Artist in the Community 2009

A Cosmopolitan Cosmology is the name I gave to the next phase of the solargraphy project initiated on Sherkin last year. The project revolves around the idea that it is relevant to all people at all times in all places, but most especially those who have a link to Sherkin Island.

It will explore space and time through the process of solargraphy and strengthen relationships between those who live on the Island and those in whom the Island lives (although they may live many miles apart).

The project application was made in association with Sherkin Island Development Society and was awarded a second round of funding by the Arts Council through the Artist in the Community Scheme managed by Create.

I have setup an initial blog for this http://sherkinisland.blogspot.com

Solargraph from Kerry

Margaret Fitzgerald

There are still a few more solargraphs to collect. The one above came from Keel in Co. Kerry - thanks to the collaborators there. It is a really interesting image to look at, as the horizon is repeated twice. This probably happened because the camera was moved during the period of exposure - another happy accident. I haven't got the exact details of the period of exposure and must chase this up.

Sherkin Island Solargraphy

We had a great day yesterday and were very excited to finally reveal the solargraphs that had been exposing since late September.

Terry Farnell

Micheal Stephens

Tara O'Donoghue

Conor O'Riordan

Artist in the Community Solstice Solargraphs

Solargraph by Mags Reilly Sherkin Island 28-09-08 - 21-12-08

Solargraph by Jo Jefferies Sherkin Island 28-08-08 -21-12-08

Congratulations Mags & Jo, your solargraph images are really great. I hope you like them too!

Solstice Solargraphy

This solargraph was exposed for 6 months using a film can, It was collected in very wet weather . When I brought it home, I took the paper out of the cannister to dry in the hot press. The changed orientation of the sheet caused the image to slip in the wet surface, almost entirely obscuring the sun track - I am not unhappy with this - the surface is richly textured giving a caustic appearance.

Solstice Solargraphy

Harvest time has come. Even though we are in the middle of winter, my crop is ripe. Six months ago at the Summer Solstice, I put out loads of pinhole cameras. Now today on the Winter solstice, its time to bring them home. These are the initial results and I am really pleased.










This solargraph was taken using a Sharwoods curry can , with the photographic paper wrapped cylindrically around the can. The pinhole was on the cap and laid horizontally about 6ft off the ground. I can't decide which I prefer positive or negative.





This solargraph was taken using a coffee can pinhole camera from Camden Road, Crosshaven facing into Cork Harbour. I probably had it pointing a little far North as there is little evidence of sun tracks.

Sherkin Artist in the Community Dec 2008

Ok I know I am a bit slow getting these images up. I developed the images straight away when I got home and was really disappointed with the negs. With all the chaos of working in the office and moving into the hall. the paper must have got flashed - so despite all our efforts to use the meagher correctly - we were foiled.

Anyway eventually i did get round to scanning the images and to be honest the positives are much better than I could have hoped from first glance at the negs - one or two images did not come out at all.

So now I am determined to come in on the 4th of January on the 10:30am ferry and with your help set up a darkroom so that we can get immediate feedback on what we are doing.

Sherkin Island Artist in the Community Workshop 23 Nov 2008

Our next Artist in the community workshop on Sherkin will be at 2pm, Sunday 23rd November

At the last workshop participants learned how to use a pinhole camera and saw that you can arrive at some pretty amazing images with very basic technology.

At the next workshop we will look more closely at how this process works using a studio pinhole camera.

We will be using a late 19th century studio camera manufactured by Patrick Meagher, Southampton Bow, London.

I would like to use the camera for what it was intended - portraiture -

Participants please take a few moments between now and then to think how you would like to be photographed, bearing in mind that you will need to be still for around 5 seconds!

The Meagher camera design had a movable back focusing screen connected by a bellows to a lens board. For storage the back was moved by rack and pinion to the front and the hinged baseboard lifted up to protect the focusing screen and if present a side gate was swung across to protect everything that was secured in position with a slotted strut and screw.

p247 Encyclopedia of Nineteenth Century Photography, John Hannavy, 2008

This is quite a unique camera and we are fortunate to have it on loan from Alison Trim.

High Dynamic Range Imaging

Taking good photographs in the dark at a distance over water is not easy. I discussed this with Marc Holden in advance of the epiphany shoot. He referred me to the technique of HDR and a great online tutorial by Trey Ratcliff

HDR is a set of techniques that allows a greater dynamic range of exposures (the range of values between light and dark areas) than normal digital imaging techniques. The intention of HDR is to accurately represent the wide range of intensity levels found in real scenes ranging from direct sunlight to shadows.

This method was developed to produce a high dynamic range image from a set of photographs taken with a range of exposures.

http://www.flickr.com/people/vinjhed/

http://www.flickr.com/people/12034714@N02/

http://www.flickr.com/search/?q=trey%20ratcliff%20hdr&w=all

You can see from the images above that HDR can capture distant, dark images very well. This technique is perfect for the epiphany shoot and I am looking forward to seeing the results.

Gillian Kenny

Earlier this year, I had begun to expieriment with screen printing using a photo sensitive mask. This was ideal for use with photo negatives /found objects and it is something I want to return to in the future.

