Assignment Five – Applying the Techniques of Illustration and Narrative

The fifth and final assignment in the Open College of the Arts Art of Photography course is ‘Applying the Techniques of Illustration and Narrative’.  This assignment is designed to draw on all the techniques and approaches developed over the previous four assignments and the course participant is required to prepare the assignment in the form of a picture essay for a magazine with one cover image and up to 12 images inside.  Each image, according to the course notes (p180) should have a caption and a short text linking images can be used. The assignment follows the section below dealing with Assessment Criteria and Reflection.

Assessment Criteria and Reflection

At Level 4 of the OCA programmes the emphasis is on the acquisition of skills and good working habits including the keeping of learning logs .  Additionally, Level 4 students should be informing themselves about others’ work by reading and viewing exhibitions.  The learning logs associated with this assignment, which is itself being submitted as a blog, are all found at ‘adivinglifeblog.wordpress.com’.  There are four types of blog; exercises associated with projects, reflections, book reviews and exhibition and photographer reviews. In general terms, therefore, the requirements of the programme are  being met.  The specific assessment criteria for Level 4 programmes, together with my reflection of how this assignment measures against them, are given below.

The Demonstration of Technical and Visual Skills – materials, techniques,observational skills, visual awareness, design and compositional skills. 

The images captured for these exercises and assignments  have involved still life, street and nighttime photography, a range of locations, lighting conditions and subjects that, in turn, have required the use of the full range of camera settings and techniques including slow and fast shutter speeds, narrow and wide apertures, changes in ISO and the use of a tripod.   Additionally, post image processing has involved conversion from RAW, cropping, perspective correction and levels adjustments.   The work to date therefore has demonstrated a wide range of technical skills.

The Quality of Outcome; content, application of knowledge, presentation of work in a coherent manner, discernment, conceptualisation of thoughts, communication of ideas.

This assignment represents the culmination of the skills and knowledge gained in the course to date. The application of design principles, the management of lighting conditions and colour and, in particular, the conscious use of illustration and narration signify and coherent approach to image making.  The use of regular reflection, based on self generated insights and tutor feedback has ensured that my development has maintained momentum throughout the course. The work has been structured appropriately and narrated to ensure that lines of thought within the work are clear.

The Demonstration of Creativity; imagination, invention, development of a personal voice.

A key underpinning context to this final submission was the feedback from Assignment Four, a reflection on which is here.  The essence of the feedback was that while I had exhibited a strong and robust capacity to engage with the material and make images as part of the exercises I needed to work to use those techniques to build a body of work with a theme or an identified outcome.  This in turn required engagement with the project at an emotional as well as a technical level.  The advice to think about why rather than how I was making an image was important.  This insight triggered a review of the image making that I have engaged in that met both technical and emotional requirements.  Once this review was completed I had gained greater insight into the images that met both criteria and, very interestingly, those images were the ones that critics, including the tutor, noted as being ones that  held the viewer.  This insight has proved particularly important in helping to understand what my ‘voice’ might be.  Although much more work is needed I have feel I have achieved something of a breakththrough.

In addition to the course notes I have found the following texts of particular benefit in the preparation of this assignment.

Context and Narrative (2011). Maria Short. AVA Publishing. 175pp.  The book is reviewed here.

Composition (2012). 2^nd Edition. David Prakel. Ava Publishing. 192pp. The book is reviewed here.

Context; reflection, research, critical thinking (learning log).

Because I have a research background I am used to the need for reflection and critical thinking and am happy that the blogs in which the exercises, book reviews, exhibition reviews and reflections are covered are providing me with appropriate learning opportunities.

The Assignment

Dockland to Playground – A Celebration

All Shiny and New – The Samuel Beckett Bridge and National Exhibition Centre

Where the Grand Canal Meets the River Liffey

What was a rat infested complex of basins and warehouses around where the Grand Canal meets the River Liffey has been almost completely transformed into an upmarket, celebrity occupied, playground with the Bord Gais Energy Theatre, the Samuel Beckett Bridge and the National Exhibition Centre as jewels in the crown of this part of Dublin.

Digging Down to Build Up

The quays upon which this part of Dublin has been built were engineered by men working in trying conditions.   In metal boxes – caissons – into which compressed air was pumped to keep out the water they dug the bases for foundations beneath the waters of the Liffey with the ever present risk of Caisson’s Disease – the bends.

