Brief

Read Chapter 2: Photography Theory in David Bate, Photography: The Key Concepts(2009) Bloomsbury.

Make notes about: 

• Structuralism.
• Semiotics.
• Photography codes.
• Rhetoric.
• Denotation and connotation.
• Reality and realism.
• Poststructuralism.

Add these terms and definitions to your Glossary – you may wish to do your own further and independent research and reading to enhance your understanding of these terms.

This chapter focused on photographic theory and key historical periods.
“The question to be asked is: what kind of theory does photography need? In other words, what problems does photography raise?……… the main arguments have been centred on what photography is (identity), how it contributes to culture (value) and why it has been such a successful invention (social purpose) (Bates 2009)
Key historical periods include: Victorian aesthetics , Mass reproduction in the 1920s and 1930s and a critical technological rise in the 1960s and 1970s.

Structuralism: Structuralism is a philosophy and method that developed from insights in the field of linguistics in the mid-20th Century to study the underlying patterns of social life. (Smith 2020

Structuralism focused on structures and the system of rules that underpin and organise any practice and was based primarily in a new, expanded use of linguistic semiotics.  The aim was to find out the grammar of forms, like language. (Bates 2009)

Semiotics: Semiotics is the study of signs and their meaning in society. A sign is something which can stand for something else – in other words, a sign is anything that can convey meaning.  So words can be signs, drawings can be signs, photographs can be signs, even street signs can be signs.  Modes of dress and style, the type of bag you have, or even where you live can also be considered signs, in that they convey meaning.

is the study of sign systems. In Elements of Semiology, Barthes tried out the idea that you can trust food, furniture fashion as a “language”…….
One of the key founders of modern semiotics, Ferdinand de Saussure, argued that language is an organised system of signs that we operate (speak and write) so as to be able to represent ourselves in human culture………
Saussure argued that every linguistic sign gains its significance and meaning not from the object that it names but through the difference between signs within the language system. (Bates 2009)

Photography Codes:Photographic codes include genre, camerawork (lens choice, focus, aperture, exposure, camera position), composition (framing, distance, camera angle, lighting), film (quality, type, colour), developing (exposure, treatments) and printing (paper, size, cropping)

 Italian semiotician and novelist Umberto Eco described 10 photographic codes.

1) Perceptive codes, which for Eco are establishing the conditions for effective perception and are studied within the psychology of perception;

2) Codes of recognition, uniting blocks of signifieds into semes, according to which we recognize objects. These codes are studied within psychology of intelligence, memory, learning or within cultural anthropology;

3) Codes of transmission, constructing conditions for the perception of images. Eco uses an example of the dots in a newspaper photograph or lines in a TV image. These could be studied by the information theory physics;

4) Tonal codes, related to the way the message is transmitted (‘expressionistic’, ‘forte’, ‘piano’, ‘crescendo’, terms used in musical notation);

5) Iconic codes, usually based on perceived elements actualized according to the codes of transmission. These can be articulated into figures, signs and semes.

(a) Figures, or conditions of perception (subject – background relationships, light contrast, geometrical values), transcribed into graphic signs.

(b) Signs, denoting (i) semes of recognition (nose, eye, sky, cloud) by conventional graphic means; or (ii) ‘abstract models’, symbols, conceptual diagrams of the object (the sun as a circle with radiating lines).

(c) Semes, more commonly known as ‘images’ or ‘iconic signs’ (a man, a horse), formulating a complex iconic phrase.

Iconic codes shift easily within the same cultural model or even the same work of art.

6) Iconographic codes, elevating the ‘signified’ of the iconic codes to the status of a  ‘signifier’ to connote more complex and culturalised semes: ‘Pegasus’, ‘Venus’, ‘King Priam’.

7) Codes of taste and sensibility, which establish the connotations provoked by semes of the preceding codes. Thus a Greek temple could connote ‘harmonious beauty’, as well as ‘antiquity’.

8) Rhetorical codes are borne of conventionalisation of as yet unuttered iconic solutions, assimilated by society to become models or norms of communication. These could be divided into rhetorical figures, premises and arguments.

