WORKSHOP RESOURCE WAYS OF LOOKING: LINES & LENSES
It’s not what you look at that matters, it’s what you see.
Henry David Thoreau
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This resource has been created for the Eye to Pencil workshop, Ways of Looking: Lines & Lenses. It explores relationships across drawing and photography, primarily as acts of seeing and engaging with the world. It has been developed for art teachers who also teach photography (or wish to do so), but is easily adaptable as a lesson resource for students, in particular for KS4 or 5.
INTRODUCTION
Let's start with a potentially daft question: what's the difference between a camera and a sketchbook?
Yes, they're two different things, made of two different materials. They look different and feel different, and if you were inclined to try (not necessarily encouraged), they'd likely smell and taste different too. But once we're past the obvious and tangible distinctions - and hopefully picking holes in the question - we're warmed up and ready. So, let's try this ...
How does making a photograph differ to making a drawing?
Are you more inclined to (say) take a photograph and make a drawing? How about record, craft, capture, sketch or shoot? Which words serve both processes equally? Which don't, and why?
What's the point in comparing two distinct ... mediums? techniques? processes? ... ways of looking or recording?
Photography and drawing are our focus. However, these words are broad, full of histories, and can apply (and be applied) to numerous actions and possibilities. But simply put, we're banging them together in playful and inquisitive ways to see what arises. Perhaps worth noting too, we're exploring two visual mediums but, mostly, we're reliant on words to facilitate and connect through this, so best give our word choices ongoing attention too.
Yes, they're two different things, made of two different materials. They look different and feel different, and if you were inclined to try (not necessarily encouraged), they'd likely smell and taste different too. But once we're past the obvious and tangible distinctions - and hopefully picking holes in the question - we're warmed up and ready. So, let's try this ...
How does making a photograph differ to making a drawing?
Are you more inclined to (say) take a photograph and make a drawing? How about record, craft, capture, sketch or shoot? Which words serve both processes equally? Which don't, and why?
What's the point in comparing two distinct ... mediums? techniques? processes? ... ways of looking or recording?
Photography and drawing are our focus. However, these words are broad, full of histories, and can apply (and be applied) to numerous actions and possibilities. But simply put, we're banging them together in playful and inquisitive ways to see what arises. Perhaps worth noting too, we're exploring two visual mediums but, mostly, we're reliant on words to facilitate and connect through this, so best give our word choices ongoing attention too.
Okay, not exactly a sketchbook or drawing but ... John Singer Seargent 'working plein air', and George R Lawrence's giant camera - purpose built in 1900 for Chicago & Alton Railway to photograph a full-length train.
What are your own preferences and practices when it comes to drawing and photography? How do you tend to use these mediums? Do you prize one over the other? Which words help to describe your allegiances and interests or hesitencies?
How does making a photograph or drawing help us to engage* with the world? How do their distinct properties and possibilities lead us one way or another? *Note: I'm using the word 'engage' here, but the alternatives are numerous - record, interact, encounter, question, translate, challenge, understand, and so on. It's an issue. When writing a resource such as this (at least for me), almost every word, question or statement seems to open additional options and possibilities, so let's agree now that it's impossible to cover all bases.
Write a two-column list of keywords for drawing and photography - words that relate to your personal interests in these fields. You might include genres, styles, techniques or concepts that appeal; you could use descriptive language relating to thoughts, feelings and associations. Do this quickly and don't be precious - this is simply a word-bank warm-up!
But then again, on reflection, what might these keywords tell us about ourselves, or others, or wider matters - such as our take on convenience, sensation, culture or values? How might these various words be grouped, connected and (re)ordered to be more or less visual, provoking or poetic?
How does making a photograph or drawing help us to engage* with the world? How do their distinct properties and possibilities lead us one way or another? *Note: I'm using the word 'engage' here, but the alternatives are numerous - record, interact, encounter, question, translate, challenge, understand, and so on. It's an issue. When writing a resource such as this (at least for me), almost every word, question or statement seems to open additional options and possibilities, so let's agree now that it's impossible to cover all bases.
