PHOTOGRAPHY DURING A GLOBAL PANDEMIC. Facilitator Arpita Shah OCA Tutor: 11.9.20
AIM: To explore the creative ways contemporary photographers have been working to make inspiring and meaningful photography work in these unprecedented times.
Some of the photographer’s work that we explored was similar to work that I’d already come across, what I found interesting here are their methods and motivations:
This work I found less innovative, inspiring:
Rania Matar a Lebanese/Palestinian and American photographer she straddles cultures and identities. “Across windows” Portraits During Covid 19 – work in progress, this was shot through windows of people at home with the windows acting like a stage. It is interesting that she describes the connection between her and her subjects, a blurring between outside/and inside and “looking in, but seeing the outside reflected onto the person in front of me”. I didn’t find this work innovative.
(Across Windows (2020)
Clara Leeming “Levy lockdown portraits” (260 portraits over 38 days) similarly has shot through windows documenting communities, migrants, travellers. In her case she likes the surreal visual metaphor that the glass gives and that she can get close to them as the glass is between them. She has to work fast as she is shooting while walking with her kids; this gives the unstaged look that they have. The style here is a little different to other’s I’ve seen.
Eleanor Carucci’s work “A Photographer’s Diary of Life in Isolation” doesn’t do it for me. They are every day and intimate images of her daily lockdown life in New York, though I can appreciate the way she has used flash to create strong shadows and give the images a strong documentary feel.
(Carucci, 2020)
Jan Enklemann a documentary travel photographer began photographing March 23rd the evening lockdown was announced. She takes advantage of a city devoid of people , the images show the stillness of a city in artificial ambient lighting which makes them look like film sets to me.
Reuben Radding Street photographer “Corona Diary 2” is B/W images, this is normal to him, but of people on the streets in masks. To me it’s a typical photographic take on the streets in the time of Coronavirus.
Rinko Kawauchi’s‘ “Keeping the fire going: a visual response to coronavirus’ was to click the shutter when he felt like it as a response to the situation saying that his images drag her notions from his subconscious. The work seems very typical of her usual work to me:
Celine Marchbank shot 70 images over 7 weeks of flowers blooming and dying giving them the appearance of old masters still lives (Shot in Isolation, 2020). it is one way of representing isolation in lockdown.
Amy Elkins an American self- portraitist, continued her work by photographing herself during the global pandemic wearing things gathered from her house, with lists of what she shot with and why alongside the images. This reminds me of feminist work I have researched previously.
(@thisisamyelkins)
These next works I found more original:
Lisa Sorgini an Australian whose work focuses on the relationships between mother and child and the notion of home. She prefers to work with natural light her images are dreamy, painterly and tender. Her work “Behind Glass”, documents 25 mothers and their children in home isolation. She says that she intends to make the invisible role of parenting visible”. I notice that she composes her images at angles and crops in an unusual way; is this her reflecting herself on the images? “
(Lisa Sorgini, 2020)
Don Ripper “In the time of corona virus portrait series, people in masks; in fact he was documenting the effect of social distancing on individuals and couples. It struck me that I’ve not seen much work in B/W in the time of Covid 19. They appear rather like Victorian posed portraits, which when you learn that he used a 2014 Petzal lens adapted for digital cameras derived from the first portrait objective lens of 1840. They do express alienation and uncertainty and isolation; he believes they also show unification, but I don’t see that, see much sadness and loneliness.
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Some of the photographers work took me back to photographers that I’ve been researching for assignment 3 such as Martin Parr, Simon Roberts, Anna Fox and Paul Reas:
Agnes Sanvito’s London Queues is very straight forward and is remenisant of the work of Martin Parr and Simon Roberts. I love the saturated colour images and wondered if and why not queues haven’t been shot in Britain before as it’s such a British thing. However I read that she was shooting queues before Covid, perhaps because as an Italian Queuing is alien, though now there is social distancing in the queues. Apparently she is fascinated by the behaviours in queues, and this makes me think about other behaviours Britsih or otherwise that would be interesting to shoot.
Robert Ormerod shot his Edinburgh neighbours in their gardens using a drone for “It’s our Sanctuary” Gardens in lockdown as seen by a drone. The grass lawns are a common feature, but the drone perspective creates interesting juxtapositions. He says it’s a record of the time and symbols of recreation, relaxation and domesticity however I think it is also a showcase of Britishness.
(Cosslett, 2020)
Some of the work really inspired me, I found it aesthetically and conceptually appealing:
Neha Hirve is an Indian Photographer so that immediately got my interest. The work “both your memories are birds” was shot in his childhood home in Pune. He talks about the pressure cooker of life, the flow of misinformation and news and represents this time and his childhood memories with images of his home, mudane objects and settings interspersed with portraits and anatomy close ups. The mixture of black and white in a variety of tones with colour images works well and I find the images both evocative of India and a strong narrative of personal space.
