Experience Wednesday July 6, 2005
A photograph shows its subject by means of showing what experience is like; in that sense it provides an ‘experience of experience’, and it defines this as the significance of depiction.
(Veronica’s Revenge, Janus 1988: 90)
In painting the subject is arguably the dominant factor, whereas in photography it is the object. In the first case, the passive object is subjected to the sustained creative activity of the subject, while in the second the light rays reflected from the object are impressed on a passive surface. In some respects this underlies the continuing question, never properly resolved but continually asked – can photography be art? And if so, what kind of photography is art, considering that much of it isn’t: the commercial and documentary work that saturates contemporary society.
Cartier-Bresson’s ‘decisive moment’ provided a uniquely defining aesthetic, by which to understand photography. Hide Leica inside jacket, whip it out and get your picture, hoping for a transient but pleasing configuration of form, theme and narrative. It was quintessentially photo-journalistic and still accounts for the bulk of photographic practice, although not all of it. Choreographed photography collapses the boundaries between theatre and everyday life where you might have someone wearing a disguise and posing in ‘real’ situations, or exploring their childhood identity much as psychologist Alice Miller did with painting (see the book The Drama Of Being A Child), or by constructing a scenario with the detail and care used for cinematic staging. These ideas have been and still are being used by well-known photographers, who justify their work as a more progressive photographic strategy. Jeff Wall for example prefers “critical analysis” to the spontaneous gaze, consensual and theatrical staging rather than candid and non-consensual work, and presenting the world as a thing to be seen, rather than a collection of ‘things seen’ (Jeff Wall 2002: 165). In other words his photography is actively critical and intellectual, and his pictures invite you to engage with the same process.
What unites all photographic strategies is their phenomenological basis and their exploration of ‘experience’ in different ways, indicating what is arguably a more encompassing aesthetic than Cartier-Bresson’s: the subject-object relationship. The camera mediates this relationship, but unobtrusively and transparently, providing you with permanent 2D images for subsequent psychological reflection – not disimilar from Wordsworth’s ‘emotion recollected in tranquility’. That haunting facial expression, that dramatic exchange between two people, that moment of joy, of shock, of serenity….the photograph depicts exactly that, as a tiny but hopefully microcosmic reflection of macrocosmic meaning. And always, ultimately, testifying to the experience of the photographer being there. And in that respect, serving a similar purpose to the ‘mirror stage’ of psychological theorist Jacques Lacan, where a literal mirror reflection produces a psychic response that gives rise to the mental representation of an “I”. The infant identifies with the image, which serves as a gestalt of the infant’s emerging perceptions of selfhood. The photograph is a reference for experiential reality we recognise as comprised of various factors – genre, emotion, theme, composition etc. – aspects of life, photographically disclosed in the subject-object relationship, reconfigured in a nourishing aesthetic form.
After looking at the works by Jeff Wall, both first hand at the Tate Modern in London, and afterwards back at school, with analysis in mind, I conclude that they are a delicate balance between science and art, and are certainly relevant in today’s society, as works of art. Although I have had the benefit of living in the environment which Wall has featured in many of his photographs, I can also see how they would affect someone who is seeing the image for the first time. The way in which Wall has portrayed his subject matter is so truthful that the photographs have a real sense of place that is transferred to the viewer, so they may feel that they have actually visited the place, or would recognise it were they ever to visit.
Wall uses a wide range of techniques to create his images, which shows the skills and talent needed to be a successful photographer. Works such as the Flooded Grave, which took two years to complete show how patience and accuracy are also required, as the image was a digital montage of 75 others, which represents the scientific side of his work.
Jeff Walls photographs, though, are predominantly art, because of the way that he manages to draw the viewer into the photographed scenes, using a variety of creative techniques. In each photograph that I studied there was a real sense of place that was underlying in the overall theme of the photograph. Small details and dynamic angles have been used to catch the viewer’s attention, and bring them into the scene. Clipped Branches entices the viewer into using their imagination, and interacting with the image.
People, who look at the work of Jeff Wall without seeing the art and creativity behind it, and without seeing its relevance in today’s world, are missing out on the experience of truly seeing the Works of this great photographer.
— Amy Carver · Feb 16, 12:50 PM · §
Thanks Amy. I agree with your views on Wall’s ‘stature’ or importance; what particularly impresses me is the depth and sophistication of his thinking. I don’t see much of that, in the world of contemporary art. And as you point out, a great deal of work goes into his images.
— James Lomax · Feb 20, 01:34 PM · §