Genius of moving image. Sam Taylor Wood

1 List two specific key relationships between Sam Taylor Wood's photography and film work?

Her work consists of people and emotions, that is the most important in her work.

2 How does the use of multi-screen installation in her work reflect narrative?

It allows the viewer to create story himself rather than a story being told by the artist. Multi screen installation reflects narrative in a way that shows it is constructed rather than one that is being dictated to you.

3 What other photographers use film as an integral part of their work. List two with examples?

Gregory Crewdson. Photographer, who does not even like to hold camera. Although picture is the final product, but artist uses film setup, hollywood manner, lighting, actors to create one perfect shot. Crewdson eves has his camera man, art director etc.

Tim Walker. British fashion photographer recently started working with moving image. The Lost Explorer - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WAZKuHFOX3k

4 Research three other Video artists and explain

their working philosophy

Tim Burton – american film director, started his career as an animator, his movies are still very much merged with illustration. In his movies frequent details are: spirals, skeletons, gothic elements, long-legged, small-feet charecters. Often collaborates with: Johnny Depp, Danny Elfman, Helena-Boham Carter.

Woody Allen was born December 1, 1935 in Brooklyn, New York. As a young boy he became intrigued with magic tricks and playing the clarinet, two hobbies that he continues today. He broke into show business at age 15 when he started writing jokes for a local paper, receiving $200 a week. His movies contain alot of pfilosophical and sexual themes.

David Abelevich Kaufman (Russian: Дави́д А́белевич Ка́уфман) (2 January 1896 – 12 February 1954), better known by his pseudonym Dziga Vertov (Russian: Дзи́га Ве́ртов), was a Soviet pioneer documentary film, newsreel director and cinema theorist. His filming practices and theories influenced the Cinéma vérité style of documentary moviemaking and, in particular the Dziga Vertov Group active in the 1960s.

Genius of Moving Image. Chris Cunningham

1. How did Bjork and Chris collaborate on the All is full of love video?

Bjork did not required anything – artists shared their ideas only – in singers imagination the video was white, containing hard surface that melts because of love and containing erotic themes, then Chris Cunningham cam eup with the concept and idea for the video.

2. What techniques were used on the portishead video to create the unusual slow motion effects? Research this.

It is shot underwater, people were floating in a tank and then digitally inserted into scenes.

3. What other music video directors have gone on to direct feature films? Name two and the feature films they have made.

David Fincher – Curious case of Benjamin Button, Social Network.

Jonas Åkerlund - Horsemen, Small Apartments

4. Which famous sci - fi film did Chris Cunningham’s work on before he became a director?

He had worked for over a year on the film A.I.

5. What makes his work different or original compared to other similar directors?

He has a very different style from other music video directors, his ideas are daring, shocking and unforgettable. Approach: "Many people think my works are scary. Personally, I find them hilarious. Spice Girls videos are scary to me." 

Genius of moving image. Visions of Light

1   What is the role of the cinematographer in film making?

Cinematographer has to understand the story and find allusive images that help to tell that story. He is responsible for visual presentation, lighting, emphasizing one or another thing in the frame, scene, movie.

2       Why did director Roman Polanski insist on using hand held camera in the film Chinatown?

He used this technique to intimidate actors, hereby forcing them to behave spontaneously, creating voyeuristic kind of look, so that the viewer would feel like participating in the story himself.

3       Name two films which use colour in a very symbolic way, and describe what they suggest.

‘McCabe and Mrs. Miller’, cinematographer uses faded colours to mimic old pictures,  photographs, taken many years ago to make movie more believable, old-looking atmosphere.

‘Godfather’. In this movie a lot of yellow, yellow-red colour is used to create dangerous, brassy period-movie atmosphere, these colours broke into motion picture business long after that.

‘The Last Emperor’, yellow – colour of emperors, power, sky, sun itself, red – colour of Peking, of the forbidden city, green – means knowledge, forbidden information in the closed, self-contained city.

4       In the film Raging Bull why was the fight scene filmed at different speeds?

The fight itself was usually 24 frames/sec, parts where men are not actually fighting, were shot at 48 frames/sec. Every fight was different. And people remember those fights as big flash pictures from ‘Life’ magazine. Creators were showing off as well.