Reminders of a Past

Glimpses of a Future

Present and Past

Into the mid 1990’s this part of Dublin was a dangerous, run down complex of warehouses, bond stores  and early bars servicing the docker communities.

Keeping Warm in the Present

Keeping Warm in the Past

Where the citizens of this area now warm themselves by jogging and dining alfresco with blanket wraparounds the citizens in the past worked loading and unloading barges that made their way into the south Midlands along the Grand Canal.  The horses that towed the barges and made the deliveries around Dublin towing carts had to be tied up somewhere.

Playground

Entertainment

The Daniel Liebskind designed Bord Gais Energy Theatre is the centre piece of the ‘Grand Canal Plaza’ and now offers lunchtime and evening entertainment.  In 1975 I worked on the reconstruction of a warehouse in the Grand Canal Dock and lunchtime entertainment was usually the retrieval of the body of some poor soul who had either fallen in drunk or been pushed into one of the canal basins.  The area has definitely changed for the better.

Assignment Four – Feedback Reflection

Assignment Four of the Open College of the Arts Art of Photography Module deals with light and its use and challenges in photography.  The assignment and underpinning exercises required a structured and technical approach to the management of light both outdoors and in a studio situation.  From the outset the assignment and exercises appealed to my technical background and the dredging up of long forgotten physics topics such as Raleigh Scattering.  And therein lay an area for development – astutely observed by the feedback from my Tutor; ‘You have demonstrated a good technical approach and your work on this is strong’.   I will come back to this below.

The overall feedback from the tutor was that the exploration of the exercises was robust and comprehensive and that there was real engagement with the technical practice. Interestingly the tutor observed that some of the images used in the exercises were more visually engaging than the exercises used in the assignment.  I remember at the time of working on the assignment images being very engaged from a technical perspective and being very satisfied that I had been able to previsualise what I wanted to achieve and then execute my vision.  However,  I  also remembered that this was technical rather than emotional satisfaction.  I kept being reminded of an earlier observation by the tutor that I should be thinking about why rather than how I make images.  The final set of observations in the feedback dealt directly with this question; use the techniques to develop messages and not as end in themselves;  be conscious that the exercises lend themselves to just taking an image to demonstrate a technical approach but the assignment can be a body of work with a theme or identified outcome.

Having received the feedback I realized that my plans for the final assignment would have to be revised because it had become obvious that where I had some emotional rather than technical engagement with images they resonated more deeply than where images where engagement was solely technical.  This posed a problem because while I had some vague idea about the types of images to which I had an emotional attachment and/or a need to make my knowledge was not sufficient to help me make choices about what  I wanted to work on.  As a result I spent some time going back over my images both for the course and not to see if patterns emerged.  This proved a rewarding exercise because it became clear for both my underwater and overwater photography that certain broad types of image engaged me more than others. Whilst this exercise of working out my ‘voice’ is ongoing I am in a much better position now to move on.  A related point is that using the Peter Honey classification of types of learning I am a ‘pragmatist’ meaning that my default is to learn only if it meets a particular purpose.  The drawback to this approach is that less time is devoted to reflection and this may be a block to growth and development.

Review: Photography; A Critical Introduction. 4th Edn. Ed. Liz Wells

Photography: A Critical Introduction (2009) 4^th Edition, edited by Liz Wells and published by Routledge is a  core text on the Open College of the Arts Art of Photography module.  The focus in the text is an exploration of key debates in photographic theory and their placement in their social and political contexts.   The individual chapters cover key issues in photographic history, documentary photography and photojournalism, personal photography, photography and the body, commodity culture and photography, photography as art and the digital age.  Each of the chapters is written by different authors including Derrek Price, Liz Wells, Patricia Holland, Michelle Henning, Anandi Ramamurthy and Martin Lister.

The use of multiple authors with different styles and approaches could have led to a disjointed text.  However, the use of a common format for each chapter including sidebar referencing f texts mentioned with summaries of the text in the side bar, a comprehensive glossary, chapter summaries and case studies means that there is a coherence to the text.

As a new student to photography the significance of many topics will only emerge over time.  However, there were some immediate learning points, particularly in the chapters on photography as art and the commodity culture. Specifically, the transition in photography from picture taking to picture making as discussed in the chapter on photography as art and the use of images in commodity culture in the chapter dealing with advertising photography.

