Re-photo

Part of the ‘thematic’ area of the exhibition

On Wednesday I went to see ‘Scarcity and Waste‘, an exhibition of the second Syngenta Photography Award, currently showing at Somerset House, London until 10 April 2015, free, and open daily from 10.00-18.00.

Rasel Chowdury and Karen Irvine

It’s an interesting show, and I was pleased to be taken with other bloggers on a tour of it by one of the jury, Karen Irvine, the Curator and Associate Director of the Museum of Contemporary Photography at Columbia College, Chicago, who also chaired a panel of four of the award-winning photographers. It was interesting to hear them talking about their work, and also to have the opportunity to talk with them and drink a glass or two of wine afterwards.

Rasel Chowdury talks with a man from Syngenta

I’ll come to the photography later, but first I want to say something about Syngenta. Although it isn’t a name that immediately meant much to me, I find it is the world’s second largest agro-company, and while walking around the show before the guided tour I began to feel just a few little seeds of doubt. And on coming home, my thoughts were confirmed when I googled ‘Seeds of Debt‘, made by Danish filmmaker Jens Pedersen, a film which blames Syngenta for suicides by Indian farmers unable to repay their debts. After threats of legal action by Syngenta, the film rights were purchased by DanWatch, “an independent media and research centre that investigates the impact of businesses on humans and the environment world-wide” whose Editor in Chief Louise Voller said they took full responsibility for its content, commenting: “We believe the message is too important. When companies like Syngenta try to threathen journalist, documentarists and vulnerable sources to silence them, we at DanWatch will take lead in making sure, that investigative journalism with documentation of human rights violations is published.”

You can watch the full 30 minute film online, or get a quick summary from the 47s trailer. Syngenta in January published a rebuttal, Looking after those who produce our seeds which you can also read, which elicited a replay by DanWatch the following day, standing by the allegations made in the film.

India isn’t the only place that Syngenta has hit the headlines, with at least two big stories from the USA. One, according to lawyers Wright & Schulte LLC is about the claims filed against them by “hundreds of U.S. farmers, corn growers, exporters and distributers…. after they allegedly incurred significant financial losses due to Syngenta, Inc.’s attempt to commercialize its Viptera GMO (genetically-modified) corn seed before the product was approved by Chinese regulators” and the other, perhaps more relevant to the exhibition, was settled in 2012, when Syngenta reached a $105 million settlement with over 1,000 MidWest community water suppliers over allegations in a class action pursued for over 8 years that  agricultural herbicide Atrazine had contaminated water supplies. A water supplier alleged in 2004  “that Syngenta knew atrazine would run off into surface water but decided to market the product with complete disregard for the expense water providers would ultimately pay to remove the chemical from the water before supplying it to consumers.”

Having said that – and its information that you certainly won’t find in the material generously provided at the show or on the Sygenta Photo web site – the photography on display, whatever one may think of the corporate entity funding the show, certainly addresses fairly bluntly some of the major issues the world faces. Who too can argue with the premise of the show “In a world of limited resources, scarcity and waste have become fundamental social, political and environmental issues of our time“? Or with the conclusion “Something needs to change.” Though we might disagree rather fundamentally about the nature and direction of those changes. And perhaps shows like this may also lead at least some people to question the role of agribusiness generally – and Sygenta in particular – in actually creating some of the problems that we increasingly face.

Back to the photographs – and I deliberately haven’t included any of there here as they are shown better on the exhibition web site than I could. So I’ll include some appropriate links.

Mustafah Abdulaziz

Mustafah Abdulaziz, born in New York and based in Berlin, was certainly a worthy winner with the ten superb images you can see online. Although the top of the page has a slide show, it’s better to scroll down below to the grid of images and click on the grey rectangle, when the individual images then appear with their captions. Although these are powerful images, I think it devalues them to be seen without this essential context. Abdulaziz spoke eloquently about his work, and I was told that there will be video of the talk available on the site later.