Write a two-column list of keywords for drawing and photography - words that relate to your personal interests in these fields. You might include genres, styles, techniques or concepts that appeal; you could use descriptive language relating to thoughts, feelings and associations. Do this quickly and don't be precious - this is simply a word-bank warm-up!
But then again, on reflection, what might these keywords tell us about ourselves, or others, or wider matters - such as our take on convenience, sensation, culture or values? How might these various words be grouped, connected and (re)ordered to be more or less visual, provoking or poetic?
LINES & LENSES: A BIGGER PICTURE
For our workshop at Eye to Pencil, the resources and activities that follow do also have a couple of wider inspirations. These are introduced briefly below:
1. The Studio as Muse (including surroundings and participants)
1. The Studio as Muse (including surroundings and participants)
It saddens me to write this, but the wonderful Eye to Pencil Drawing Studio will close its doors in 2025. It is a remarkable space for making, observing and collaborating. With this in mind, it feels fitting to use the studio as a muse for our experiments here.
Photography, of course, has long been associated with a desire for preservation, be it for personal memory or historical record. And drawing also holds both history and potential for this, so we will touch on these themes. However, even with the studio as starting point and stimulus, the emphasis is less on the representational or romanticised depiction of this subject, and more on the thinking, sharing, processes and connections that might emerge through experimentation. (Which is how the studio would like it, I'm sure).
Photography, of course, has long been associated with a desire for preservation, be it for personal memory or historical record. And drawing also holds both history and potential for this, so we will touch on these themes. However, even with the studio as starting point and stimulus, the emphasis is less on the representational or romanticised depiction of this subject, and more on the thinking, sharing, processes and connections that might emerge through experimentation. (Which is how the studio would like it, I'm sure).
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A few prompts ...
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2. An Attempt at Exhausting a Place
to try meticulously to retain something, to cause something to survive; to wrest a few precise scraps from the void as it grows, to leave somewhere a furrow, a trace, a mark or a few signs.
Georges Perec
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Georges Perec (7 March 1936 – 3 March 1982) was a French writer and filmmaker. He was a member of the Oulipo group, a small but radical collective of writers who were interested in seeking new structures and patterns for writing - often by devising challenging or seemingly surreal constraints. Perec, for example, once wrote a novel without using the letter 'e'.
In An Attempt at Exhausting a Place in Paris, Perec compiled a melancholic and oddly touching document in which, as the title suggests, he sought to exhaust a place in Paris, specifically Place Saint-Sulpice. From behind cafe windows, Perec recorded everything that passed through his field of vision. This included the humdrum, the non-event, the everyday - "what happens," as he put it, "when nothing happens". Everything is noticed and noted - the people walking by; the buses and cars; the pigeons moving suddenly en masse; a wedding (and then a funeral); the signs, symbols and slogans. How might Perec's attention to details - including the seemingly insignificant - be of relevance or inspiration to our own acts of attention and observation? Which visual artists or photographers might have comparable approaches to Perec? |
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Excerpt from Georges Perec's 'An Attempt at Exhausting a Place in Paris'
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Activity
Spend one full minute writing an inventory of everything that you see in your immediate field of vision. Do this as quick as possible, one item/object/observation per line. Try to avoid making decisions of what to include or not; simply list everything that enters your eyeballs and registers for registering. Let instinct, intuition and/or immediacy dictate the descriptive detail you use. For example, a hat might simply be a hat, a green hat, or a green bobble hat on a chair. How does your list compare to others created in the group? Is yours similar to the person next to you, for example, or is it quite distinct? How might this exercise compare to drawing or photography, or even poetry? Could the one minute time limit be compared to a camera's shutter speed? Could your list be used by yourself or others to initiate drawing and/or photography? If so, what possibilities or considerations arise? ('Invitations' is another way to think about this - how one action can open another pathway for exploration, if alert to such things). How might your list and others be reorganised or presented to become more 'accurate', surreal or poetic? |
LENSES, LIGHT AND BLACK MIRRORS
Turn your phones off. The following introductory activity involves concentration. Or, rather, it requires a black mirror or (convex) lens to concentrate your view (or three lenses, if you also include your eyes). Read on to find out more ...