5       Who is the cinematographer for the film Apocalypse Now, and what is his philosophy?

Vittorio Storaro. He sais that photography is a single person’s art, like music, painting, writing whereas cinematography is communal art, it can not be expressed by one single person.

ITAP. Genius of Photography. Part VI

1.How many photographs are taken in a year?

80 billion.

2.What is Gregory Crewdsons modus operandi?

He uses film set for his pictures, Hollywood manner, lighting, actors etc. Crewdson also has his own art director, camera man, he does not operate camera himself.

3.Which prints command the highest price & what are they called?

Prints, made by photographer himself, closest to the time picture was actually taken. They are called vintage.

4.What is a Fake photograph? Give an example and explain how & why it is fake.

Picture, presented as vintage, but  which is actually not. Eg. Lewis Hine’s ‘Powerhouse Mechanic’ print. Many collectors bought it as only one of two vintage prints, but it happened to be fake, because scientists fount OBAs chemical, used only from 1955, whereas Hine himself died in 1940’s. Fakes were made by Walter Rosenblum.

5.Who is Li Zhensheng and what is he famous for?

He was Red army soldier, a photojournalist, who found himself covering the cultural revolution in 1960’s and early 70’s. He photographed chaos of cultural revolution and was hiding the negatives in order to protect them and himself.

6.What is the photographers “holy of holies”?

Magnum.

7.How does Ben Lewis see Jeff Walls photography?

He thinks that Jeff Walls did not reinvent photography, but took it back to 19^th century, to painting, where everything is creative – the people, the light. Everything is constructed for a meaning.

8.Which famous photograph was taken by “Frank Mustard”?

“River scene”

ITAP. Genius of Photography. Part V

1.Who said “ The camera gave me the license to strip away what you want people to know about you, to reveal what you can’t help people knowing about you”, and when was it said?

Diane Arbus, early 60’s.

2.Do photographers tend to prey on vulnerable people?

Yes, they do. Although it has been one of the big controversies, especially in recent years. But it is seen in pictures of the Great Depression era, when vulnerable people were literally on the streets and many great photographs were taken.

3.Who is Colin Wood?

A boy Dianne Arbus photographed in 1962, New York Cenrtal park.

4.Why do you think Diane Arbus committed suicide?

Probably although she was successful photographer, she had very complicated life, problems, thoughts, that she could not share. But no one except of her can tell the real reason.

5.Why and how did Larry Clark shoot “Tulsa”?

He was an insider, shooting his and his friends everyday life. It is more as a diary.

6.Try to explain the concept of “confessional photography”, and what is the “impolite genre”?

It is photography about uncomfortable subjects, themes that ordinary people would not have courage to ask and talk about. It is intimate, showing all aspects of life, even most personal things, so the viewer could sometimes be shocked, even disgusted.

7.What will Araki not photograph, and why?

He do not shoot what he do not want to remember.

8.What is the premise of Postmodernism?

It was the opinion that we now live in the culture so saturated with media imagery and media models of how people live that our idea of how one lives one’s life and who one is made up of that kind of that media myth. In postmodernism, people do not have any inherent humanity. We are all these composites and myths, created by other people.

ITAP. Genius of Photography. Part IV

1.Why did Garry Winogrand take photographs?

To see what the world looked like photographed.

2.Why did “citizens evolve from blurs to solid flesh”?

Technology evolved enough to capture people – shorter exposures were needed, so people were not blurs anymore.

3.What was/is the “much misunderstood theory”?

Cartier Bresson’s decisive moment theory

4.Who was the godfather of street photography in the USA?

Garry Winogrand.

5.Who was Paul Martin and what did he do?

Photographer, who began beach photography in Britain in 1896,  Great Yamouth.

6.Who said “When I was growing up photographers were either nerds or pornographers”?

Edward Ruscha.

7.Why does William Eggleston photograph in colour?

He said himself: “If I just make the colour hierarchy the structure of the picture, can that work and still do realistic subject matter, still do the real world?” Colour gives the meaning to his photographs, some of the pictures would be nothing without the colour.