Entrants for the Professional Commision are also required to submit a proposal for a further project related to the theme. At first I was a little surprised, even a little disappointed, that Abdulaziz’s proposal was “to look at California through the prism of water” (read more about it at the bottom of the web site page.) But on reflection it certainly makdes a lot of sense – the USA is of course the most profligate consumer of the world’s limited resources and will surely need to change more than the rest of the world.

Mustafah Abdulaziz, Richard Allenby-Pratt and Rasel Chowdhury talking

I found Rasel Chowdhury‘s work challenging. His chosen subject – the killing of Dhaka’s river by urbanisation and largely uncontrolled industrial activity – and in particular his treatment of it in dull, subdued and sombre tones is powerful, so much so that I found it hard to stay long in the room that houses it. In the leaflet and on the web site the images seem a little less extreme, perhaps rather warmer. But these are certainly not pictures I would want to hang on my wall.

Richard Allenby-Pratt

Third place went to UK photographer Richard Allenby-Pratt who has been based for some years in Dubai. Working as a commercial photographer, the landscape images from the UAE in his project ‘Consumption’ are a personal project  which  “explores aspects of the supply chain associated with the modern consumer; from the extraction of resources, to processing, manufacturing, energy production, construction, food production, logistics and retail, through to waste management and reuse.”

On the wall, I found these works rather cold, and I think they come over better on the web site (again better seen further down the page, where the captions also help to explain the inexplicable.) There is a surreal quality in thes images that appeals, particularly a half-built flyover, some pylons in the sea and trees left by gravel extraction), but on the wall I found the deliberate uniformity of approach which has very consciously been used for the project became just a little boring.  Some of the screen images seem just a little more definite than the prints and I think this is an improvement, though those pylons need to be viewed in the orginal.

Stefano De Luigi makes a point in the discussion

After the 3 rooms of the main prize-winners came the 3 winners of the Open Competition.  Benedikt Partenheimer‘s ‘Particulate Matter‘ with images through pollution with the location and air quality index as titles I think do need to be seen on the wall, and on the web lack the subtlety which is their major attraction. For me ShiziazHuang, AQI 360 was so much more impressive than the other two that I rather wish it had been the only one on show. Stefano De Luigi, winner of so many awards, including WPP in 1998, 2008 and 2010, had three great images, particularly one of a group of women attempting to get water from the bottom of a 20meter deep hole dug by villagers in Kenya, though his dead, twisted giraffe in a dried up riverbed is unforgettable.  Camille Michel’s pictures from Lapland of abandoned equipment on the fringes of Sami villages were certainly interesting. It was perhaps surprising that she was the only woman to feature in the prizewinners.

One of the questions raised at the talk concerned the tension between the aesthetic approach and the content of work addressing serious issues such as scarcity and waste.  It’s something I’ve sometimes felt difficult about in the work of photographers tackling environmental images which have produced beautiful images of hideeous pollution to be sold as high-priced art.  To a lesser extent it’s something we always face when making documentary images, the need to produce images which will interest people enough to get them looked at them while ‘telling it how it is’ and will also encouraging people to action.

The exhibition also includes several rooms of work by around 40 other photographers selected from the very large entry, which included quite a few images that intrigued or amused me, with a wide range of approaches. Although many were of interest, it seemed perhaps a little lacking in coherence. But certainly the show is worth a visit if you are in London.

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Although one can greatly admire the ingenuity and professionalism of both photographer Sandro Miller and “legendary Hollywood A-Lister John Malkovich” (I had to look him up, but that just shows how out of touch I am) and presumably also the makeup artists etc involved, the work in ‘Malkovich, Malkovich, Malkovich: Homage to photographic masters‘ recently shown at the Catherine Edelman Gallery and on sale as ‘pigment prints’ (which almost certainly means inkjet prints using pigment-based ‘inks’) in editions of 35 + 5 artists proofs at prices from $3,200 to $12,000, raises a number of questions.

In his discussion of the work in The Photographer and the Painting (5), A D Coleman looks mainly at the copyright angle, and whether the aping of famous images by well-known photographers, mainly still in copyright, could possibly constitute ‘fair use’ under US copyright law. Although careful to disclaim any legal expertise, he  details his thoughts on the subject using the University of Minnesota’s online ‘Thinking Through Fair Use‘ which appears to me to be very useful tool. Though again they add a clear disclaimer: “it does NOT tell you whether a proposed use is fair or not, and does NOT provide any kind of legal advice. It simply helps you structure your own reflections about the fair use factors, and provides a record that you did consider relevant issues.”