(a) visual rhetorical figures are reducible to verbal visualised forms. Examples are a metaphor, metonymy, litotes, amplification and so on.

(b) visual rhetorical premises are iconographic semes, bearing particular emotive or taste connotations. An image of a man walking along a never-ending tree-lined road connotes ‘loneliness’.

(c) visual rhetorical arguments are true syntagmatic concatenations imbued with argumentative capacity, for example in the course of film editing, succession/opposition between different frames communicates complex assertions.

9) Stylistic codes are determinate original solutions either codified by rhetoric, or actualized once. They connote the type of stylistic success, the mark of an ‘auteur’.

10) Codes of the unconscious. By convention they are held to be ca pable of permitting certain identificationsor projections, of stimulating given reactions, and of expressing psychological situations. They are used particularly inpersuasive media.

Umberto Eco is an incredible polymath, his works are a total joy to read. His final magnum opus, a series of books on art bringing together all his immense semiotic knowledge and accompanied by fabulous illustrations includes such gems as ‘On Beauty’ (2004), ‘Infinity of Lists’, and ‘The Book of Legendary Lands’. 

According to Bates “Eco has a provisional list of ten photographic codes, which would be tempting to simplify, however it it rhetoric that has been the most developed within a semiotics of photography, no doubt because rhetoric is the discipline that can help us provide a summary of how all photographs make their arguments” (Bates 2009)

Rhetoric: “In terms of photography rhetoric defines the organisation of codes into an argument. Rhetoric is the art of persuasion, aiming to move, to please and instruct”……
In Photography codes are combined to produce a rhetorical argument. By themselves, codes are meaningless, like phonemes in language. It is only when the codes are put together in specific combinations that they are effective in producing what we call a “good photograph” It is from a particular configuration of such codes (whichever ones are included) that the rhetoric of the image determines the range of meanings available from the photograph” (Bates 2009)

Denotation and Connotation: Denotation – Visual signifiers and Connotation – The Cultural Signified.
In Bates example he used a photograph of a Hippo being looked at through railings by a crowd of people.
Thus far a series of oppositions or contrasts between animal and humans (Bates2009)
Denoted: Large/Small, Lying down/Upright, Asleep/Awake, Inside/outside
Connotations: Nature big/Humans small, relaxing resting/in prison behind the bars

Reality and Realism:”Reality is what we believe exists whereas realism is the mode of representation that supports that reality….. how far a photograph corresponds to pre-existing conceptions of reality is partly to do with how far it fits with pre-existing beliefs about reality” (Bates 2009)

Poststructuralism: “Post-structuralism is an intellectual movement that emerged in philosophy and the humanities in the 1960s and 1970s. It challenged the tenets of structuralism, which had previously held sway over the interpretation of language and texts in the humanities and the study of economies and cultures in the social sciences”

Bibliography

Bates, D. (2009) The Key Concepts Photography – Chapter 2 Photography Theory. London: Bloombury.

Umberto Eco, 10 Photography Codes
Available at: https://environmenteurope.wordpress.com/2018/03/22/critique-of-the-image-umbertoeco_-%E2%80%8F/
[Accessed 10th October 2022]

Poststructuralism
Available at: https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/social-sciences/post-structuralism
[Accessed 10th October 2022]

R.G. Smith,
Available at: https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/social-sciences/structuralism
[Accessed 10th October 2022]

Semiotics

Glossary

Key Terms and Definitions

As you work through the course materials it will be beneficial to develop your own glossary on your blog. This will consist of key terms with their definitions. As you work through the unit, you will be able to build your list of terms. You can also add quotes or different voices or definitions into the glossary for each entry. Different theorists and practitioners may use the terms with different or subtle nuanced meaning which you can acknowledge in your glossary. All of this will help your own writing and critical analysis as you develop.

GENRES

• Genres are types of painting. These were codified in the seventeenth century as (in descending order of importance) history, portrait, genre (scenes of everyday life), landscape and still life

Hyperbole

• extravagant exaggeration

Rhetoric

• The art of effective or persuasive speaking or writing, especially the exploitation of figures of speech and other compositional techniques.