(Hirve, 2020)
Alexia Webster a South African photographer also works with childhood memories. In “Contact tracing” she moved into her childhood home and projected archival photographs around her home exploring the relationship of her family with their house. I find this an interesting project, the method she has used. She also relates her work to exposing the deep inequalities inherited from Apartheid, so like Hirve is showing us on the inside of her home reflections of the outside world.
(Webster, 2020)
Devin Yalkin, another photographer we explored led me to this work. Yalkin spent lockdown in a house on the Jersey shore. I absolutely love the way that rather like Hirve he takes B/W photographs of the mundane, some with touches of people. He describes how he had time to photograph his surroundings constantly “There’s more clarity in being able to just look and watch things occur, especially in such a liminal space”. I find the work hugely evocative of time and place.
(Ruben, and Webster, 2020)
George Selley’s Lock down project “Pubs shut til Xmas” interests me in the way he combines image and sound from landscapes in what first seems an unlikely alliance-locations of where first human species were found in the UK with anonymous quotes from world leaders. I am considering what text I might put with my car park images so this is particularly interesting. He explains that the photographs and sounds demonstrate metaphorically and literally, our temporality.
(Warner, 2020)
My learning points:
This was a lot of photographers and work to look at in one sitting, however it was useful because while reflecting I was able to determine which had had an impact on me such as Yalkin, Hirve and Webster and why. With Yalkin and Hirve I was struck by their representation of consciousness through the mundane and their mixing of different focal lengths, the inclusion of humans sometimes and sometimes not – I find their work very evocative, and would like to explore and try something similar myself.
I was also helped by coming across the work of George Selly and his use of juxtapostioned text and images.
I was also able to filter out work that I consider more mainstream and less interesting, and feel that I used a critical eye.
References:
A Pandemic Portrait – The Artist as Photographer in the Time of COVID-19 (2020) At: https://thezebra.org/2020/08/03/a-pandemic-portrait-the-artist-as-photographer-in-the-time-of-covid-19/ (Accessed 27/09/2020).
Across Windows (2020) At: https://raniamatar.com/portfolio/windows/ (Accessed 27/09/2020).
Amy Elkins (@thisisamyelkins) • Instagram photos and videos (s.d.) [Instagram photo] At: https://www.instagram.com/thisisamyelkins/ (Accessed 27/09/2020).
Carucci, E. (2020) A Photographer’s Diary of Life in Isolation. At: https://www.thecut.com/2020/03/elinor-carucci-photo-diary.html (Accessed 27/09/2020).
Cosslett, R. L. (2020) ‘‘It’s our sanctuary’: gardens in lockdown, as seen by drone’ In: The Guardian 16/05/2020 At: http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2020/may/16/its-our-sanctuary-gardens-in-lockdown-as-seen-by-drone (Accessed 27/09/2020).
Design Exchange (2020) Agnese Sanvito’s London Queues. At: https://www.demagazine.co.uk/2020/05/04/agnese-sanvitos-london-queues/ (Accessed 27/09/2020).
Hirve, N. (2020) Neha Hirve Both Your Memories are Birds]. At: https://nehahirve.github.io/corona.html (Accessed 27/09/2020).
Kawauchi, R. (2020) ‘Keeping the fire going: a visual response to coronavirus’ In: The Guardian 19/06/2020 At: http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2020/jun/19/keeping-the-fire-going-a-visual-response-to-coronavirus (Accessed 27/09/2020).
Lisa Sorgini (2020) At: http://www.lisasorgini.com/ (Accessed 27/09/2020).
Lockdown London (2020) At: https://www.enkelmann.co.uk/lockdown-london (Accessed 27/09/2020).
Locked down (2020) At: https://www.ciaraleeming.co.uk/locked-down/ (Accessed 27/09/2020).
Reuben Radding photographer (2020) At: http://www.reubenradding.com/corona-diary (Accessed 27/09/2020).
Ruben, J. and Webster, A. (2020) ‘The Quotidian and the Surreal’ In: The New York Times 09/06/2020 At: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/09/arts/movement-quarantine-photographs.html (Accessed 27/09/2020).
Shot in Isolation, 2020 (2020) At: https://www.celinemarchbank.com/work/shot-in-isolation (Accessed 27/09/2020).
Warner, M. (2020) George Selley’s lockdown project considers the fragility of human existence. At: https://www.bjp-online.com/2020/06/george-selley-pubs-shut-till-xmas/ (Accessed 27/09/2020).
Webster, A. (2020) ‘Tracing lives: a visual response to coronavirus’ In: The Guardian 26/06/2020 At: http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2020/jun/26/tracing-lives-visual-response-to-coronavirus (Accessed 27/09/2020).
Photography 2: Documentary 