Visual Cultures. Week 4 Time and Space

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Randolf Evans
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1 Visual Cultures Week 4 Time and Space

2 Andreas Gursky, Rhein II, 1999, 190x360cm, C-Print mounted on Acrylic Glass

3 Civil War Photography Alexander Gardner George Barnard Documents of the toll of the war on the American landscape Images of body-strewn battlefields shocked those at home in New York etc.

5 photograph Film sequence

6 The Great Wave (Gustave le Gray, 1856)

7 The Brig (Gustave le Gray, 1856)

8 River Scene, France (Camille Silvy, 1858)

Photography and Time: Jeff Wall Born 1946, Canada Trained as Art Historian, first at University of British Columbia, then postgrad at Courtauld Institute (1970) Becomes lecturer and publishes essays

11 Photography and Time: Jeff Wall Born 1946, Canada Trained as Art Historian, first at University of British Columbia, then postgrad at Courtauld Institute (1970) Becomes lecturer and publishes essays on many contemporary artists Produces first backlit cibachrome transparencies in 1977 His work engages with issues of representation and time drawn from the history of art, as well as the nature of photography

12 Backlit photographic transparency Jeff Wall Photographs at National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, Nov 2012 Mar 2013

13 Backlit photographic transparency Jeff Wall Photographs at National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, Nov 2012 Mar 2013

14 Backlit photographic transparency Jeff Wall Photographs at National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, Nov 2012 Mar 2013

15 Jeff Wall, A Sudden Gust of Wind (After Hokusai) (1993) Transparency in lightbox. 250cm x 397cm

16 Jeff Wall Photographs at National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, Nov 2012 Mar 2013

17 ..,,...

18 Katsushika Hokusai, Under the Wave, off Kanagawa (c1831) Colour woodblock print. From the series Thirty-Six Views of Mt. Fuji

19 Katsushika Hokusai Edo period Japan Ukiyo-e ( floating world ) Courtesans, kabuki dancers, urban life, but also landscapes and rural life.

20 ... Living only for the moment, turning our full attention to the pleasures of the moon, the snow, the cherry blossoms and the maple leaves; singing songs, drinking wine, diverting ourselves in just floating, floating;... refusing to be disheartened, like a gourd floating along with the river current: this is what we call the floating world... - Asai Ryōi

22 Henri Cartier-Bresson, Behind the Gare Saint-Lazare, Gelatin silver print, 1932

24 "Photography is simultaneously and instantaneously the recognition of a fact and the rigorous organization of visually perceived forms that express and signify that fact - Henri Cartier-Bresson Images à la Sauvette = stolen images

25 Photography is not like painting. There is a creative fraction of a second when you are taking a picture. Your eye must see a composition or an expression that life itself offers you, and you must know with intuition when to click the camera. - Henri Cartier-Bresson Images à la Sauvette = stolen images

26 Henri Cartier-Bresson, Behind the Gare Saint-Lazare (1932)

27 Jeff Wall, Milk (1984) Transparency in lightbox 187cm x 229cm

28 Jeff Wall, A Sudden Gust of Wind (After Hokusai) (1993) Transparency in lightbox. 250cm x 397cm

29 When I was making A Sudden Gust Of Wind, I knew I wanted to show how the air would carry the papers. Hokusai had already solved some of those problems. If you analyze his composition, you realize that many of the little pieces of paper coincided with very important points on the rectangle. He composed something that had a feel of the accidental. It was not accidental, but he knew how to make it look that way. I thought that the only way to achieve that was to first create chance situations, to create a lot of movement and then just have a lot of material to edit. So we created a way a lot of paper could be moved in the air and then tried to think of both the rectangle and the invisible air current in three dimensions. As the papers move in depth, they move away from us and get smaller. I just worked hard on it and tried to compose. There is no guide, it s just a feeling, a sense of the real, how things really are or would be. Jeff Wall, Interview for the German magazine Revolver, 2004

33 ,

35 What is video? Film Video Photographic still images Analogue wave on magnetic tape

36 What is video?

37 What is video? Projected light vs. radiant light Cinema vs. TV

38 Bill Viola Born USA, 1951 Video artist Martyrs (Earth, Air, Fire, Water) permanent installation in St. Paul s Tiny Deaths currently in Tate Modern

39 Masolino, Pietà (1424) Bill Viola, Emergence (2002)

40 Bill Viola, The Greeting (1995)

41 Bill Viola, The Greeting (1995)

42 Bill Viola, Ocean Without a Shore (2002) Bill Viola, The Raft (2004)

43 Bill Viola, Ocean Without A Shore (2007)

44 Bill Viola, The Reflecting Pool (1977) 7 min, color, sound

45 Bill Viola Persistent Themes Bodies in water Slow motion Scales of time Speeds of duration

47 Analyse each photograph in detail. Think about its nature as a landscape How does it (or does it not) function as a landscape? What kind of space do we see in each case? Do the photographs have different ideas of what space, or landscape, is?

The British Museum HOKUSAI; ON THE WAY TO MOUNT FUJI. SUNSHū EJIRI, a ukiyo e print from the Edo period. Object in focus. Room 3

The British Museum HOKUSAI; ON THE WAY TO MOUNT FUJI. SUNSHū EJIRI, a ukiyo e print from the Edo period. Object in focus. Room 3 The British Museum Object in focus Room 3 HOKUSAI; ON THE WAY TO MOUNT FUJI SUNSHū EJIRI, a ukiyo e print from the Edo period. Mount Fuji is traditionally linked to eternal life. It is recognized as a