Trope 

• A figurative or metaphorical use of an image, word or expression.
• A significant or recurrent theme; a motif.

Photo-Secession

• Led by Alfred Stieglitz, it was the first influential group of photographers that worked to have photography accepted as fine art.

Structuralism

Semiotics

Photography Codes

Denotation and Connotation

Reality and realism

Poststructuralism

Limit – telephotography 

• Photographing landscapes that cannot be seen with the unaided eye

Mnemonic Device

• aiding or meant to aid one’s memory
• of or relating to memory or mnemonics

Pixtorialism

• Fine Arts. the creation or use of pictures or visual images, especially of recognizable or realistic representations.
• emphasis on purely photographic or scenic qualities for its own sake, sometimes with a static or lifeless effect:

Sublime

• elevated or lofty in thought, language, etc.: Paradise Lost is sublime poetry.
• impressing the mind with a sense of grandeur or power; inspiring awe, veneration, etc.: Switzerland has sublime scenery.
• supreme or outstanding:

Anthropocene

• noting or pertaining to a proposed epoch of the Quarternary Period, occurring in the present time, since mid-20th century, when human activity began to effect significant environmental consequences, specifically on ecosystems and climate.

Numen

• divine power or spirit; a deity, especially one presiding locally or believed to inhabit a particular object.

Numunous

• of, relating to, or like a numen; spiritual or supernatural.
• surpassing comprehension or understanding; mysterious: that element in artistic expression that remains numinous.
• arousing one’s elevated feelings of duty, honor, loyalty, etc.: a benevolent and numinous paternity.

Geomorphology

• The study of characteristics, origin and development of landforms

Sublime Vacancy

• Large open vast areas with no people or cities

Place Identity 

• Defined by Proshansky and colleagues (Proshansky, Fabian, & Kaminoff, 1983), place identity, is one of the main constructs focusing on the relationship between people and places. Other relevant concepts are restorativeness (Herzog, Maguire & Nebel, 2003), and the role of nature in the person-environment interaction (Kaplan, 1995). Place-identity and restorativeness (which is taken to include landscape preferences) are two psychological constructs that explain people-environment interactions in two different ways, or “paradigms”. While place-identity stresses place and its meaning, then, as Stanley Milgram (Milgram, 1970) points out, restorativeness focuses on “overloads” of living experiences in cities.

Vernacular Photography

• An umbrella term used to distinguish fine art photographs from those made by non-artists for a huge range of purposes, including commercial, scientific, forensic, governmental, and personal.
• Snapshots capturing everyday life and subjects are a major form of vernacular photography.

• A Rhizome (botanical origin), unlike trees or their roots, connects any point to any other point, and its traits are not necessarily linked to traits of the same nature. Rhizomatic is a philosophical concept developed by Gilles Deleuzeand Félix Guattari, used to describe theory and research that allows for multiple, non-hierarchical entry and exit points in data representation and interpretation.

Brief:

Analyse an image in your chosen genre. 

Complete one genre analysis activity (Exercise 1) following the guidance in your chosen genre resource document:

Thinking About Landscape (Exercise 1: Establishing Conventions)

• • Still Life – The Objectness of Things (Exercise 1: Historic Still Lives)
  • The Origins of Photographic Portraiture (Exercise 1: Historic Portrait)
  • Documentary Traditions (Exercise 1: Humanism)

Analysis can take the form of a diagram, annotated notes, text, an A/V presentation, or voice memo. Post this to your learning log.

I have decided to go with Still Life Exercise 1: Historic still Life,  as below

Exercise 1: Historic Still Life

Research photographic still life. Study an overview of the key historical periods mentioned here and select one image to really study in depth. Write a critical reflection of this photograph of an object / still-life, but don’t merely ‘describe’ what you see (although you might start with a short description).

The idea behind this exercise is to encourage you to be more reflective in your written work, which means trying to elaborate upon the thoughts and feelings evoked whilst viewing an image. Later you will be developing a more analytical approach to the building blocks or ‘codes’ of still-life – the mechanics of the image and the object and concept it represents.