Narrative and Illustration:Project-Illustration; Exercise 45 – rain

This, and other exercises in this section on Narrative and Illustration on the OCA’s Art of Photography module, require a clear understanding of the use of signs and symbols in photography.  Maria Short in her book (reviewed here) Context and Narrative devotes one chapter to understanding signs and symbols in photographic art.  She introduces Semiotics, the study of signs and symbols, and, in introducing the work of de Saussure and Sanders (the orginators of semiotic models) and draws the distinction between the form which the symbol takes (the signifier) and the concept it represents (the signified). This distinction has arisen in a previous exercise where the representational aspect of symbols was explored; essentially a symbol is something that represents something else.  Closely related, although different, to the concept of a symbol is the concept of the icon.  In the case of an icon  the signifier is perceived as imitating the signified (e.g. a scale model or cartoon of the real form).

This exercise deals with indexical signifiers; symbols that can be causally liked or inferred.  For example smoke to symbolise fire, or footprints indicating footsteps.   In this exercise the brief is to make an image that will be used to illustrate the cover of a magazine that deals with rain.  We are asked to avoid settling for obvious images such as rain swept streets yet leave the viewer in no doubt about the subject of the magazine.  In other words the symbolism in the magazine cover must be closely linked to the subject without necessarily being obvious or cliched.

In the image below I show a range of symbols associated with rain without at any stage showing rain drops specifically; umbrella, reflections in a puddle and the effect of rain drops on the puddle itself.

Rain

Narrative and Illustration:Project-Illustration; Exercise 44 – juxtaposition

Juxtaposition is the combination of two elements in a photograph that carry equal weight  and  which either with contrast each other or in which one element contributes towards another to create an overall theme.  The two elements should be strong in their own right so that when the viewer looks at it they come to their own conclusion about their purpose in the image.

Exercise 44 in the OCA’s Art of Photography programme deals with the use of juxtaposition as a means of illustration.   The course notes (pg 117) note that often still life image making is used so as to control the juxtapositioning process and, indeed, suggest that such a process could be used in the making of an image on juxtaposition for the cover of a book.

I have selected a late night image from the city of Brussels, arguably cliched, but one that I could not ignore; the contrast between the homeless person settling down for the night with his dog with his back towards the upmarket clothes store.  The spot is only 100 metres from the famous Grand Place.

Steven McCurry’s picture of children playing on burnt out tank in Lebanon is a strong use of juxtaposition as is Walker Evan’s image of a graveyard overlooking a steel mill in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania from 1935.  Juxtaposition can also be used for humorous ends as frequently used by Robert Doisneau.  Here is ‘L’Enfer’ from Paris in 1952.  The gendarme is clearly aware that he is a centre of attention but not sure why.  That the image is set up is not in doubt but that does not detract from the humour.

Narrative and Illustration:Project-Illustration; Exercise 43 – symbols

This, and other exercises in this section on Narrative and Illustration on the OCA’s Art of Photography module, require a clear understanding of the use of signs and symbols in photography.  Maria Short in her book (reviewed here) Context and Narrative devotes one chapter to understanding signs and symbols in photographic art.  She introduces Semiotics, the study of signs and symbols, and, in introducing the work of de Saussure and Sanders (the orginators of semiotic models), draws the distinction between the form which the symbol takes (the signifier) and the concept it represents (the signified). In another exercise the particular use of indexical signifiers (symbols that can be causally liked or inferred to the subject) was referenced in respect of symbols to represent rain.

In this exercise we are asked to suggest symbols for a number of concepts.  In suggesting symbols and, in two instances (see below) providing an image by way of visual illustration, I am conscious that choice of symbols will be heavily influenced by social, political and cultural background.  For example, someone of right leaning political persuasion might well evidence graffiti as a symbol of crime whereas someone left leaning might see this as symbol of class expression.

In suggesting symbols appropriate to the concepts it is also worth bearing in mind that too often symbols can be cliched and become hackneyed because of their frequent use.  However, the choice of symbol must  not be so obscure that the relationship between  signifier and signified becomes impossible to determine.

Growth; nuts and seeds (see image below); eggs – especially if cracking open; sequential images of plant growth – would require digital manipulation to merge into a single image; sequential images of human growth; juxtaposition of acorns and oaks.

Excess; conspicuous consumption – especially when juxtaposed with images of poverty; luxury cars; private planes; tables overladen with food.