Coleman also provides a link to Bored Panda which publishes 16 pairs of images, putting the remake by Miller/Malkovitch next to the original images which have been recreated, so you can judge how closely they have acheived the aim of reproducing the original works.

My initial reaction to these image pairs was “how very clever, but how entirely pointless“. And on further reflection, I think it was absolutely correct. What is the point? Other than of course to make money for Miller and the gallery (and perhaps Malkovich, who with more than 70 films under his belt, a video game and an Italian clothing line surely doesn’t need it?) And Coleman questions “The creative ethicality, if I may call it that, of generating such straightforwardly replicative ‘derivative works,’ even if legal questions don’t pertain.” Absolutely so.

What is perhaps most surprising is to learn from Coleman not only that Miller informed him that he took legal advice which told him thatthe work would be covered by “fair use”, but that the possible legal problems have not been mentioned in the many publications on the work which he lists in his post. I don’t expect it’s possible to sue lawyers for their advice, but if so I think it fairly likely that Miller may have to do so. But of course I’m not a lawyer either.

I imagine the images will sell, if only because a man who has been in over 70 films must surely have fans, some of whom are sure to have more money than sense. As a commercial proposition it would seem to make sense, but it is the commercial possibility that seems to this non-lawyer to be both something that makes ‘fair use’ far less likely to apply and also to greatly increase the chances that one of the rights-holders in the 40 out of the 42 images not in the public domain will sue.

When I taught photography, it wasn’t unusual for students to copy or attempt to copy works by well-known photographers, though usually their efforts were usually so different from the originals despite their intentions that there would have been zero danger of a law suit. But after they had done so, I would discuss with them what they had learnt from the exercise and tell them to go out and make their own work. We all learn by ‘beg, borrow and steal’, or to put it more positively, exploring the tradition and becoming a part of it, but our aim should surely be to contribute, rather than simply replicate the work of others.

I came across another case which is more debatable on Sunday, when a photographer pointed out in an online forum that a picture of sculptor Hans Haacke holding up his design for the new sculpture on Trafalgar Square’s fourth plinth published in The Guardian and attributed to “Hans Haacke/VG Bild-Kunst. Courtesy of the artist and Paula Cooper Gallery, New York” was rather similar to one he had made earlier and that was published in the New York Times last October.

There are of course similarities as you can see from the links above. It is the same man, and he is holding up the same drawing. And being known for his dislike of having his face photographed he is holding the drawing in front of most of his face.  But there are also clear differences. In the image in the Guardian the framing is portrait which I think better suits the subject, and Haacke holds the image up with two hands instead of one. He also carefully holds his drawing so that none of the horse is obscured, and the photographer has shown rather more of his black glasses, the arc of which at the left of the white print is important in the image.

There is a delicate line to be drawn. I’ve photographed Tower Bridge many times, but would not claim any breach of my rights in anyone else’s photograph of that building, even if taken from exactly the same position. For the photographer to have a valid claim I think he would have to persuade a court that Haacke had never ever held up a photograph or drawing in front of his face before, and that he was the first photographer ever to have got him to do that – or perhaps even to have got any other artist to do the same thing. It would be tough.

I’ve taken far too many pictures of people holding things in front of their faces, usually when I don’t want them to, but also on a few occasions when people haven’t wanted their face to be shown. Resemblance it seems to me isn’t enough, there has to be some real originality to claim infringement, and for me the idea isn’t orginal enough and the similarity perhaps not close enough. Of course a court might see it differently. Again, IANAL.

There was clearly an originality about Doisneau’s ‘Picasso and the Loaves‘, with two “main de Nice” replacing the painter’s hands, and it’s something that has been reused by some others, in a way that I think is fair use.  But I dimly recall a case where Doisneau’s estate prevented a rip-off of this image being used in an advertisement.