The Claude glass, above left, is named after the French 17th century landscape painter Claude Lorraine. Claude glasses have the effect of reducing and simplifying the colour and tonal range of scenes and scenery to give them a painterly quality. The user would turn their back on the scene to observe the framed view through the convex tinted mirror—in a sort of pre-photographic lens (perhaps comparable to an Instagram filter). Claude glasses were widely used by tourists and amateur artists in the 18th Century, as shown in the central drawing by Thomas Gainsborough. Source.
A Claude glass was also known as a 'black mirror', a title now more likely associated with Charlie Brooker's TV show, named after the black reflective surface of a turned-off gadget, such as a phone, tablet or TV screen. Conveniently, a turned-off screen will also function as an acceptable Claude glass.
Activity
What other connections, ideas or possibilities - invitations! - arise from the various stages of this activity? What wider links can you make to each of the stages listed below?
A Claude glass was also known as a 'black mirror', a title now more likely associated with Charlie Brooker's TV show, named after the black reflective surface of a turned-off gadget, such as a phone, tablet or TV screen. Conveniently, a turned-off screen will also function as an acceptable Claude glass.
Activity
- Hold your black mirror in front of you (i.e. your switched-off phone or a blackened lens, provided). Pay close attention to what is reflected. Move the black mirror around and notice how tones are reduced and objects appear more distinctly layered in space, perhaps comparable to a diorama.
- Holding your black mirror, create a 'selfie' using an eraser and the carbon paper provided (Tip: tape the paper down first to limit its movement).
What other connections, ideas or possibilities - invitations! - arise from the various stages of this activity? What wider links can you make to each of the stages listed below?
- a reflection/self portrait on a phone screen;
- drawing with a rubber, bringing light to dark;
- having varying degrees of control and predictability - and the satisfaction/dissatisfaction with this;
- Developing a collaborative group of portraits with a pre-defined medium
Profile PICTURES
This activity extends on the previous task whilst casting a light on some historic drawing and photographic concerns. To my mind, the term 'profile picture' has an inviting dual meaning here - historically, a head viewed from the side; now more associated with an image or avatar that represents a person on social media.
From left to right: The Invention of Drawing, by Joseph-Benoît Suvée (Belgian, 1743 – 1807); Sir Robert Hooke's 15th Century proposal for a “wearable” camera obscura he called a “Picture Box”; Alexander Alexander’s (I know!) Graphic Mirror, The Magazine of Science, Jan. 25, 1840 - a camera lucida.
Pliny the Elder was a Roman author and philosopher who wrote the encyclopedic Naturalis Historia (Natural History). Within this he wrote: the geographical “origin of painting is uncertain,” yet “all agree that it began with tracing an outline around a man’s shadow”. Pliny the Elder then tells that the earliest artist to have made a shadow silhouette was called Dibutades, the daughter of a potter of the same name (fl.600 BC). She was a Corinthian who traced her lover’s profile on a wall by candlelight before he left to go on a journey. The first image above, dramatically re-stages and romanticises this myth which as been re-told and repeatedly depicted throughout history.
A camera obscura is a darkened box or room with a small hole through which an image is projected onto an inside wall or surface. Without a lens, it is commonly known as a pinhole camera. Camera obscuras have been used since the second half of the 16th century and became popular as aids for drawing and painting. The central image above shows a “wearable” camera obscura for artist-use, as proposed by Robert Hooke, a 17th Century Physicist.
A camera lucida is an optical device used as a drawing aid by artists and others, patented in 1806 but detailed in documents 200 years earlier. When looking through a camera lucida, the artist sees both scene and drawing surface simultaneously, as in a photographic double exposure. This allows the artist to duplicate key points of the scene to aid the accurate rendering of perspective.
A camera obscura is a darkened box or room with a small hole through which an image is projected onto an inside wall or surface. Without a lens, it is commonly known as a pinhole camera. Camera obscuras have been used since the second half of the 16th century and became popular as aids for drawing and painting. The central image above shows a “wearable” camera obscura for artist-use, as proposed by Robert Hooke, a 17th Century Physicist.
A camera lucida is an optical device used as a drawing aid by artists and others, patented in 1806 but detailed in documents 200 years earlier. When looking through a camera lucida, the artist sees both scene and drawing surface simultaneously, as in a photographic double exposure. This allows the artist to duplicate key points of the scene to aid the accurate rendering of perspective.
