More City

Out again today photographing the city, trying to pull together all the ideas, advise and inspiration up to now:

The Snow Factor

Snows really quite distracting, I don't mean the inner child snowman desire, it seems to distract me from the project ideas I already have. This is probably because the world looks so different under snow, though essentially its the same, its only a bit of cold water.


Having said that a couple that I made did turn out alright, here you go:

A Brief

I response to a question to Hugh this morning, he mentioned the brief, or my brief. This reminded me that the brief he gave us was quite vague and writing my own brief might be helpful.
I'm not going to make this any long winded thing, just a brief brief to outline my intention. Come to think of it, its only recently that my intentions for this project have become slightly clearer, even to me. This considered, now is probably a good time to lay down some intentions; after the photos are taken.

I want to represent the city of Nottingham through its life today, through its people. I also want to include myself but not in too obvious a way, more just I was there, I was a part of it. I am not an impartial observer, I live here too. Through composition and construction of the images I hope to deliver meaning to the viewer, though I understand this is difficult to achieve.
I want to portray Nottingham as a pleasant place, it has a reputation for crime but I've never personally witnessed this, I'm sure its no worse than any other UK city, and this reputation is just down to statistic wrangling by the media. I hope to show this is true with my photographs.

Single Image

Good point Julia, this photo does stand well on its own, you have the dish representing my world, with me in the centre then you have a patch of green on one side and the gray buildings on the other, representing the countryside where I normally live and the city where I live now, all tied up in one image.

Just to see how the meaning could change I went back to this spot today in the snow. The meaning is lost because you cant see the green grass symbolising the countryside.

More Work - Reflections

Ive been working at improving my composition, and bringing more meaning into my photos. Looking over Friedlanders work some more, one thing he uses a lot are reflections, often including himself. Ive given this a go myself to see what it says to the viewer about me, to see if it can carry some of my own feelings and opinions about the world.
Let me know what you think.

Todays Photos

Today ive been out around the city again with Hughs advise on getting closer and Friedlanders work in mind. I think these are a step forward from Mondays images, let me know what you think.

Registry Office, Shakespeare Street

Bus Stop, Mansfield Road

Railway Station

Railway Station

Family and Youth Courts

Lee Friedlander

On Hughs advise I've been having a close look at Lee Friedlander, an American photographer who's work stems from the 60's to now, so a very similar time period to the Riboud stuff. I'm mostly interested in his street work from the 60's & 70's as this reflects closely the style I'm working in.
Looking at his photos there is a real essence of him in the images, be it his shadow or reflection or just the way you can sort of feel his presence from behind the camera, I've read that he always worked alone so this presence could be some sort of loneliness coming through.

© Lee Friedlander New York 1963

© Lee Friedlander Lafayette, Louisiana 1968

Formally a big majority of his photographs incorporate strong vertical lines, this is clearly to divide up the scene, like the two above they are used to separate the people from one another. The revolving door image seems like a divide of class, the working man on one side and the well to do woman on the other, could this also be a bit sexist?

In the second image Friedlander seems to be playing with the subjects, the telegraph pole which acts to divide the picture is part of him, his shadow is on it and it is preventing the army/police looking types from taking the parade any further into the photograph, with a click he freezes them like this forever.

I'm beginning to understand from this that the photographer has tremendous influence over the subjects in the image, compositional choices make a real difference to how we perceive what is going on and the opinions we draw from it.

Sander and Friedlander

After today's lecture and seminar revolving around the work of August Sander, I've been giving some thought on how to structure this project. I like the way Sander divided his project between different sectors of society, The Farmer, The Woman, The City, etc.
I think I could do something similar with different areas of the city, Lenton, Radford, City Centre... One thing that concerns me though is that it could end up being seen as judgemental with regard to the differences between deprived and affluent areas, like Sander purposely used different compositions to elevate the important figures, I aim to avoid this, perhaps though it is inevitable that some aspect of it will show through.

Thanks for the comment Hugh, wasn't it Capa that said "If your photos arn't good enough, your not close enough", either way sounds like good advise I'll give it a go. Also Lee Friedlanders work looks perfect for what I'm trying to do, I'll have a closer look at him tomorrow.

New Direction

As I discussed in yesterdays post, Im taking the project in a different direction, after looking at how Marc Riboud represented Leeds I want to do something similar with Nottingham, my world so to speak.
As a starting point I've had a look back at the last project, and the photos I made centered around the cities bus stops.

I enjoyed making these images and want to go down the same route again, making these images involved sitting and watching, waiting for an interesting group of people to gather, this time i think that approach wont really work as it only shows a very limited aspect of goings on. This time I think I need to go out looking for those interesting scenes.

I've been out today doing just that and this is what I've come up with, I don't think any of these really cut it, but I intend to go out every day until I get something good.

Went up to Leeds today to have a look at an exhibition of work by Marc Riboud at the Leeds City Museum. It was a exhibition of a series he produced in the 50's for a photo news magazine as part of its 'Best and worst British cities' series. With this exhibition being in a museum it was the photos historical and social content that was the main focus, rather than the photos themselves, but having said that isn't that the point of documentary photography, the photos were intended as a document of the city to show the magazines readers what it was like there and then.

Leeds, 1954. © Marc Riboud

This got me thinking, at the moment my project is quite personal, my window, my breakfast etc, why not broaden this to include the vast and varied surroundings that make up my world. It doesn't need to follow some sort of pattern like first and last, but rather just to stand as a document of what my world is here and now. Ribouds photographs were intended for curious people who lived elsewhere as a through the keyhole look at somewhere different, that was the audience they were intended for, now though they are placed in a museum as a window into the past, their audience and purpose has changed.
Now the audience for my project is only the staff and students at Trent, but will this always be the case? Will they mean something different in 50 years? Should I take this into consideration? Probably not.

Another thing I picked up on was that recurring issue of photography and truth, it said that Riboud always used black and white film as it was considered a guarantee of authenticity, I really don't think that a photograph can ever be completely truthful, the photographers choices and decisions will always influence the outcome. I suppose that's why this project is called representing my world, representation seems an easier concept to grasp than documentation, at least at the moment.

This trip has given me renewed enthusiasm to go out making, I felt a bit trapped before, tied down to patterns and links, now I feel I can broaden things and take into account much more that makes up my world.

Morning

As promised a new version of the morning window that matches the new night time one.

The weather is rubbish today compared with when I took my first one of this window. Im not sure what this says in the picture, perhaps this is a more 'real' view of Nottingham, as if photography can ever give you the 'real'.

Try again

After what Hugh said on yesterday about being really careful to replicate angles exactly when doing paired images, Ive decided to redo the 2 window images.
Ive gone for a different angle from before including the reflection on the wardrobe giving more of a scene of the room.
I'll add the morning image in the morning.

Continuing with the idea of first and last things, I've documented yesterdays first and last meals.
As you can see their is quite a difference, just to add I don't eat kebabs as normal meals their just quite tempting after a night out.













Im not sure at this point if this first and last idea will work, I can see myself running out of ideas quite quickly, and everything getting a bit samey, let me know what you think.













Also what do you think of this image, do you think including flatmates makes it look like a bit of a snap? Ive purposely included the poster in the background as its quite poignant after a night in Oceana.

By Night

Like yesterdays picture im using my bedroom window, this time its the last thing I look at in the day. Maybe I can expand on this idea of first and last, will have to have a think, sleep on it even.

My first photo

This is the view I wake up to in the morning.
Im glad my halls have such big windows that make the most of what can be seen outside. I rarely draw my curtains because I find it hard to wake up if its dark.
(the flower stickers are a mark of the previous occupant)