The nature of my relationship to anything social scientific is through my artistic interest in filmmakers Stan Brakhage and Jack Chambers. Their relationship to phenomenology and making images captured and inspired me. Specifically Chambers’ notion of wonder has led me to think about my subjects in varying ways. I did not feel that a brief statement was an appropriate forum to elaborate.

My statement, rather, was meant to introduce the ideas surrounding my work which have been greatly influenced by an art historical context. Funny enough Catherine, the context is filmic in nature. This, I believe, is entirely appropriate when the discussion of the work is an accessory to its face value. It is there I wish to step off from being a part of any overarching illustrations of social scientific thought. That kind of thing leaves no room for these to be autonomous images.

It was not my intention for this to become about semantics or excellence in art-speak. It is a challenge to be precise as Catherine suggests and certainly relates to our varied elevations in the understanding of terms. I offer, “organic” is not an essential part of how I see things but rather a word that is familiar to me. It relates to printmaking processes and the discovery of an image when a print is pulled, layer upon layer. I was relating my digital practice to my manual practice in a way. That’s all. I could omit that word with little consequence to what I am offering as a photographer here. I’ll be more careful in the future.

When David first commented, I felt some clarity on the thoughts surrounding my work would be useful in a critical context and to the best of my ability did so. That seems to have opened and steered the conversation in an unfortunately opposite direction. I suppose David, despite being engaged in picture making, there is a magnetic pull at work to draw this discussion elsewhere.

Dagmara, thank you for the offer but I do not wish to weigh in on anything surrounding the “social science” dialogue. I bow to the more knowledgeable. That is far outside my humble interests and I think I have enough work cut out for me as an emerging imagesmith.

I think there is still opportunity to talk about the images though. They are after all, what is truly important to me. Thank you for your comments and insights.

Kind regards,

Colin.

“The question of the (somtimes) forced link between the social sciences and art is as already noted often an attempt to assure audiences and potential audiences of the usefulness of the arts. I value art that offers those kinds of links but only when the aesthetics are absolutely primary and the social observations are complex, non-polemical, and come back to an individual perspective that is alive to that phenomenological content. The example of William Kentridge comes to mind (not a photographer though he does use some lens-based media. I am not completely conversant with the field of photographers). His work is rich, complex, and he has a political and social content, but it is always subordinate to the strong aesthetic content and his sensitivity to his location in time and space.”

Now, let it be clear I think this diversification is a fantastic thing. But the dialogue one type of work engages is very different from another. Of course there’s no need for the artist to be well-versed in all of them. Indeed, more and more, the artist seems to be a specialist in a larger field. I’ve often heard painters criticizing video artists and video artists being suspicious of performance and performance…etc. etc.. What I’m concerned about is the increased division is rendering certain types of work more favourable to funding initiatives because they have greater instrumental value or are more implicated in the social through medium alone. So I wonder what the relationship of work to funding looks like. Which leads the other and how much give and take is there? Is art practice also dividing on a more fundamental line–between the academic artist (i.e. the one who gets the PhD) and the commercial/career artist? Is the PhD just a way to get at job or is it partially a product of the diversification of artist interest and specialization? When art becomes as subsumed by the market as it is now, is there a search for a different type of art that might find its place within the university setting?

Admittedly these answers to these questions aren’t clear cut but I think they’re worth looking at in earnest. I’ve seen a marked amount of students switch into BFAs from other faculties when they discovered they had creative inclinations that did not include drawing. Art education is spilling over into specialized schools, gallery-run programs (and I’m not talking about those bring your kids to drawing class enterprises), artist residencies and other opportunities that are re-contextualizing art education itself. I wonder to what extent art is changing and redefining itself at its core.

I think there’s relevance to what you say but I also think you’re making some unwarranted assumptions.

First, the statement that art schools should be solely art colleges makes the assumption that art colleges don’t exist… but they do. They exist exactly as that alternative to a theoretical education. They exist as a means of focusing on the material of art within a purely art setting.

Second, your comments imply that art does not change. There are many reasons why art has moved into the university setting, some less flattering than others. But I think it’s fair to say that one of them is because artists started thinking about about what they do. They started asking questions like “What does it mean to make an image?” or “What is an image?” They started working with theorists and critics more and more–i.e. Greenberg. Then some started writing their own art criticism–i.e. Patrick Ireland/Brian O’Doherty. Further, artists started challenging the old “material” processes of art and in came conceptual, performance, video, media art.

The point is that art is far too diverse and allows for too wide of an array of practices to simply call for a totalizing response to it. Like other creative pursuits, it pushes its own boundaries and redefines itself generation after generation. That’s the point or at least it has been since the church and royalty stopped patronizing artists. The fact that it’s an elitist pursuit that is best pursued by those who can afford it is another point entirely. It’s unfortunate but it’s the case with writers, dancers, actors and, well, anyone who does something that isn’t immediately instrumental.

That being said, you make one last assumption–that other faculties, like law for example, train their students to work in their respective careers. This is simply not the case. Speaking to a trained lawyer the other day, he corrected me in saying that his school made no qualms about teaching people law and not expecting them to be lawyers. Indeed, we’d have far too many lawyers if all of them became one… perhaps we have far too many as it is! But the point of a university is higher learning. The fact that it can often be inaccessible and causes a massive amount of debt is a whole other issue.

I put up a topic about art and research in the topics section to talk about BlackFlash, and possibly other magazines, using a “social sciences” dialogue to talk about art. It actually would be great to get your input on it so please feel free to share your ideas. You can link to it from the mainpage.

Thanks!

First, let me say I am aware of what is academic here and in no way feel bound or trapped in it. But thank you for offering an out. I am a willing participant and feel no bristle at the mention of it.

On the issue of tension. You almost answer this for yourself in your criticism. The comment, “It seems to me the work centers around time and layered perspectives,” is a fair assessment. By collapsing many layers of the same subject, shot in the same circumstance at various vantage points into a singular image, I am interested in generating something specific. The viewer repeats their first experience with the subject when unpacking the elements, offering many opportunities for discovery. It is a bit like blending many extended first glances. Resting in and extending that glance before meaning is deciphered relates directly to Merleau-Ponty and “primary perception”. It would seem, based on your own work and statement, phenomenology is a mutually relevant area of photographic interest.

How this lends to memory. The viewer is afforded a position in this work to see the subject all at once without having to make sensible concrete conclusions about the truth of the subject or their position in relation to it. The memory of a subject is similar. Conflated by primary and secondary information without any pure certainty, memory harbors a similarly shifting perspective in time and vantage. This interests me and has been a part of my investigations for some time.

It is curious a word such as “organic” would seem so controversial. As a fellow printmaker you might be more sympathetic to the notion of growing an image through process.

That all this “is not revealed in the work” might matter more if there was no life to my work outside of it’s academia and I can accept your disinterest in or disapproval of it.

Best regards,
Colin.

‘Organic other’ please explain.Is there a non organic other?

How does and why does an image that is ‘complicated in orientation’ ‘lend inself to memory’?
It seems to me the work centres around time ,and layered perspectives .

All photographs are concerned with time and as such with mortality.Yes memory is connected to things past but the tension between ‘presentness’ and memory you suggest is not revealed the in the work.

This is academic jargon – free yourself before its too late.