Crime; vandalised property; graffiti; burnt out cars.

Silence; backlit meditation pose (e.g. as here), finger to lips (e.g as here).  Other possible symbols might be church and library interiors.

Poverty; Outstretched cupped hand; images of malnourished children; ragged clothes. .

Walker Evans, a small collection of whose work is reviewed here, worked for the Farm security Administration in the US between 1935 and 1938 and used symbols extensively in his work of witnessing the great depression; his portrait of Allie Mae Burroughs being a good example of this fact as his image of a cotton tenant farmer family from 1936.

Narrative and Illustration:Project-Illustration; Exercise 42 – evidence of action

This exercise is an introduction to the use of symbols (see Exercise 43, Exercise 44 and Exercise 45 for further exploration of the use of symbols in narrative and illustration) and is part of the Narrative and illustration module of the OCA’s Art of Photography module.  The exercise requires the production of one photograph in which it is clear that something has happened, the course notes suggest including something that has broken or spilled.

The periord from early December 2013 to end Fenruary 2014 has produced some of the most violent storms and coastal damage in living memory along the west coast of Ireland.  The image shown here is clear of evidence of action as required by the exercise.

 

Arguably the most famous ‘evidence of action’ image is that of Robert Capa showing the soldier shot in the Spanish Civil war.

 

Review: ‘Robert Doisneau’ – Jean Claude Gautrand

Robert Doisneau (1912-1944) spent most of his life taking street photographs in and around Paris.  In the book being reviewed here (Robert Doisneau, by Jean laude Gautrand, Taschen, 2012) he is quoted in the notes as saying that ‘Paris is a theatre where you book your place by wasting time.  And I am still waiting’.   Many of his most famous images e.g. ‘the kiss’ and ‘the sidelong glance’ were clearly set up and intended to be humorous; many dealt with Paris during its occupation by the Nazis and have a much more serious intent; Arrest of a Sniper, Clandestine Press.  These and about 150 other images spanning the period 1912 to 1985 have been brought together in this small format publication by Taschen and published.  The book notes have been prepared by Jean Claude Gautrand.  The images are grouped into ‘The Early Years – 1912-1939’, ‘The War – 1939-1944’, ‘A Thirst for Images – 1945-1960’, ‘From Toil to Consecration – 1960-1944’.  the book notes are grouped into three sections ‘Lessons of the Street’, ‘Paris:The Luck of the Stroll’, ‘Robert Doisneau’s Legacy’.

The Taschen volume is a small, nicely produced publication that provides a useful introduction into the influences on Doisneau and the images he made.

Susan Woods; City Assembly House, Dublin

The New York photographer Susan Wood’s exhibition ‘close up’ is currently showing at the City Assembly House in South William street as part of the Jameson Film Festival.  the exhibition runs until the 22nd February.  Woods is well known for her cineman stills work.  The exhibition features images from Billy Wilder’s Private Life of Sherlock Holmes, Easy Rider with Peter Fonda and Dennis Hopper, Modesty Blaise with Monica Vitti, Dark of the Sun with Jim Brown, Marcello Mostroianni in Leo the Last and John Wayne in Hatari.  Two sets of images stood out those from Leo the Last and Easy Rider.  The images from Leo the Last portray the swimming pool scenes a while the Easy Rider scenes are a mixture of set shots that feature Fonda and Hopper.

 

Richard Mosse – The Enclave; Royal Hibernian Academy, Dublin

Richard Mosse, a kilkenny born photograhper is currently exhibiting his recent work from the Congo in the Royal Hibernian Academy in Dublin.  The exhibition consists of a small number of very large images and film installation and a soundtrack all of which were generated during 2012 in the Congo.  Mosse, on his own home page, states that the work is an attempt to bring “two counter-worlds into collision: art’s potential to represent narratives so painful that they exist beyond language, and photography’s capacity to document specific tragedies and communicate them to the world.”  The whole installation is both stunning in its visual imagery and deeply unsettling as it narrates and documents the horrifying war that has been going on there for a long time.  the images in their own right are visually dramatic as he uses a military spec 16mm infra red film that is no longer in production.  these result in vegetation turning red and dramatic surreal landscapes.

The Enclave represented Ireland at the 55th International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia in 2013 and runs in the Royal Hibernian Academy, Ely Place until March 12th.