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.

‘Working Lives’: Exhibition at the National Photographic Archive, Meeting House Square, Dublin

‘Working Lives’ is an exhibition of late 19th/early 20th century images from the National Library of Ireland’s image collection.  Two collections from the library are featured; the Mason and A.H. Poole Collections.

The Mason Collection (1890-1910) consists of 2,144 glass slides relating primarily to the island of Ireland and some to the Isle of man.  The Mason firm was originally established in 1780 and sold scientific, optical and mathematical equipment.  In 1894 the company opened an optician and photographic business and the images on display largely date from the period when they operated as the photographic business.  The collection has been catalogued and digitised and is searchable on http://www.nli.ie.

The Poole Collection originates with the Waterford photographic family business of A.H. poole which operated as a commercial entity with collections in the image spanning the period 1884-1954.

The images from both collections in this exhibition depict working people who came to work at the period spanning the late 19th and early 20th centuries.  The period saw significant social upheaval as the political and industrial landscape changed irrevocably; the labour and trade union movement, the ‘Irish’ question, labour law changes…  The images presented fall clearly into the borad area of documentary photography as so clearly described in CHapter 2 (Surveyors and Surveyed) of Photography a Critical Introduction (ed. Liz Wells, Routledge, 2009).  Serendipitously, the Gallery of photography, also in the Meeting House Square, is currently holding an exhibition of documentary photography by Tom Wood (an Irish born photographer) who has spent forty years making images in the Merseyside area of England and which is reviewed here.  Also serendipitously, I happened to have just spent time making my way through Robert Doisneau images in a small book published by Taschen and curated/edited by Jean Claude Gautrand (2012)  Clearly, the subjective documentary style in Doisneau’s work in which the participants are complicit in the image making (see his famous ‘Kiss’ image for an example of this) is far removed from the more, apparently, objective docmenting of working conditions but the roots are the same; the desire to record what is seen in a manner that remains faithful to what the photographer believed was seen.

There are stand out images in this exhibition for all sorts of reasons; working conditions, dress, class divides.  Two images stand out for me; a still life of the various Varian Brush products manufactured by the Varian Brush Company in Dublin at the turn of the century that is similar in appearance and style to the William Henry Fox Talbot ‘The Open Door’ but clearly significantly different in terms of the intent of the photographer.  A second image that was very striking was a collar factory showing stacks of white detachable collars being prepared for shipping.  In one image the social change in a century in Ireland was clear; dress, the dominant role of men, the factory conditions.

The exhibition runs until May 1914.

Tom Wood; Gallery of Photography, Meeting House Square, Dublin

The Gallery of Photography in Meeting House Square in Dublin’s Temple Bar area is currently hosting an exhibition by Tom Wood. Wood was born in the west of Ireland in 1951 but grew up in England.  The exhibition is a reworking of his extensive set of images made over forty years and featuring street life in England.  The exhibition is presented as ‘Men and Women’ without a narrative or chronology and so allows issues of gender to be explored by the viewer as well as allowing glimpses of the relationship between the documentary photographer and the subject.

Serendipitously, the National Photographic Archive, also in the Meeting House Square, is currently holding an exhibition of documentary photography from the national archives entitled ‘working lives’ based on the Mason and Poole collections from the national library of Ireland.  this exhibition features Ireland in the late 19th and early 20th Century. Also serendipitously, at the time of viewing the exhibition I happened to have just spent time making my way through Robert Doisneau images in a small book published by Taschen and curated/edited by Jean Claude Gautrand (2012)  Clearly, the subjective documentary style in Doisneau’s work in which the participants are complicit in the image making (see his famous ‘Kiss’ image for an example of this) is subtly different from Wood’s approach.  Woods imbues his image making with somewhat less humour but similar empathy for example here and here.

The exhibition runs until mid January 2014.

Colour Accents – Scarlett Hooft Graafland

Scarlett Hooft Graafland is a Dutch photographer whose work has been most recently exhibited at the Huis Marseille gallery in Amsterdam as part of the exhibition The Rediscovery of the World celebrating the reopening of the gallery following a major extension.  Graafland, together with thirteen other young (mid twenties to early forties) photographers, is part of an attempt to employ ‘…the intrinsic power of an artistic medium …in order to penetrate external reality…’  so as to’…nourish, in turn, the artistic core of photography.’; from the exhibition brochure.

