Car Parks and Night

To further experiment, I’ve taken my work outside. I’ve been working at night, because I wanted empty spaces and I love the quality of light that you get at night time in the city.

I chose these spaces because they’re relatively secluded in the evening, and I’m more comfortable working like this. I’ve also kept working with someone with me that I can stick in images if I feel it would work.

They’re all working on quite different levels, and with varying degrees of potential.

This image is the first time I’ve created the convex effect you can achieve with panorama style shots. It gives a nice flow to the image, and provides a strong through-line, even if things don’t quite line up around it. This is a far smoother effect than I’ve been working with.

The presence of a figure is also pretty successful in this image. At a  glance, it’s not necessarily evident that there even is a figure in there; it blends in with the image and almost has the same structural qualities of the lampposts. Once this is noticed, it alters the initial reading of the image. The viewer then either places themselves in the position of the figure, or becomes a voyeur. A number of questions are raised by the figure. Who are they? Why are they there? What are they doing? This leads the viewer to construct narratives around the image, with little to point to a certain reading. I like having this ambiguity in the work, and the idea of an open narrative.

The positioning of the figure works better than I feel it should; usually I don’t tend to like central things, but here it seems to work because it leaves a long stretch either side of the figure, and they become isolated within the image. Due to the nature of time created in the panorama, it also raises questions of how long the figure has been there. A brief pause during the instant of the photograph, or far longer?

I picked this location for the qualities of the wall; I like (most of) the graffiti on it, the long string of numbers which gives a sense of mathematics, and the lighting, and the grimy feel work well (and obviously subvert the idea of mathematics.)

The images have ended up very disjointed in their execution, and although a slight disjoint works, this is too much, especially because of the flat wall, and the lack of objects.

What does work is the flat plain contrasted with the depth on either side of the wall. It creates two worlds within the image; this flat canvas, that almost feels like a stage – like something could be about to happen – and then the ‘real’ world remaining behind this. I think the tree enhances it – the grimy feel of the image contrasted with nature, this brightly lit tree.

I feel like this second image isn’t working, but there’s a certain quality to it that I do like. There’s a definite flatness to the image which is very different to where I started, and it does something very different to the other images. It raises more questions about why these images have been joined together – it’s not to create a greater sense of scene, movement and time like the others. Perhaps it’s more about non-spaces, and the figure existing in a repeated part of the image starts to ask what it is to be somewhere.

I also like the quality of the image – parts of it do not feel like a photograph, such as the way the shadow falls around the legs. It’s fluid and I like this.

This was just an experiment in trying to purposefully jar the viewer by having an unexpected aspects completely interrupt the flow of the reading. It doesn’t work like this but the idea’s still intriguing, if I could find a much more subtle way of doing it. There’s something here about the brief flash of a presence that could be likened to splicing something into a film reel that doesn’t belong there. However, this is going to be much harder to achieve through still image, because you can’t make the thing go away again.

It looks like I've inadvertently begun working with liminal spaces. Car parks are a functional space - we use them, we pass through them, but they're not places we tend to stop in. The same is true of places such as corridors, train stations, airports... these are places we just pass through, or wait in - we use them as a means to an end. This spaces can be used as blank canvases, a space in which to create metaphors. It's interesting to use these spaces as settings for my images because it draws attention to a space we usually don't fully notice. It could also be interesting to explore what happens in these spaces, both in terms of their intended use, as well as more non-standard uses that may take place there.

Bar panoramas

The way I seem to work best is by just doing stuff. I need to work through ideas, scrappily, ignore quality, what I should be doing and just do it. It’s the only way I can explore what works and what doesn’t. You never know until you try (or at least I don’t.)

So I’ve experimented with a new location, but used the same joiner technique. I like the technique for the way it imbues the image with an inherent sense of time, and can also create unusual angles and perspectives, repetitions and gaps. It needs exploring.

I’ve stuck with black and white because I felt colour may have distracted from the image, and made it too busy and not visually tight. Also, black and white reflects the language of memory.

I don’t think these images are quite as successful as the yard had potential to be, but I can’t quite put my finger on why. Perhaps it’s because they’re busier. I chose a pub because it’s a familiar location to most people, but this one is an old building, and can almost have a homey feel to it.

Despite these not being too successful, I feel this one (above) has got more potential. Because of how we naturally read the image, we start at the top left with a pair of feet, and follow through the empty space to the third pair. The presence of people automatically begins to create a narrative. We don’t know who these people are, but we begin to assign characteristics to them in order to try and understand the image. We also begin to make assertions as to the relationship between the different sets of feet. Because they are all presented within one image, it alludes to there being a link, and the large space between allows a narrative reading to form.

Perhaps it also functions because it is a relatively empty image and therefore gives it a sense of simplicity that allows the viewer plenty of space to create narratives and appreciate the structural qualities, where the previous images were pretty busy, and then become more about studying the image than simply taking it in.

Alexey Titarenko

http://www.alexeytitarenko.com/

I stumbled across Alexey Titarenko's work by chance, but I love it. The flow of time and movement he captures is astounding, crowds of people become no more than a blur while the concrete and landscape remain static.

This passage of time in the photograph is something that is relevant to my work, as the panoramas, by nature, reflect a passage of time.

The blurred, or sometimes ghost-like appearance of some of the figures is something I was doing in some of my earlier work, so Titarenko's work is fascinating for me.
There's a quality to them which extends beyond pure photography, some parts appear almost as paintings or drawn pictures, while other aspects retain their appearance of a photograph.

Personal Space

The actual act of photographing an object transforms it into something else. It gives it importance, marks it as something worthy of note. It can also provide a fresh look at previously familiar objects.

This is a chair in my backyard that I see most days. I’ve never given it a second thought until taking this photo of it. In the photo, the unusual qualities and formal construction of this object becomes apparent. I have never looked at it the same since.

This can be the pleasure of photography – it has the power to defamiliarise the previously familiar, and provide it with a new significance.

To continue this, I photographed the rest of the yard to form an almost 360 degree view. I then joined these photographs together to represent the whole space within one image.

Although the perspective is not accurate, the uneven flow of the images provides a sense of the contours of the actual space.

In this culture, we read left to right and this is also true of how we ‘read’ a set of images. This means we begin to read a sequence such as this the same way in which we’d read a sentence. On top of this, the sequence automatically begins to suggest a timeline. Because this images were taken separately, that begins to denote a certain amount of time passing in the image, and also the time it takes to fully scan the image.

This sequence also presents certain sculptural qualities which add to its intrigue; the repetition of the brooms, the chair within a chair. The repetition of certain areas or objects begins to create a sense of the unreal; this is not a ‘true’ image – this is something stitched together which does not exist in this view in ‘real’ life. The gaps and more jarring aspects of the image also add to this; we know things are out of kilter and continue beyond the frame where they are cut off, but this begins to leave space for the viewer to ‘finish off’ the image in their own mind.

There are a number of features in the image which point to a presence, and the places function as part of a living space; the chairs, bikes, bins, but the lack of any physical presence allows the viewer to form their own narratives about what goes on here/who lives here etc.

To further these ideas I need to do more. But is it relevant that this is a domestic space or would a public space serve the same kind of functions? Would manipulating a public space (i.e putting the chairs on a street) work or become too contrived? Is it necessary to work around ‘found’ scenes? And what would happen if you did have people in the image? Is there any way to get them within the gaps/overlaps in the image, so they exist in a non-space?