The Genius of Photography- Part 2 ,,Documents for Artists’’

1) What are Typologies?

Typology is a study of types. In photography it is the systematic, accurate recording of places, people and things (to create pure a document, just the facts nothing else). The series of photographs usually taken in a similar way (angle, lighting, composition, framing) which enables comparison of the subjects. 

 

Bernd & Hilla Becher

 2) What was “The Face of The Times”?

August Sander was a German commercial portrait photographer who in 1929 published his selection of the portraits under the title ,,The Face of The Times’’.  His human typology used a system of categorisation based on 7 social types and focused on functionality of the individual in society. He presented these images as strict documentary however each of them have a meaning behind it that you couldn’t talk about at the time when they were created (chaos in Germany during the period of post war).

August Sander

3) Which magazine did Rodchenko design?

Rodchenko designed the “URSS en construction” magazine. He was a master of photo- montage who introduced a new way of seeing. This radical photographic style was combined with cutting edge graphic to create political propaganda.

4) What is photo-montage?

Photo-montage is a graphic technique which has been taken from cinema montage. It’s composition obtained by  cutting, posting, retouching separate photographs and  re-photographing very last outcome. The final piece has a different and stimulated  meaning more than the original photographs.

5) Why did Eugene Atget use albumen prints in the 1920’s?

Albumen prints were used to print in the sunshine not in the darkroom. For 1920 the technique was quite old. However Atget didn’t know how to print using modern material and methods.

6) What is solarisation and how was it discovered?

Solarisation was discovered by Man Ray’s assistant Lee Miller in the late 1920s. No camera is involved when making this type of photograph. Solarisation is simply a characteristic effect created by exposing the print or film while is developed to the white light. It is a surrealistic metallic effect with areas of reverse tones like on negatives.

Man Ray

7) What was the relationship between Bernice Abbott and Eugene Atget?

Bernice Abbott was an assistant of Man Ray.  Eugene Atget was also a photographer and his work was inspiring for Bernice Abbott and she decided to take a portrait of Eugene Atget in 1927.

8) Why was Walker Evans fired from the FSA?

Walker Evans in 1935 was commissioned to produce propaganda images for the FSA – Farm Security Administration (the photography program created by American government to deal with the crisis). The photographs were supposed to show a perfect and idealised society in America. Evans shaped reality to fit his personal vision but he couldn’t make that vision fit to the propaganda requirements of FSA. He was sacked in 1937.