8.What is William Eggleston about?

He is about photographing life today.

ITAP. Genius of Photography. Part III

1.What is described as “One of the most familiar concepts in photography”?

“A decisive moment”

2.Should you trust a photograph?

We should not trust it blindly. Photograph is showing only one side, objective point of view of the photographer, it can be surrounded by myths and create clichés.

3.What was revolutionary about the Leica in 1925?

It was the first small, light, easy to carry, quiet camera.

4.What did George Bernard Shaw say about all the paintings of Christ?

“I would exchange every painting of Christ for one snapshot”

5.Why were Tony Vaccaros’ negatives destroyed by the army censors?

They contained images of dead GI’s so army censors decided that the world is not ready to see that.

6.Who was Henryk Ross and what was his job?

Jewish photographer (propaganda on one hand), who was incarcerated in Lodz ghetto. His job was to record life in ghetto and document the production of goods, produced by the inhabitants.

7.Which show was a “sticking plaster for the wounds of the war”, how many people saw it and what “cliché” did it end on?

“The Family of man”, opened in New York, 1955. 9million visitors saw it by 1964. It ends with an optimistic cliché, that photographers themselves are the falily of man, that they felt the same. It ends with W. Eugene Smith’s picture of his children, going into the light from the shadows of their own garden, beginning of their sentimental journey through life.

 8.Why did Joel Meyerowitz photograph ground zero in colour?

There is a tragic element in black and white photography and the photographer did not want to keep it as a tragedy while it was just a collapse

ITAP. Genius of Photography. Part II

What are Typologies?

Photographs made to record the facts, pure documents and nothing else. Usualy made for comparison .

What was “The Face of the Times”?

August Sander‘s publication of portraits (human typologies) in 1920‘s. He was working with old-fahioned glass-plate negatives. Used categorisation based on 7 social types.

Which magazine did Rodchenko design?

USSR In Construction. Propaganda magazine, glorifying achievements of the soviet system. Included photomontage as well.

What is photo-montage?

Technique that took it‘s cue from cinema montage. Cutting, pasting, retouching, rephotographing pictures, text, drawings in order to change its meaning, intention.

Why did Eugene Atget use albumen prints in the 1920’s?

He said himself: ‚I don‘t know how to do that‘

What is solarisation and how was it discovered?

Photograhpic process, invented by Man Ray, french photographer. Process, that gives metalic impression on things, especially human skin.

What was the relationship between Bernice Abbott and

Eugene Atget?

Brought 5000 negatives of Atget to America

Why was Walker Evans fired from the FSA?
He could not make his personal vision conform to the propaganda requirements of the FSA.

ITAP. Genius of Photography. Part I

What is photography’s “true genius”?

Mainly photography is able to intrigue us by showing the secret strangeness that lies between the world of appearances. In almost 200 years photography has delighted us, served us, moved us, outraged us and occasionally dissapointed us.

Name a proto-photographer.

Henry Fox Talbot

In the 19th century, what term was associated with the

daguerreotype?

Mirror with a memory

What is the vernacular?

Genre of photography that contains journalistic, touristic, scientific, forensic photography, insurance records, court documents, passport photographs, postcards, boxing match records, all uses of photography, except art.

How do you “Fix the Shadows”?

Stoping picture from dissappearing, overexposing, creating a permanent image, that was impossible up until 1839.

What is the “carte de visite”?

Small photograph – a portrait – one of 8 in the sequence, shot wit camera with 8 lenses for commercial purposes.Type of photography introduced by frenchman Disderi. Smaller then postcard.

Who was Nadar and why was he so successful?

Gaspard-Felix Tounachon, french photographer, who revolutionised the world of portrait photography. He photographs up amd coming stars of Paris, but he is not setting up those scenes, except of the plain background, he takes pictures in his daylight studio – without any decotations, so his portraits are revolutionary natural, there is nothing to indicate what a profession is.

What is pictorialism?
„Serious“ art-photography, opposite to vernacular. Mean, moody, magnificent. People tried to establish photography as a branch of fine arts. Uzually manipulated, arrranged.