Presentation 3: Cultural imaginaries & landscape photography Esteban Pastorino Diaz, Lauren Marsolier, Mishka Henner & Hall - In A Place in the World? Places, Cultures and Globalization, Masssey_1995
What is mean by Cultural imaginaries
• This
is a theory derived by 2 different concepts.
• One
of Halls culture definition and Benedicts idea of the imaginary.
• Camacho
explains that this is a notion upon which migrant communities imagine their own
culture in a space that technically doesn’t
belong to them.
• Photographers
create cultural imaginaries. It
suggests that the photographer may look at a subject in a different way to
another person therefore will reflect their perspective through their
photograph. This then allows the viewer to see from their point of view.
Esteban
Pastorino Diaz
• He
was born in Buenos Aires, 1972
• focusing
on ideas of challenging
perspectives and perceptions of space
• Aerial
perspective photographs, creating different perspective for viewer upon mundane
landscapes.
• Diaz creates
cultural imaginaries through his use of model landscapes. By physically
creating the landscape he is able to portray a more accurate portrayal of his
perspective.
Landscape photography
•Landscape
photography shows
spaces within the world, sometimes vast and unending, but other times
microscopic. Landscape photographs typically capture the presence of nature but can also focus on man-made
features or disturbances of landscapes.
•This
method was originally used to denote the background of a subject.
•Usually
an absence of human presence is witnessed in such photographs.
Lauren Marsolier
•She was
born in France, 1972. Now works in
Los Angles
•These places have inspired her landscape
photographs with modern architecture
•simple , symmetrical, void and digital
photographs
• “I
became interested in how we perceive reality and how our times, marked by
constant changes, affect us on a psychological level.”
•famous work, Transition, represents
the psychological experience
•“Located
somewhere between fiction and reality, her images represent a mental landscape
affected by a world of constant change. They show an unreality become manifest,
transitional non-places where human action and inhabitation are recorded in
strange antitheses of nature and artifice, or, better still, artificial nature
and natural artifice.”
•This is how her work in Transition
has been described.
Mishka Henner
•documentary
photographer who has studied at Loughborough and worked at London for several
years
•known
for his contribution to the photography in the Internet and digital age
•ideas
such as identity, the information age, exploitation
•use
the collection of public images from the internet, satellite and TV
•takes
photos from Google Earth and finds images on Google Street View with use of image rich technologies.
•‘A
new
approach to photography is seeing the light - photographers without cameras.
The need to press the shutter is replaced by a direct interest in images - not
necessarily in making images. These photographers make books with photographs
they find and sometimes they mix them with photographs they take. In this rising
flock Mishka Henner is the trailblazer’.
No Mans land
“No Man’s Land” is a photographic project which produced by Mishka Henner, it is about roadside prostitutes in Italy and Spain. The book was produced entirely by searching on Google Street to find the images. A book like this shows the vast amount of information accessible today, one only has to research in order to produce a photographic book. Without setting feet on the ground Henner makes clear the point which has been prominent in photography for the past 30 years originating around the time of Sherrie Levine’s ‘After Walker Evans’ in 1980.
Further research:
Charlie Waite
•One
of the most renowned landscape photographers.
•Noted
for his painterly approach in his usage of light and shade while photographing.
•His
style- Graphic finesse combined with spiritual quality of calm and serenity.