Portrait of a woman to right, by Gilles Louis Chrétien; Woman in Profile with Lace Collar and Shawl, by Albert Sands, 1850 - a daguerreotype, exposed in a camera obscura and developed in mercury vapors.
A photograph is not only an image (as a painting is an image), an interpretation of the real; it is also a trace, something directly stencilled off the real, like a footprint or a death mask.
SUSAN SONTAG
Since its invention, a primary subject for photography has been the human face, often as a means of study and identification, and not always as a force for good. Whilst early commercial portrait studios mostly catered for middle class aspirations by using photography to confirm character and status, some scientists - and pseudoscientists - were embracing photography's seemingly objective eye. Issues abound here. For example, read the sentences below in relation to the images above (from left to right), and then consider the following questions.
- French police officer and biometrics researcher, Alphonse Bertillon applied anthropological techniques to law enforcement. He created a flawed identification system for criminals based on physical measurements.
- Anthropometric portraits were a scientific genre that invited readers to compare different races from all over the world. What appears as objective recordings tell little of the harsh colonial assertions, motivations and practices.
- Francis Galton was founder of the Eugenics movement. He believed photographs helped communicate the goals of Eugenics - primarily determining who should and should not produce children. During the Nazi era in Germany, eugenics prompted the sterilisation of several hundred thousand people then helped lead to antisemitic programmes of euthanasia and ultimately, of course, to the death camps.
A few questions to consider before completing the next task ...
- How might the process of taking someone else's portrait be utilised as a positive force for connecting and collaborating? How would you feel if someone you didn't know was taking your picture - what, if anything, would you want them to be mindful of? Once completed, who owns the image? Who decides how this might be used or where it might be shared?
- How might you set about photographing a stranger's portrait? What are some of the potential considerations - be these visual, technical, conceptual or contextual?
- What nuances in the process and interactions of taking a side-profile portrait might vary its degrees of objectivity and subjectivity?
Activity: Part 1
For these collaborative experiments, each participant will need a phone with a camera and a sound/voice recorder app; some tracing paper and/or white card to draw on - cut to the same size as phones; a pencil.
For these collaborative experiments, each participant will need a phone with a camera and a sound/voice recorder app; some tracing paper and/or white card to draw on - cut to the same size as phones; a pencil.
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From left: Profile-related hand-rendered works, by Henri Matisse, Leonardo Da Vinci, and Kara Walker. These works - by different hands, from different eras and with different motivations - have been deliberately ordered in this sequence in response to the task above, but the order of the last two is debatable (don't you think?).
Activity: Part 2
The following activity extends on the previous one to consider alternative ways of recording.
1. Maintaining the same positions as above, and working to an agreed time limit (e.g. 3 minutes), all participants should simultaneously complete an observational drawing of their subject in side-profile. However ...
2. Before beginning, frame the subject in position, carefully study this on screen, and then take a photograph (again).
3. Switch phone from camera mode to audio recording mode. Place the pre-prepared paper upon the phone - still held in position - in preparation for drawing.
Potential points for reflection and discussion at this stage:
The following activity extends on the previous one to consider alternative ways of recording.
1. Maintaining the same positions as above, and working to an agreed time limit (e.g. 3 minutes), all participants should simultaneously complete an observational drawing of their subject in side-profile. However ...
2. Before beginning, frame the subject in position, carefully study this on screen, and then take a photograph (again).
3. Switch phone from camera mode to audio recording mode. Place the pre-prepared paper upon the phone - still held in position - in preparation for drawing.
Potential points for reflection and discussion at this stage:
- how the camera reveals itself and obscures the view - something here about the (often illusionary) directness of the camera, and its (in)visibility.
- the various 'lags' in acts of recording - how photography and drawing might compare in terms of their directness, immediacy and fluidity.
Once the drawing is complete, participants will have 3 different types of recording - the original photo, the drawing and a sound recording.
- Consider/discuss the 'value' of each recording. What appeal or possibilities arise, individually and/or collectively?
- How do other factors influence judgement of these - for example, self-consciousness, or perhaps a desire to compliment (or at least not offend) the subject?