Graafland’s signature is the use of small, impermanent interventions including the use of colour splashes to create scenes that that have a magical relationship with the landscape and the people who live in it.  The Rediscovery of the World exhibition features many of her images from her most recent collection prepared in Madagascar.  Graafland manages to blend landscape to culture to history to fantasy as here in an image showing blue people – a significant play on the expression once used to describe slaves. Blue also features in the image of a zebu cow amidst spiny green plants. The splash of yellow amongst the baobab trees is particularly striking accompanied by the title ‘we are not your enemies’.  In a curious way the strange treatment of the situation draws attention greater attention to the fundamental elelements than might otherwise be the case; we notice the baobab trees more, we notice the black people more.  This use of colour splashes is not a recent phenomenon by Graafland.  She has used a similar approach in previous exhibitions as in here, here and here in 2007/2008 Igloolik series.

It seems to me that the use of colour, often humorously by Graafland far from acting as a visual reference serves to draw attention to wider matters in the images.  Graafland makes her images using analogue photography.

Reality/Unreality – Popel Comou

Popel Comou is a Dutch photographer whose work has been most recently exhibited at the Huis Marseille gallery in Amsterdam as part of the exhibition The Rediscovery of the World celebrating the reopening of the gallery following a major extension.  Comou, together with thirteen other young (mid twenties to early forties) photographers, is part of an attempt to employ ‘…the intrinsic power of an artistic medium …in order to penetrate external reality…’  so as to’…nourish, in turn, the artistic core of photography.’; from the exhibition brochure.

Comou’s photographs are as unreal as they are completely true and regularly involve reworking of several images to produce images that are ’empty’, grainy, illuminated through cutouts or include shadow patterns, as here for example. Occasionally she includes herself to, in line with tradition, act as a foil.  In a recent development she has prepared photographs on lightboxes that allow the viewer to set the lighting themselves.    In this exhibition Comou has also included photographs of clay miniatures that were first made in 2003 and are included for the first time in the exhibition in the Huis Marseille. The miniatures are almost childlike in the degree of saturation of the colours and, while referencing real things are real in their own right.

Reptiles and Portraits – Juul Kraijer

Juul Kraijer is a Dutch photographer whose work has been most recently exhibited at the Huis Marseille gallery in Amsterdam as part of the exhibition The Rediscovery of the World celebrating the reopening of the gallery following a major extension.  Kraijer, together with thirteen other young (mid twenties to early forties) photographers, is part of an attempt to employ ‘…the intrinsic power of an artistic medium …in order to penetrate external reality…’  so as to’…nourish, in turn, the artistic core of photography.’; from the exhibition brochure.

Kraijer works in a variety of media and started life as a graphic artist working mainly in charcoal or pastel; in the mid 2000’s she started making photographs. Whether working in charcoal or making photographs she uses tonal gradation and grey tints to surround her subjects with darkness, as here, so they emerge from the background.  In this exhibition she has used snakes, an apparently recent development in her work, and this has allowed new and decorative patterns to be created as in this and this.

Her photographs seem to transcend time and reality and using a black background gives her images a Renaissance or medieval painting feel. (Interestingly this technique is increasingly being used in underwater photography to draw out the subject; here, an example of such an image.

Huis Marseille – Museum for Photography, Amsterdam

To coincide with the reopening of the Huis Marseille, following its expansion into a building alongside it (and an effective doubling in size), in September of 2013 an exhibition entitled ‘The Rediscovery of the World’ was conceived and mounted.   The exhibition features  artists in their mid twenties to early forties who are all ‘…looking at the world in entirely new ways…’ according to the brochure for the exhibition.  The artists, again according to the brochure, are asking what is real and of real value in the world.

The fourteen artists exhibiting are Popel Comou, Elspeth Diederix, Eddo Hartman, Scarlett Hooft Graafland, Juul Kraijer, Tanya Long, Katja Mater, Hellen van Meene, Awoiska van der Molen, Illona Plaum, Emma van de Put, Viviane Sassen, Scheltenes and Abbenes and Simon van Til.  The fourteen artists’ work is spread between the two buildings and on multiple levels requiring the viewer to work backwards and forwards and up and down the labyrinth of stairs and corridors.  The effort, at least for me, was worthwhile as amongst the fourteen artists several grabbed my attention in a variety of ways.