Still life can be anything of your choice, but try to choose a historic practitioner of note. This will make your research much easier, as the practitioner’s works will have been collected internationally by galleries and museums and written about extensively. Read what has already been written about your chosen practitioner’s archive, paying particular attention to what historians and other academics have highlighted in their texts.

16 PH5CGG Source Text – The ‘Objectness’ of Things

To help with the writing, you might want to use the model developed by Terry Barrett (1980, 2010) to help classify the function of the photograph and then dissect the image at a more forensic level, this includes:

Physical Description and Subject Matter: the ‘thing’ recorded in the work. What is the object in the image? Describe the image initially, a few sentences (denotation) will allow the connotations and then meaning to emerge. “Robert Mapplethorpe, for example, sometimes used the subject matter of flowers in his photographs but the subject of those photographs is not flowers but can be interpreted to be sensuality” (Barrett, 2010: 05).

Medium: of course, in this instance we are dealing in photographs, or ‘lens based’ media; although they may be either a mere straight mechanical documentation of objects or artworks or they could also use more expressive aesthetic techniques such as ‘painterly’ (cyanotypes), mixed media or moving images.

Form: composition, light, colour, tone etc. How an image has been constructed: “a combination of how subject matter, materials, and elements of art are put together according to some organizational principle” (Barrett, 2010: 156).

Context: the time, place, and circumstances in which the picture was made which can imply wider meanings, but also its presentational environment – how and where it is seen by viewers.

Content: what the image is about, depicts or shows: an animal’s head is an animal’s head but it is also symbolic of other ideas or concepts (nature, death, simultaneous beauty/revulsion). What the work expresses or communicates which also – through interpretation – implies meaning.

Add the written critical reflection to your blog.

Still Life (General research)

I have always been fascinated by the symbolism that is often part of still life art and in particular the historical aspects found in the 15th and 16th century paintings (Fig.1) For example a skull representing the fragility of life and mortality and hourglasses or timepieces to represent the passing of time.

Fig.1 Philip de Champaigne. Vanitas Still Life with a Tulip and Hourglass, ca 1671

Due to the early photographic requirements of long exposure times, still life photography was a sensible choice, allowing for a greater amount of control. (Figs 2,3

Fig. 2 Still Life of Flowers in a Vase (1846) Hippolyte Bayard (French, 1801 – 1887)

Fig. 3 Articles of China (1844) William Henry Fox Talbot (English, 1800 – 1877)

“The first still-life photograph was created about a decade before the news of photography invention was announced in Paris and London in 1839” (Martineau, 2010) (Fig.4)

Fig. 4 Niepce, Joseph Nicephore*1765-1833 (1825)

“Before that time, a picture of a basket of flowers was simply identified as a basket of flowers. The impetus for a new term came as artists created compositions of greater complexity, brining together a wider variety of objects to communicate allegorical or latent meanings” (Martineau, 2010)

Photographers such as Roger Fenton and Thomas Richard Williams began creating images in  that  included the symbolism found in earlier paintings. (Fig 5,6)

“Fenton’s still-life photographs, whether of flora or fauna, are displays of abundance that have their antecedents in the eighteenth century French and Dutch paintings” (Martineau, 2010)

Fig. 5 Roger Fenton Still Life with Fruit and Decanter 1860

Symbolism of Vanitas in the above image by the the rotting fruit in the lower left hand corner.

Fig. 6 Thomas Richard Williams (English, 1824 – 1871) The Sands of Time 1850–1852

“Thomas Richard Williams was among the first professional photographers to develop a series of popular still life compositions based on the pictorial tropes passed down through the history of painting. In the Sands of Time he juxtaposed emblems of vanity (a skull, and extinguished oil lamp, and an hourglass) with those of learning and industry (books and a drafting compass). Williams created a visual metaphor that illustrates the Latin expression Omnia mors equate (Death makes us all equal” (Martineau, 2010)

One photographer that I came across whilst researching Still Life images was an Austrian/German by the name of Heinrich Kühn (1866-1944). I was struck by the differences in two of his works that were separated only by a period of 11 years but are vastly different in style.