- Do the sound recordings add interest to this experiment? Is a sound recording comparable to photography and/or drawing?
- What might these sound files look like as visual images? For example, as a waveform graphic or a spectogram, or your own abstract (or not) drawing as a subsequent response to the recording? How might sound data compare with a histogram of the photograph?
From left: A histogram of a profile portrait; a section of the recorded sound waveform; a spectogram created from the recording.
In reflecting on the value of these recordings - a drawing, a photograph and a sound - do you/others tend to value the representational and most accessible outcome over processes or conceptual leaps?
In reflecting on the value of these recordings - a drawing, a photograph and a sound - do you/others tend to value the representational and most accessible outcome over processes or conceptual leaps?
TRACES, TOUCHES, TENSIONS
What I want to do is to make visible existence, visible connections and visible relations appear more clearly. And to cause non-visible existence, non-visible connections and non-visible relations to appear. And to cause visible existence, visible connections and visible relations not to appear. Keiji Uematsu
The quote above by Keiji Uematsu appears contradictory, or maybe suggests continual states of transition. With this in mind, the 3 images below (and paired quotes from Teju Cole) have been chosen to provoke sensitive reflection and discussion on how photographs - by chance or design - can emit and/or evoke complex and contradictory thoughts and sensations. Also up for consideration is how photographs can function as, or evolve into, self-referential acts.
Bruce Davidson Subway. New York City, USA. 1980
ColoUr is the sound an object makes in response to light. Objects don’t speak unless spoken to. An object does not have a coloUr—it makes a coloUr (the way a bell makes a sound). TEJU COLE
Gabriel Orozco, Breath on Piano (1993)
it takes a moment after the first glance to know what the picture is about. You don't so much see the image as let it dissolve into your consciousness, like a tablet in a glass of water. Teju Cole
Keiji Uematsu, Wave Motion I, 1976
I stand and listen to the small movements in things. I listen with my camera, for the camera is a kind of microphone. TEJU COLE
About looking ...
Consider the 3 images carefully, firstly how they land when you first encounter them - the thoughts, connections, sensations, memories or existing knowledge that is evoked. Following this, it might be helpful to focus on a particular aspect, for example, content and subject matter; potential genres, intentions or purposes; visual/formal qualities; technical considerations; or wider contextual and/or conceptual concerns or connections. You might wish to research the works or artists further.
Now try this ...
Consider the 3 images carefully, firstly how they land when you first encounter them - the thoughts, connections, sensations, memories or existing knowledge that is evoked. Following this, it might be helpful to focus on a particular aspect, for example, content and subject matter; potential genres, intentions or purposes; visual/formal qualities; technical considerations; or wider contextual and/or conceptual concerns or connections. You might wish to research the works or artists further.
Now try this ...
- What happens when you put one singular word below or alongside each image? How about a word such as 'Trace', 'Touch' or 'Tension'? How do these influence your readings and interpretations?
- How might these words help to connect the images in logical or imaginative ways?
- Which other words might help to do this? Alternatively, what happens if an arbitrary word is paired with an image - a word generated entirely by chance? How does this then shift its reading?
- Is it really possible for a fixed flat image to contain movement, depth, texture, or even sound?
- If these images were drawings, how might their power or potential alter?
Activity
Taking inspiration from the previous images and related discussions, explore the studio space in response to the words Trace, Touch, and/or Tension. Produce observational drawing(s) and/or photography work (using media and subject matter of your choosing) to be added to the shared studio wall. Below are some additional prompts to support this.
Taking inspiration from the previous images and related discussions, explore the studio space in response to the words Trace, Touch, and/or Tension. Produce observational drawing(s) and/or photography work (using media and subject matter of your choosing) to be added to the shared studio wall. Below are some additional prompts to support this.
- How might your drawing/experiments be influenced by photographic 'looking', be it related to choices of materials, techniques, genres or concepts? For example, how might you produce a documentary-style drawing? How might this compare to a more objective approach or, alternatively, a quest for something more ambiguous and/or poetic?
- How might you produce an observational drawing/experiment that also references or reflects on drawing itself, be it directly via subject matter, or by taking a more conceptual or experimental approach?
