Curatorship
Jan Dibbets
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Syzmon Roginski
Syzmon Roginski was inspired to take these group of photos, titled "UFO's", by his colleague Grzegorz, who believed heavily in UFO landings. Roginski discovered these landscapes in poland that had been alterted mentally so that that they were now classified, by a certain group, as "UFO hotsapots". As he dove deeper into the search for mysterious spots that, according to ufologists, may have been landing strips long ago, he became engrossed in the baron polish fields and forests.
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Catherine Yass
She is best known for her distinctive photographic and film based work. Typically she manipulates her subject matter by overlaying the negative and the positive from photographs she has taken and then realises the resultant images as lightboxes, prints and films. The detachment with which she photographs people and their living and work spaces give the images an intimidating presence.
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She continued to concentrate on interiors in later projects, including a series taken in Spitalfields Meat Market, London; the empty meat hooks and stained walls are set off by the searing blue negative in the window spaces. Yass's photographs explicitly recall the historical conventions by which portraits and landscapes were used to immortalise and support the status of the patrons. Yet by highlighting the normally concealed activity and decision-making process that lies behind the production of both art and industry, Yass lays bare those conventions and exposes to public scrutiny the relationship between the artist and private and institutional patrons.
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Overview
On the whole, these artists have similar ideologies as they all distort the environment that they photograph. All three use colours to make the photo more surreal and distorted in order to change the perception of the image from the gritty greys and whites, to vibrant blues and pinks. However each artists alters the image in their own individual way focusing on different aspects that they feel are most important in telling the story of the image.
How Do Artists Explore the Strained Harmony between Mankind and the Environment?
Rationale
In my project I plan to focus and depict Landscapes that have been distorted by the environment or by Humans, trying to juxtapose the vastsness of mans ideas and architectural progression against earths unwealding power to control and determine everything around it. I have always been interested in the wider picture of mans actions on earth, in my previous projects i have also incorporated such themes and have focused on interaction and the environment. In visiting galleries in London and also in Paris I have been engrosed in other artists with similar themes such as Paul Graham and Edward Burtynsky to name a few, and this has allowed me to incorporate such ideas, creative as well as asthetic, in to my own work .
Introduction
In my three chapters, "Man's Footprint", "Home?" and"Earths power over Human ideas" I will incoperate my personal depiction of Mans impact on the World. All three chapters will document the power struggle between Man's evolutionary ideas and the conservative society of Man and the World around us. I will focus on trying to photograph asthetic landscapes and scenery but to show signs of humans exists and places where the footprint of man has left its mark. In addition i will be focussing on the common ideology of rebuilding to evolve, meaning that many places will completely change from day to day and that at what point can a place no longer be called home. This, in turn, will allow me to discover and photograph the reasons behind these changes in landscape. I will use artists such as, Catherine Yass, Edward Burtynsky, Syzmon Roginski, Nadav Kander, Guillaume Herbautto and Donavon Wylie do explore this subject matter. One wonders when and where humans obsession with building big came from. Bigness has always been prized throughout history because the notion is closely associated with success and power. Monuments of all sorts were created to be larger than life, whether statues, obelisks, or mausoleums. In fact, whenever the opportunity presented itself, man has risen to the desired challenge of making things bigger. Whether it was weapons, buildings, or ships and planes, bigger has always been considered to be better. The taxpayers are left to deal with the aftermath of this bigness binge. I will explore the idea of mans effect on the earth and therefore show the effects with humans addiction with expansion.
Chapter 1: "Man's Footprint"
In this chapter I will depict the vast, some may say scar, that humans have left on their surroundings. I wish to document, however the idilic formulaic nature of these abandoned areas and to question whether they can be classified as tarnishes or whether these areas and buildings are stepping stones needed for humans and the earth to grow and evolve. I will focus on artist that have contributed to my fascination for this subject matter and who's work I feel has lead to the development of my theme and outcomes. Guillaume Herbaut, focusses on portraying people through the things they leave behind. The Chernobyl project portrays this in quite a poignant way. The City of Pripyat, whose 40,000 inhabitants, many workers from the plant, were controversially evacuated after the explosion had contaminated the area with radiation. He said he" witnessed a place that was forgotten, and yet replete with things testifying to the fact that people had lived there." In his work, he maintains the philosophy that emptiness is a matter of creation and creating a melancholic atmosphere. He is constantly trying to find, not the natural state, but in man's interference with nature. "There is a serenity to be found in the melancholy".
Guillaume Herbaut
Edward Burtynsky
In addition Edward Burtynsky sees the industry as a predominant theme in his work. He sets course to intersect with a contemporary view of the great ages of man; from stone, to minerals, oil, transportation, silicon. To make these ideas visible Kander searches for subjects that are rich in detail and scale yet open in their meaning. "Recycling yards, mine tailings, quarries and refineries are all places that are outside of our normal experience, yet we partake of their output on a daily basis." As a race we are drawn by desire - a chance at good living, yet we are consciously or unconsciously aware that the world is suffering for our success. Our dependence on nature to provide the materials for our consumption and our concern for the health of our planet sets us into an uneasy contradiction ad this something i want to show in this chapter, to show the combination between our dependence and seeing emptiness as a form of creation.