Fig. 7 Heinrich Kuhn Still Life 1895

Fig. 8 Heinrich Kuhn Tea Still Life, Version iii 1997

The lavish composition of “Still Life” (Fig.7) created by Kuhn in 1895 is in stark contrast to the simplicity of the still life he created in 1907 (Fig.8). There seems to be a shift from the “traditional”.

Some artists of the time, including Heinrich Kuhn

“realised that the possibilities of still life photography extended beyond mere representation to the expression of inner thoughts and feelings. Influenced by poetry and dream imagery, they eschewed traditional iconology in favour of symbols that were deeply personal” (Martineau 2010)

Analysing an Image

The image I have chosen to analyse is a still life created by Jan Groover in 1976 (Fig. 9).

Fig. 9 Jan Groover Still Life 1979

Jan Groover was an American photographer born in 1943 and turned to photography after spending many years painting.

“With photography I didn’t have to make things up,” she said, explaining the change of medium. “Everything was already there.” (Groover and Kismaric, 1987)

Using Terry Barretts model to look at the Physical, Medium, Form, Context and Content it became clear that the image wasn’t as hectic or random as one might think a first glance.

The image depicts kitchen utensils made of what looks like stainless steel on a predominantly white surface. There is also a glass bowl, a wire cooling rack and some cake icing tools. I noticed lots of shapes and reflections. Aesthetically a very pleasing image created using everyday objects. Although most of the items are recognisable to the majority of people, some of the items have not been placed in a way that would be seen as usual, which causes you too perhaps linger and wonder what is not quite right. I spent quite some time looking at this image and whilst doing so, realised that the general mess, which normally accompanies this type of activity is not evident. There are no bowls or utensils covered in cake mixture or flour/icing sugar spilled and sprinkled over the utensils and worktop. The image is in colour and seems to have a vintage look to it. Perhaps because of the softness and the colours which brought to mind an American diner (Fig 10,11)

Fig. 10

Fig. 11

The image shown on the Getty website states it is a polaroid dye diffusion print. Possibly another reason it has a vintage look and feel to it?  Polaroid was at its peak in the late 1970s and the images produced by these instant cameras are a part of history along with many other people of that era.
This image is far larger than the well-known instant polaroid print, at 61 x 52 cm which confused me somewhat and made me consider that the information may be wrong. I couldn’t find any information relating to the exact camera that Groover may have used, but I did come across a large polaroid camera that had film plates of 51 x 61 cm, so it is possible that this was how she created the large polaroid images. I did find more large images of hers online that stated they were polaroid dye diffusion prints.

This image has a painterly look to it and it is no coincidence that many of Groovers images are described in this way. She was a painter before taking up photography and I suspect never quite left it behind.

“Is her insistence on formalism simply perverse, an unwillingness to abandon the terms of her first medium, painting? Or does she have an idea about photography’s capabilities that has thus far eluded us?” (Lifson 1981)

It looks like the composition is very specific. Some items have been put in strange locations, such as a knife balanced on a metal jelly mold. The light and colour along with the composition come together to make the image somewhat mystical. The items themselves are usually seen as very functional and yet have been photographed in a way that make them less functional and more “art”.

Groover was, without doubt a huge influence in the photographic world

“In 1978 an exhibition of her dramatic still-life photographs of objects in her kitchen sink caused a sensation. When one appeared on the cover of Artforum magazine, it was a signal that photography had arrived in the art world – complete with a marketplace to support it

The 70s was a decade in which colour photography started to become more common and as a teenager in the mid to late 70s I can remember colour film being very exciting! We have now become used to images of the everyday aspects of life presented as art.It is clear that Groover was intent on creating shape and form and if there is a deep meaning behind them then it is not something that is obvious. Could it be she is saying something about the female role in the kitchen? or perhaps something more subtle?

“Notwithstanding their seductive depths, Groover’s photographs are never coy about what they are: items of kitchen equipment, transformed into abstract shapes through the lens and mechanisms of a view camera, and the geometric fantasies of an artist. Wholly confident in their status as works of art that can stand on their own, they have no need to gesture toward historic or cosmic themes outside the frame” (Woodward, 2022)

It is also quite clear that if this was a “real” image of some kind of baking activity it would look very different. Is that what makes it interesting along with the shapes colour and reflections.

