened up the mid ground – he perched his camera on the top of his portable home which he traveled in. Simon says that because he was removing himself of what it is to be British, he was putting the view of the subject into the being part of the landscape. His first photograph showed an elevated position, enlarged the landscape and showed the people like little figures which could still be identified.

What Simon ultimately did was engage his audience as opposed to being completely independent and finding his own approach to documenting Britain. This leaves an essence of us in the pictures, but still offers the level of study offered in the frame in relation to the structured approach Simon used to actually photograph his scenes. It has opened up a new kind of perspective based on how we act and inhibit the landscape and why.

Clearly, there was a hybrid of identity in the pictures that could not be readily seen due to them being so different in comparison to Martin Parr, for example. However, Simon was not the leading member of the picture because the pictures all look the same and are not subjective; the reason he made these pictures was due to audience participation.

Next steps

What are the next steps for the project?

To help widen the stories of people with Autism, have got in contact with a staff member of the disability services here at the university. I have asked them to circulate this e-mail to their autistic students on the database:

Hello. My name is Christopher Trafford and I am a second year undergraduate student studying Photography here at Coventry. For one of my current assignments, I want to give young adults, who are studying at University, a powerful voice towards what I see is the underrepresented group of people on the autistic spectrum. 

 

I am wondering whether it would be possible for you to document your daily lives for about a week in order to provide a simple story. I also ask that I visit you in person so that I can take your portrait for the exhibition that I will need to prepare as part of my assignment. 

 

It would be great if I can get to meet you first so I can explain what I want from you. There is nothing to fear from in this project; all you need is a compact camera or any device that can take good pictures (like a mobile phone) and you know how to use it. If you have exams, don’t worry. It’s a very simple task.

 

It is very important that I can get as many people as possible to work with so your participation will be very helpful. I will be there to mentor you with the pictures so you know what to take. 

 

If you participate, your pictures as well as my portrait of you will be prepared for exhibition. I will also give you a signed large print of your portrait in return.

 

If you are interested, please contact me at…

I wanted to give emphasis on the simplicity of the project in the subject’s part. This is why I gave details about the role the subject’s would play and equipment they would need. Since my subjects do not know what portrait I will make of them, adding that I will give them a large print of their portrait in return to their participation should create some interest. I am still awaiting responses.

I have gotten in touch with 2 students and have given them instructions to make images of their daily lives. Since the term “daily life” is quite loose, I did offer some guidance but not so much that the validity of their life becomes limited and unbelievable. They often asked how many pictures I wanted, but I said as many as possible, whenever possible. I am giving them a minimum of a week’s worth of picture-making given the fact that I want lots of pictures, and after that week is up, I will do the following:

• Edit the images they have whilst being with them. This will help me get some commentary on what the pictures are about and could also help me decide how I should communicate them to my audience. I will take the images and store them for printing.
• Arrange to take their portrait.

This is not the major next step, however. What I need to think about is how I should display the work. What I do know is this: I want to display a large, single portrait of the subjects on a gallery wall and I initially wanted to wall mount the selected images of their daily life on the wall as well, in no particular order. I wanted to show the images in no particular order because I just want to emphasise the contents of the daily life the student has, not a chronological diary of activities. This way, the images become a celebration of their own, and a celebration of the places, people, activities, etc that the subject encounters and engages with.

How many photographs would I need to print, however? This thought concerns me. What I realise is that there is a significant distinction of physical interaction between wall-mounted prints as opposed to prints that can be touched. With gallery wall prints, everyone can view them all together, but with prints that you can touch, only one viewer at a time can view them. However, what is more important? Space or convenience? The ability to touch or see with others? I will investigate artifact presentation in the next post.