An artist I will reference before beginning again is Gillian Kenny
Gillian Kenny: New Work , Phatory Gallery, New York, 9 September - 2 October 2004

Gilian Kenny: Bins , oil and acrylic silkscreen on steel, 15.5 x 22 cm; courtesy the artist

"The realistic nature of photography has unfortunately led the medium to be associated with pragmatic truth, where each supposedly functions as a given of the other. Gillian Kenny chips away at this long-standing paradox within a series of fifteen pieces that use the silk-screen process to render a different photographic image upon each unframed, steel surface. Suspending her work between perception and depiction, Kenny then scratches or applies paint over these representations, so as to transform the objective to subjective. In the end, these pieces play with machinations of personal memory" (Jill Connor Art Critic NY, RECIRCA 2005)

Source Photographic Review

Contemporary photography is documented quarterly in Source magazine. They have established links with University Graduate shows to publish an online graduate gallery.

The DIT do have representation, but not from fine art. The School of Media BA in Photography are represented by 11 students in 2008. Registration is easy, a fee of €33 is charged and with it come four free editions of Source Photographic Review

Solargraphs so far

This is a collection of negative and positive solargraphs in an experimental phase.

Click on the images above to see them enlarged

Camera Obscura

Tanya Kiang, Director of the Gallery of Photography, Templebar, Dublin wrote a great essay exploring the history of the camera obscura as a prelude to building one in Dublin. The article

Dark Wonder

was written for Circa magazine in 2001. The Camera Obscura had not been built when I visited in June 2008, so I guess it will take a little longer now that we are crunched.

She cites the following artists who use camera obscura in their work.

Paul Brewer

Jacqueline Griggs

Peter Richards

Lindsay Seers

Abelardo Morell

Barbara Ess

Richard Torchia

f/stops

Photographer, Marc Holden, gave a great explanation today on calculating exposure times.

When an f stop is halved, the area of aperture is reduced but the value increases (counter intuitively). The diagram demonstrates this and the relationship with exposure time.

diagram reference

Using a light metre on his Hasselblad, we determined that in the light conditions prevailing we needed an exposure of - 100 ASA film for 0.25 sec at 4.5fstop

but we were using an old Meagher camera like the one pictured below

To extrapolate the values taking into account we were using a paper negative of 6 ASA.

Adding 25% for reciprocity failure the total time required is 5 seconds.

Reciprocity failure is a characteristic of 'slow' film and the following table gives an indication of the compensation required.

X-ray photography

I am trying to work something out in my head -

I want to print the solargraphs in a way that preserves there delicate luminosity and also in a way that is consistent with my research aims.

I have been thinking about printing to film - ideally the weight and size of an x-ray - so maybe why not an x-ray. Trying to find out information about this type of printing is difficult. Below are the references I have found...so far.





Artist Nick Veasey has a great website and his worked is featured along with other artists in Cult Case an online culture and art magazine that did a special feature on xray photography. The interdisciplinary crossover of Floral Radiography also provides some great images.

The art of surveillance

Ever since the first photograph was taken, it has been used as a tool for surveillance. Google has taken this potential with street view proving 360 degree panoramic street levels views that allows viewers to proceed through an area as if at ground level.

Artist Hasan Elahi who was picked up as a potential terrorist on returning to the US post 9/11 has since published every aspect of his life on the web. He publishes his real-time location, daily photos validating his whereabouts, his bank statements, the meals he has eaten and even the toilets he has visited. All this in order to avoid being mistaken for a terrorist again. The regime at Guantanamo Bay leaves one with little confidence in the precept of justice, innocent until proven guilty.

For this artist going public was the only way he could ensure his privacy and primary right to freedom.

The Day Nobody Died

Last Spring I went a little crazy on ebay purchasing all kinds of photographic oddments at rock bottom prices. One of these items was a 156 metre x 15.6 cm roll of Kodak Royal colour paper. I was itching to do something with it , but was unsure how I could process it. Well, as is the way of the world someone else used this technique already.

In June of this year Adam Broomberg and Oliver Chanarin traveled to Afghanistan to be embedded with British Army units on the front line in Helmand Province. In place of their cameras they took a roll of photographic paper 50 meters long and 76.2 cm wide contained in a simple, lightproof cardboard box.

They arrived during the deadliest month of the war for the British army. Ignoring events that normally would be recorded by a photographer, they instead ufurled a seven-metre section of the paper and exposed it to the sun for 20 seconds.

The evacuation of content and the strange abstract nature of the resultant image present the viewer with more questions than answers.

It is on exhibition at Paradise Row, London - The Day Nobody Died

Now what am I going to do with that roll of paper?

Lensculture

My process is concerned with making the familiar strange - a common enough approach to making art. Melissa Fleming and Joachim Schmid engage with familiar materials in very different ways. There is a very physical aspect to the way in which both approach their work.

I like the work of Melissa Fleming as she exposes photographic paper to sea and sand to make beautiful prints.

http://www.lensculture.com/fleming.html

Joachim Schmid is obesessed with photographs to the point that he collects photographic garbage to restore and reassembles the detritus.

http://www.lensculture.com/schmid.html

These references come from an online magasine Lensculture.