I’ve always beeen a little ambivalent about the work of Nan Goldin, and it seems a totally appropriate reaction.  A recently published feature on her on Dangerous Minds is labelled with the topics: Art; Drugs; Queer; Sex; Unorthodox; often I wonder if my own interest in the pictures might be labelled prurient. Not that I would consider them pornographic or abusive (unlike the Gateshead police). But I certainly find her work interesting.

The article, Being human: Sexuality, gender and belonging to family in Nan Goldin’s photography (NSFW) might not be safe for your work, but seems fairly tame for mine and includes a fairly short video of Goldin talking about her life and work. Although she speaks with great candour, and her work has made aspects of her life very public, I sometimes feel she does not entirely admit (perhaps even to herself) the control she exerts in making her images.

Commenting many years ago I wrote about her work “It only offers us glimpses, framed and caught with more or less skill by the person who directs it – and Goldin’s control as a director is remarkable.” Even when she is in bed and using a long cable release to a camera placed earlier on a tripod across the room.

One of the skills that distinguish good photographers of events develop is that of visualising a scene from a different viewpoint.  When you may see something happening while you may immediately make an exposure even though you are not in the right position just in case,  but the first reaction is to think where your camera should be to best photograph the scene, and to try to get there.  If the camera is fixed and you are in a different position, choosing the right moment to press the release is not largely a matter of chance but again of visualisation. And of course after the event editing, selecting the images that work best.

I first wrote about her after seeing her work in the book, The Ballad of Sexual Dependency, (you can see a 42 minute video version to a soundtrack by The Tiger Lilies on Vimeo, but it seems incredibly slow moving compared to her slide show which I saw – and there are various other shorter versions on YouTube) which she described as “the diary I let people read” and revised the piece as Nan Goldin’s Mirror on Life in 2002 after seeing her work at the Whitechapel Gallery, and again in 2007 to put on this site.
Nan Goldin’s Mirror on Life

I suppose like most photographers I’ve occasionally taken what might be labelled a ‘still life’ but it has never been a genre that has held my interest in photography. Some I’ve done because people have asked me for a particular purpose, like recording the flowers that my wife has been sent or a birthday cake she made, though these are perhaps not truly still life.

Here’s the start of what Wikipedia has to say:

A still life (plural still lifes) is a work of art depicting mostly inanimate subject matter, typically commonplace objects which may be either natural (food, flowers, dead animals, plants, rocks, or shells) or man-made (drinking glasses, books, vases, jewelry, coins, pipes, and so on).

The whole article is worth reading, and the Wikipedia MediaViewer shows images of some great examples, none of which is a photograph, though the last example is a computer generated image.

More often I’ve photographed inanimate objects as objets trouvés, and perhaps an important point that the definition above omits is the element of arrangement in creating still life compositions.  So looking at the Pencil of Nature,  Talbot’s image of a fruit bowl

to my mind qualifies as a still life (if perhaps a rather poor one) while other images including ‘A Scene in a Library’ and ‘Articles of China’ are not, as although the photographer has carefully framed the pictures he has not (or not effectively) arranged the objects for the purpose of the photograph.

Articles of China” by William Fox Talbot – The Pencil of Nature, 1844.

There have been relatively few photographers who have made still life images that I find of much interest. Perhaps the best of these was Josef Sudek, who produced some truly fine examples. Of course many other photographers produced some fine still lifes, including Edward Weston (and many of his nudes were more still life than nude.)

What sent me thinking about this, and almost made me miss a train starting to write about it on Saturday morning, was a Facebook post about an article in Vice magazine, No More Lazy Still-Life Photography, Please , by Vice photo editor Matthew Leifheit, which includes illustrations by another phtoographer whose work in the genre I’ve also long admired, particularly for her colour work, Jan Groover. Again, Google Images is a good place to see a large selection of her work.

As Leifheit writes “any 13-year-old with a camera flash can throw some pineapples onto a brightly-colored backdrop and call it art. ” But making a really satisfying still life with a camera is I think something rather more difficult. Perhaps even more difficult than doing it with a paintbrush.