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Additional resource 1 - photographs as windows and mirrors. Click on the image to watch Photographer Paul Graham talking about three bodies of work he made in the United States between 1998 and 2011 - American Night (1998–2002), a shimmer of possibility (2004–06), and The Present (2009–11). He is very articulate about how these three bodies of work are linked by common subject matter and underlying issues such as racial and social inequality, and also the nature of sight, perception, and photography itself. |
In the video clip, Paul Graham makes reference to 3 primary controls on a camera - shutter speed (controlling exposure time), aperture (controlling how much light comes in) and focus (controlling what is seen clearly, or not).
How might these considerations be imaginatively utilised for your studio-based drawing experiments?
For example:
Additional resource 2 - drawing as action and self-referential investigation
The following drawings were produced by Charlie, a Year 13 student. In setting out to produce a large-scale pencil drawing of the molecular structure of graphine (that forms graphite within pencils), Charlie also devised a series of methods for documenting, preserving and interrogating his materials and processes.
How might these considerations be imaginatively utilised for your studio-based drawing experiments?
For example:
- Can you create a drawing that is only limited to the time you have between blinking?
- How might you produce a drawing that is under or over-exposed? What materials might lend themselves to this? Is it more 'photographic' to work from light to dark (e.g. on white paper), or dark to light (e.g using a rubber on charcoal)?
- How might you experiment with focal points/depths of field via drawing and mark making (for example, attempting to draw something out of focus)?
- What might it be like to draw on a small scale - for example on clear 35mm film (to be provided) - and then project these up to play with focal points?
Additional resource 2 - drawing as action and self-referential investigation
The following drawings were produced by Charlie, a Year 13 student. In setting out to produce a large-scale pencil drawing of the molecular structure of graphine (that forms graphite within pencils), Charlie also devised a series of methods for documenting, preserving and interrogating his materials and processes.
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WAYS OF SEEING
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The title for this section, perhaps obviously, has been lifted from John Berger's seminal 1972 essays and TV series. You can click on the image to view the first episode. In this Berger is preoccupied with how photography has influenced how we look at painting, which is not entirely relevant to where we might be going with this (but who knows), and regardless, Berger still makes for profoundly rewarding viewing.
What John Berger does so well, to my mind, is promote a heightened level of critical thinking and engagement with the visual. His choice of words is sharp and his focus is clear, but in destabilising traditional western aesthetics he opens up new frequencies for seeing and questioning that also create uncertainty and ambiguity. This section shares some further examples of photography as potential provocations for drawing and mark making experiments. The attention here is on alternative ways of responding to what is seen, sometimes in ways that either deliberately challenge, or knowingly evoke, established methods. |
Coming up for Air, 2008-2009, Stephen Gill
Coming up for Air is a photo book by British photographer Stephen Gill. It is is the result of a body of work made in Japan between 2008 & 2009. Though the images were made in Japan they are more of a reaction to Gill's life in London at that time. Gill describes this work like muffled sounds when swimming beneath water. A fictional aquatic world as if viewed from the other side of an aquarium looking outwards. The series, likely influenced by Gill's noticing of the sheer quantity of fish tanks in Japanese restaurants, is more of a reaction to the modern world rather than an attempted description of it. Source.
A few questions ...
A few questions ...
- To what extend can a photograph or series of images express a state of mind? Gill has stated that this work is a reaction to the modern world, but what sort of reaction (aside from taking photographs) might this be?
- How does seeing the images above as pairs (and/or collectively) influence how they are read? Is it appropriate to consider each double page a diptych? How do you 'read' two images when encountered like this?
- How might you respond to the studio space in ways that have an affinity or connection to Gill's approach here?
- How might you pair and display your drawings/images (or those of others) to initiate interesting contrasts or connections?
I happen to believe in the beauty of simple things. I believe that the most uninteresting thing can be very interesting. SAUL LEITER
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Saul Leiter was an American artist and photographer best known for his colour photographs taken in New York in the 1950s. However, he was also a lifelong painter and his abstracted forms and radically innovative compositions within his photographs have a distinct painterly quality influence by his Abstract Expressionist contemporaries of that time.
