Photography and the City: 2011

Friday, 30 December 2011

Berenice Abbott and Eugene Atget

Berenice Abbott was an American Photographer who was introduced in 1925 to the work of Eugene Atget, she was so taken by his work that after his death Berenice aquired what was left of his work and went on to promote it heavily. Abbott wrote two books about Atget's work; The World of Atget (1964) and Atget, photographe de Paris(1930) and it is Abbottss continuous efforts that helped Atget gain international recognition.

Wednesday, 28 December 2011

Photographer research - Berenice Abbott

After looking more into the work of Berenice Abbott, I feel that it would be wronbg for me not to include her work in my blog! Abbott's images of New York that are shown below have such depth to them , it is as if you are transported to the time they were taken. The contrast and tonality of her images for me seems so perfect that had they been taken in modern day, I would fail to believe they hadn't had something done to them post production!

Rephotography - Further research

Another website I looked at for my research into rephotography was one called New York Changing.

http://www.newyorkchanging.com/

This is another wonderful and inspiring website for my city brief, which again shows all images in black and white, re-inforcing my decision to also shoot in the same manner. This series of images produced by Douglas Levere, takes Berencie Abbott's work from 1930's New York and replicates it in the modern day, showing the changes to that have happened over time to the city of New York. This is the same effect I hope to achieve with my images of Liverpool .

Rephotography - Further research

During my research into rephotography, I came across a brilliant article (interactive work) on the website for the McCord Museum in Montreal, Quebec.

http://www.mccord-museum.qc.ca/dq/intro-e.html

When you hover over the images you get a sound bite of how each image would have sounded at the time it was taken.

This website was a great find and leads me to the conclusion that when I shoot my images, they will also both be in black and white because your eye is not immediately drawn to one image over the other therefore each image is contemplated in more detail.

Tuesday, 27 December 2011

The City, new idea, rephotography!

So after having a good think about this project and where I was going with my initial ideas and where I could go with it from feedback, I decided I liked the idea of bringing old photographs into the equation, so I researched rephotography and I finally felt inspired!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/scotland/landscapes/what_are_rephotographs.shtml

Whilst researching rephotography the work of Sergey Larenkov has been brought to the fore. This is a photographer who we have seen the work of briefly, but I have no looked into in greater detail. Below are some of his images. Larenkov overlays old and new photographs and uses computer software to give a glimmer of the past in the modern day image, by editing them in such a way that the old image appears to be coming through the new one. I find Larenkov's images extremely thought provoking, they draw the viewer to think about history in a different way; by seeing it embedded in the present. My particular favourites are the images that he has integrated with those scenes from ww2 as they evoke more emotion in my opinion, given the fact that we all know how atrocious the war was.

Thursday, 15 December 2011

The City - Feedback from re-shoot

From our feedback session for my second shoot as part of this assignment the feedback I received indicated that again the images needed something more, (something I was aware of with this assignment that does not seem to be getting anywhere!) Ideas where as follows;

Merging with old photographs.

Changing perspective ie; get higher (the Goodyear blimp was suggested by Les!), get lower etc.

Bringing personal stuff into the spaces.

Look at what else defines the area.

Taking old neighbours into the photographs. (I know nothing about our old neighbours now, we never kept contact when we moved or when we lived there in all honesty...)

Including sound excerpts over the images.

I will look further into these things and see if I can gain some inspiration for this assignment.

Monday, 12 December 2011

The City - Re-shoot

For my re-shoot I returned to the same area of Liverpool, the Norris Green estate (Liverpool 11). Whilst there I became very aware of the fact that all the street signs had been left in place despite the fact that there where no houses on any of these streets and none of them led to anywhere of consequence (other than onto another road with no houses on!) To me this seemed pointless and almost a sad reminder of what was there. So, I decided to instead focus on these road signs (to nowhere). This decision was made partly based on the fact that I felt increasingly uncomfortable taking photographs in the more affluent area of West Derby (which was my comparison for the social divide/difference with the Norris Green estate). The area is well known for having drug dealers living there and I felt that my photography could be misconstrued as surveillance!

Below are the images from this shoot.

Wednesday, 7 December 2011

The City, 1st shoot, reasoning & feedback

For my first shoot as part of the city brief I returned to my home city of Liverpool and in particular the area where I spent from the age of 11 through to 18; A council estate called the Norris Green estate (Liverpool 11) or "Boot estate," as it is more commonly known. This area has changed a lot in the last 9 years, the house where I spent those years growing up is no longer there, as is the case with most of the surrounding streets - they where demolished due to poor structural integrity. Now, this was never the nicest of areas to grow up in and I was happy when we left, but that did not stop me feeling a little saddened at the sight of waste land where I once lived, I had happy memories of growing up there. The area itself has been left to ruin as the images below show, intentions of re-building on the land are yet to come to fruition. Less than a quarter of a mile away lies the area of West Derby (Liverpool 12), an area that can be considered fairly affluent. This area is worlds apart from the remains of the Norris Green estate, a gate adorns the driveways to two of the small housing complexes, the pavements are well maintained and there are no council houses in sight. Obviously, the differences between Norris Green and West Derby have always been clear, but now with most of the Norris Green estate gone and wasteland in it's place, the class divide is even clearer. My intention with this shoot was to document the differences between these 2 areas that are a stones throw away and with it this social divide that exists between 2 areas that are under the remit of the same council.

In order to show this I photographed;

Houses.

Pavements/Roads.

Green spaces.

Road signs.

Below are the images I used to get feedback from my group, they have been cross-processed in lightroom.

The Norris Green Estate (Liverpool 11)

West Derby (Liverpool 12)

The Norris Green Estate (Liverpool 11)

West Derby (Liverpool 12)

The Norris Green Estate (Liverpool 11)

West Derby (Liverpool 12)

Feedback

The feedback I recieved for this series of images was that it was a good idea, but areas where it needed development where pointed out;

Less Green and yellow in the processing (alteration to the cross processing)

Stepping back more with the camera with the road signs so you could see more of the surrounding area.

Views from other angles.

Advised to look at other photographers, such as Paul Graham and Richard Billingham.

Despite all this feedback and help from my group, I feel stuck with this assignment, i'm not sure where I can go with this series of images. Looking at Richard Billinghams Black Country series and Paul Grahams work amongst my research with other street photographer, hasn't really given me any inspiration.... My solution is to go and re-shoot as planned and see what happens from there.