In these photographs by Edward Burtynsky you can see the clear effects of the evolution of industry. Fifty years ago, American car companies dominated the world especially General Motors, who were the worlds biggest industrial between 1940-1960. While it was inevitable they would eventually lose their monopoly position, their failure to adapt their production methods and meet changing consumer tastes accelerated their decline, US firms failed to innovate in the design of cars, preferring to make money by increasing the size and weight of their vehicles by adding air conditioning, power steering, and fancy sound systems. It was therefore, left to European manufacturers to develop disc brakes, rack-and-pinion steering, air-cooled and diesel engines. And the mass production system discouraged innovation because it was so expensive to introduce fundamentally new models. These derelict automobile factories show the end result of this change in the American's car industry as slowly more and more factories closed down and a great number of workers started to lose there jobs. The photographs are shot in a formulaic style showing the ordered and structured way these buildings were constructed in the 1940's and although there are bold colors within the photo they have been died down, by decreasing the saturation, to depict the disuse of these structures. There is something, however, fascinating and striking about these Detroit landmarks. These buildings inspired a large number of the U.S people to move to Detroit, where there were a vast amount of work opportunities and where it seemed unemployment rates were only going to decrease. Kander depicts the notion of "keeping up with the times" as humans continue their journey of technological evolution and those who linger and do not act quickly will be kicked to the side. Kander uses the car industry as a metaphor for everday life and as depiction of capitalism in the U.S.A.
Marcus Lyon
Marcus Lyon is a British artist, who was Born and raised in rural Britain. His early working life with Amnesty International in Latin America was the inspiration for his exploration of the issues surrounding development and urbanisation. Lyon explores the interface between man and nature in the 21st century focusing on developing countries that have had a sudden boom in terms of their infrastructure and population. The early 21st century saw his work move from the micro to the macro with the formation of the large scale BRIC, in which he explores the urban expansion and migration in the modern world. Lyon's work explores the "edges that manifest the inflection points and spaces of critical change that encapsulate the relationship between the man-made and natural worlds." His use of photoshop to portray an almost never ending landscape, emphasises the rapid creation of these areas and how squashed these provinces are, indicating the amount of people in a these vast cities. His work as a metaphor to the dilemma of our modern existence reflecting pools of our times. Much of his work, often described as 'Archaeo-logies', has stemmed primarily from the political and social landscape of Brazil, Russia, India and South Africa. While focusing on these aspects he captures in this set a gritty realism to the living conditions of the population of these countries.
Chapter 2: 'Man's Power over Man"
In contradiction to to the previous chapter I will focus on human's overwhelming power to progress and its input into everyday people's life. Here the artist chosen will accompany my work in order to illuminate my key themes and techniques. One of these artists featured in this chapter is Nadav Kander who focusses heavily on letting his emotions take the picture for him. He will never go out to take a certain photo he will predominately find a location and try to explain his feelings through his camera. In the set of images from 'God's Country' he concentrates on humans leaving there mark on their surroundings and how the environment around us is constantly changing due to our always evolving ideas about how we should live our lives. Mankind are responsibe for many of these changes in the world, yet individuals appear lost and diminished within it. Kander says he was influenced by John Martins's and Caspar David Friedrich's paintings, in which humans are dwarfed by the might of nature. This is why Kander's images, in many cases, echo a classic ink painting, but in his photographs the contrast is more often between tiny people and giant structures.
Nadav Kander
In this set of photos from his project "Yangtze - The Long River" Nadav Kander, depicts China's constant radical change. Travelling along the Yangtze River, he took pictures of the population, surrounding "China's main economic artery", hapless attempt to face this overwhelming change. The group of men fishing, in the left photograph, are over powered by the ongoing work of this immense bridge, and one can not help to wonder what may happen to these fisherman in later years. Will they be forced to move due to pollution from boats and poor game, or will life continue round these few. Kander himself says " China is a nation that appears to be severing it's roots by destroying it's past in the wake of the sheer force of it's moving 'forward' and such and astounding and unnatural pace." The Misty fog that Kander captures in his work, shows the almost imminent change that is on the horizon, with the fishermen in control but certainly not forever.
After 2000, Giles Coulon distanced himself from the documentary formula and sought a new form of art form with White Night, a series of nocturnal wanderings in search for the universal and evocative glow of neon lights. In this work, Coulon aimed to decipher peoples attempt to maintain light throughout the night, trying to experience it subjectively. By exploring poorer areas of cities and speaking to homeless people in the area they started to realise how these sources of light became beacons and meeting points for people from around the city. By not confining oneself to the obvious, Coulon propose a almost homely vision to the worn down provinces. Although these photographs are constructed in a precise and orderly manner, the red light and the family of chairs gives off a almost homely appearance. Nevertheless this collection provokes questions from the viewer. Why are these places baron? Why are people calling these places home? Out of choice? We do not see any sign of people throughout the collection. What we do see is the tension promise of what will be, the insecurity of the future and whats to come. This work identifies the constant change occuring in cities. Places change and become neglected.
Conclusion
During this dissertation i have attempted to bring together work that relates to my study, in which i have accumulated ideas, evidence and interpretations by the artists shown above. I have concluded that humans instinct reaction, when they have a sudden increase in population or a sudden influx of money, is to build big and up. This is almost a symbol of power and stability that countries have the technological insight to build these buildings. In addition to this countries such as Dubai and China almost loose sight to who they were and their history ias they evolve at such a staggering rate that they can no longer hold on to their past. This can be especially seen in Nadav Kander's work on the 'Yangzi River' where he shows whole villages and civilizations being moved and destroyed to make way for initiative new technological ideas, like the Three Gorges Dam. In addition work by Edward Burtynski and Guillaume Herbaut, show the effects of humans technology moving on, and in the case of chenobyl, destroying a vast area of land.