Activity
Both Stephen Gill and Saul Leiter, in different ways and to varying degrees, have embraced the potential of the camera to obscure, blur and abstract. The following task, in playful and potentially performative ways, reverses this interpretation and invites you to distort what you see and subsequently respond through mark making.
Both Stephen Gill and Saul Leiter, in different ways and to varying degrees, have embraced the potential of the camera to obscure, blur and abstract. The following task, in playful and potentially performative ways, reverses this interpretation and invites you to distort what you see and subsequently respond through mark making.
- Using the magnifying lens and cardboard provided, construct headwear/eyewear that obscures and distorts your vision. Respond to what you see via drawing, mark making and/or collage.
…and to draw a bright white line with light (11.2), 2011, printed 2021, Uta Barth.
In this series, above, Uta Barth manipulated light to “draw” lines that she then photographed. After noticing a horizontal sliver of light on the diaphanous curtains in her bedroom, she began to maneuver the fabric, altering the shape of the beam, which grew in width in the waning hours of the day. By sequencing the panels to show ever-widening bands of light, she made the passage of time palpable. Source
Compositions of Light on White (Composition #12), 2011, Uta Barth
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In the Light and Shadow of Morandi, 2017, Uta Barth
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In her home, Uta Barth observed rectilinear shapes of light cast on a set of closet doors. She strategically opened and closed the window shades to manipulate blocks of light and shadow, organising them into a pictorial composition. Barth has repeatedly drawn inspiration from twentieth-century painters, with a specific interest in artists who continually returned to a motif or method of creation. This series shows the influence of geometric abstraction as developed by the Modernist Dutch painter Piet Mondrian (1872–1944). Barth's 'In the light and Shadow of Morandi' series contain colourful refractions and stark shadows of glass vessels. As the title suggests, this body of work is an homage to the canvases of the Italian painter Giorgio Morandi (1890–1964), whose still lifes often feature humble domestic containers rendered in a manner to emphasise their sculptural forms. Source
A few questions ...
- Does Barth's work acquire additional value through its visual and/or intellectual nodding to artists firmly established within the Modernist canon?
- Is it easier (or more enjoyable, rewarding profitable ...) to produce work under the guise of 'homage' than to develop something distinctly unique?
- What would a drawn, collaged or painted homage to Uta Barth's homages look like (or is that a meta-silly idea)? Or, alternatively, which artist or art movement might you choose to reference through your own studio-based experiments?
ADDITIONAL PROMPTS & POSSIBILITIES
The following (and incomplete/ongoing) notes relate to potential ideas for drawing tasks inspired by photography:
- Using film negative wallets to write sequences of descriptions and/or draw responses to these - exploring composition possibilities.
- Why are camera lenses round and photographs straight-edged? How might this conversion be explored through drawing?
- Could 'blind' drawings (observing what you see but not what you draw) be compared to film photography (and some forms of printmaking) in that they involve uncertainty, anticipation and a wait to see the results?
- How might you draw in the style of a particular photographer or genre, or photograph in the style of an artist?
- Exploring edges and frames - drawing/extending beyond photographs, drawing on the frames of viewfinders, exploring deliberate and abrupt cropping Vs formal framing.
- Exploring how photographs become less/lighter with time (over exposure), yet drawing (paper) becomes more marked.
ADDITIONAL READING
The Photograph as Contemporary Art - Charlotte Cotton
The Ongoing Moment - Geoff Dyer
Photography - Stephen Bull
The Nature of Photographs - Stephen Shore
On Photography/Regarding the Pain of Others - Susan Sontag
About Looking/Ways of Seeing/Understanding a Photograph - John Berger
Photography - David Bate
On Street Photography & The Poetic Image - Alex Webb and Rebecca Norris Webb
The Ongoing Moment - Geoff Dyer
Photography - Stephen Bull
The Nature of Photographs - Stephen Shore
On Photography/Regarding the Pain of Others - Susan Sontag
About Looking/Ways of Seeing/Understanding a Photograph - John Berger
Photography - David Bate
On Street Photography & The Poetic Image - Alex Webb and Rebecca Norris Webb
IMAGES FROM THE EYE TO PENCIL WORKSHOP
Images above by Alex Clarke
