Hello again reader, I am glad you are back! Welcome to Part 2 of this micro series on Art! As we continue, I would like to delve into, in my opinion, the most underrated type of art: photography.
Maybe you are a photo geek like me or maybe you have never spent time behind the lense. Either way, when we as a culture think of modern art, we normally picture a ceramics class with clay in their hands or people drawing while perched on wooden stools. It is very rare for the first image of art we think of to be someone taking a photo.
I find this to be so sad because some of the most powerful art is the silent, untouchable, frozen image confined by the four sides of a piece of paper. Pictures are powerful.
“A photograph is a secret about a secret. The more it tells you the less you know.”
“I really believe there are things nobody would see if I didn’t photograph them.”
- Diane Arbus
I agree with Diane completely. Not only are photos a secret of the photographer, they are a moment that is so very unique to the taker of the photo.
To execute my point, I would love to share with you some of my personal works. I am taking a photography class and we are experimenting with different types of photography. Currently, we are capturing pinhole images.
A pinhole camera looks like this:
Simply stated, it is a wooden box with some sort of lense (a tiny piece of aluminum with a small hole in the center, about the diameter of the tip of a needle), and a lense cover (a piece of black electrical tape works fine). A piece of light sensitive paper is positioned inside. To capture the image, its lense is left open for a certain amount of time depending on the light exposure during the time and the place the image is captured.
Pinholes create very sharp and very detailed images. The photo paper begins as a negative which is developed in a "dark room" and then is converted to a positive image in PhotoShop. The process of taking the image, development, PhotoShop conversion and editing can take up to 30 minutes per image.
Before I show my work, I would like to make a disclaimer for pinhole images. They are black and white images and are defined in the art sphere by their ability to convey emotion. When color is removed from a photo, the aspects that people take for granted such as a brick wall or a blade of grass take on a new texture and a new presence.
The following images were all taken at different times of day in different weather.
I will purposefully leave out all of my own commentary on these images.
I feel as if this is a perfect way to start allowing yourself to feel what my art is trying to convey.
Please enjoy:
I hope you have allowed yourself to explore these images.
Lastly, I challenge you to allow yourself to look that the world as you would through a camera lense. This extremely detailed view will allow you to see what you wouldn't normally observe.
Please keep an eye out for Part 3 of this series.