A full examination of each of the fourteen artists is well beyond the scope of this exhibition review however I do want to briefly note the work of  four of the photographers whose work I was taken with; in each case I will return with a more detailed consideration in further blogs.

Colour is a particular feature of all the artists in the exhibition but none more so than Scarlett Hooft Graafland.  Graafland combines site specific sculpture and photo set ups using local materials to produce images of  simplicity and clarity such as here.

Juul Kraijer’s arresting portraits involving snakes and other reptiles cannot be ignored and, like Graafland, have strong use of colour.

Popel Comou’s images evidence multiple digital workings leaving the viewer wondering is it a photograph, drawing or something in between as here.

Elspeth Diederix’s images included several from a project entitled ‘A Studio Garden’ on which she worked with the living materials in her garden as well as surreal and set up underwater images such as this one.

The Rediscovery of the World runs until the 8th December.

FOAM – Amsterdam

Fotografiemuseum in Amsterdam, better known as FOAM, is currently (the time of the visit was late October 2013) hosting four exhibitions.

‘Framed in Print’ celebrates 40 years of Dutch magazine photography and is arranged thematically rather than by photograher.  As might be expected of a magazine retrospective fashion, sport, reportage, cuisine, documentary, beauty and portrait images dominate the exhibition which is laid out magazine style.  I was particularly drawn to the culinary images and in turn to the images of Bart Nieuwenhuijs.  I am not sure why his images are categorised as culinary as the only connection they have with cuisine is as raw food products – chickens, fish – and here fish and beans.

Cristina de Middel’s Afronauts exhibition has been widely acclaimed.  Cristina works as a photojournalist and documentary photographer but the Afronauts has been a more personal project for her. The work documents an abortive attempt by Zambia to join the space race.  The collection of posed images and original documentary material makes for a gentle and humorous take on the ill fated venture by Zambia.

Four rooms of FOAM are devoted to Lee Friedlander’s ‘America by Car’.  This is the record of a trip but framed through car windows and windscreens.  Billboard details, signage and store symbols add layers to the work.  Interestingly, his Route 9W New York, 1969, one of his iconic images, was not on display although his equally iconic Albuquerque image was part of the exhibition.

The fourth photographer was Peter Puklus and I am afraid that I did not get this mix of still life, streetscapes and installation type images.

The Flats, Pearse House, Village in the City – National Photographic Archive

Pearse House is a complex of flats in Dublin’s inner city built in the 1930’s to help deal with the accommodation crisis in Dublin first identified in 1912.   The flats were a significant improvement on what had previously been on the site.  The exhibition of photographs by Jeanette Lowe, – ‘The Flats, Pearse House, Village in the City’  is at the National Photographic Archive (part of Ireland’s National Museum) and is replicated in one of the Flats at Pearse House (3b) which has been recreated as a 1930’s flat.  Lowe, who was a winner of the Photoireland 2012 People’s Choice Award, is connected to the flats through her Grandmother, Bridget Ashmore, who was one of the first residents in the new flats in the earl’y 1930’s.

Lowes’ series of photographs, captured between 2009 and 2013 is complemented by one wall of photographs, collected from residents of the flats, from the flats and their surrounds from earlier times.  The sense of community (A Village in the City) jumps out from every image; washing lines and smiling faces; small children and large pets; homes and pride in them.

The images are not currently up on her website, http://www.jeanettelowe.ie, but you will get a sense of the project from the Facebook page for the project, http://www.facebook.com/pearsehouse.

I am not a superstitious person but earlier in the morning before going into the Archive  a back cat had crossed my path (for luck) and I spied two magpies  (two for joy) and a little part of me wondered what the day would bring! Little did I realise that I would experience a practical working out of Robert Adam’s quote that the real use of art is’…to keep intact an affection for life.’; quoted in Why People Photograph, Aperture, 1994 from Adams’ earlier (1981) book Beauty in Photography.