Looking at her this and other kitchen still live images that she created  I really was struggling to determine if there was some kind of hidden meaning.  I found them pleasing to look at, interesting, some times confusing and enjoyed the shapes, reflections and colours. Finding and transcribing an interview by her husband really helped me to understand something of what she was trying to achieve.

“……just this is pointing to that and that’s it’s like a Renaissance painting and that’s one of the things about Jan’s work it’s never about the subject I can’t say never but almost ever usually if it’s about the subject it was a joke but it was about space and how things relate to each other” (Bruce Boice, 2018)

“I think she got in a sort of a sense smarter, meaning smarter at looking at things and a lot of people don’t understand how to look at things as far as I’m concerned. Anyway I mean they all they care about it as a subject matter and what the painting or photo means, its meaning, Jans photos never mean anything, and she just really wants the visual excitement of it of your eye just flying around and not knowing where to land” (Bruce Boice, 2018)

Something groover said in 1990 stuck with me after making me smile and start to understand what she was doing with her art and the relationship between the objects in her images. It is so true! A lemon does lie down and an apple sits! We all know this but how many of us have articulated it.

“Each object has a certain kind of physical characteristic […] A lemon lies down. It can’t do anything else, but lie down. An apple sits. […] So all these objects have these attitudes. The objects talk to each other, and it’s either one special relationship or the other, that I don’t know how to talk about” (Jan groover 1990)

Bibliography

Schmied, Wieland (1978). Neue Sachlichkeit and German Realism of the Twenties. London: Arts Council of Great Britain

Martineau, P., 2010. Still life in photography. Los Angeles, Calif.: J. Paul Getty Museum, p.6,10

Figure 1
Available at: https://www.bimago.art/reproductions/philippe-de-champaigne/vanitas-still-life-with-a-tulip-skull-and-hour-glass-111732.html
[Accessed 07/09/2022]

Figure 2
Available at: https://www.getty.edu/art/collection/object/107RHS
[Accessed 14/09/2022]

Figure 3
Available at: https://www.getty.edu/art/collection/object/108GG8
[Accessed 14/09/2022]

Figure 4
Available at: https://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/news-photo/niepce-joseph-nicephore1765-1833-miterfinder-der-news-photo/541029951?language=es
[Accessed 14/09/2022]

Figure 6
Available at: https://www.getty.edu/art/collection/object/104FDM
[Accessed 15/09/2022]

Figure 5
Available at: https://www.getty.edu/art/collection/object/104DQ5
[Accessed 15/09/2022]

Figure 7
Available at: https://www.getty.edu/art/collection/object/106QZ6
[Accessed 15 September 2022].

Figure 8
Available at: https://www.getty.edu/art/collection/object/106QYY
[Accessed 15 September 2022].

Figure 9
Available at: https://www.getty.edu/art/collection/object/109AHE
[Accessed 16 September 2022].

Kismaric, Susan, and Jan Groover. Jan Groover. New York, NY: The Museum of Modern Art, 1987.

Figure 10, 11
Available at: https://i.pinimg.com/originals/d2/01/13/d2011307fcc69cc84174cf59aa34a5e1.jpg
[Accessed 17 September 2022].

Woodward, R., 2022. Jan Groover, Vintage Kitchen Still Lifes @Janet Borden | Collector Daily. [online] Collector Daily.
Available at: <https://collectordaily.com/jan-groover-vintage-kitchen-still-lifes-janet-borden/&gt; [Accessed 17 September 2022].

Boice, B., 2018. Jan Groover An Intimate Portrait.
Available at: <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zETXjboqplY&gt;
[Accessed 25 September 2022].

Available at: https://issues.aperture.org/article/1981/1/1/jan-groovers-embrace
[Accessed 27 September 2022]

Available at: https://artpil.com/news/jan-groover-at-gak/
[Accessed 27 September 2022]