Queensland Art Gallery

We visited the  Queensland Art Gallery as a class on Monday last week, which has a whole range of things from glassware, Victorian furniture and sculptures to Aboriginal art and of course paintings and even a couple of photographs.

We were looking for things that inspired us and things that did not appeal to us so much. Several of us found the first difficult, especially when it came to the abstract or more modern collections. As for myself, I tend to see the world for what it is, what's already there right in front of me. I can see the beauty in a scene or the value within an item, but I don't tend to interpret such things or draw deep personal meaning from them which a lot of art is meant to do. 

No surprise then that the collections that didn't speak to me at all were indeed the abstract and conceptual pieces. (The abstract sculptures a bit less so since - being a 3D object - I could see interesting photographic potential in them.) Rather, it was the paintings that depicted reality - even everyday life - that caught my attention, perhaps more so given the era they portrayed from the 1800-1900's (one that does actually interest me on the side).

Below is one such painting in which a mother and child have been evicted from their home. What captures me most about paintings like this (apart from what it depicts) is how much detail has been added to the scene, from the leaves on the ground to the vines and texture on the houses to the toy horse being dragged behind the girl to the number of other people looking on and the different expressions on all their faces. The more I look, the more I see, and the more emotive and expressive I realise the painting is.

The ability of the artist to see such a scene so clearly and then to be able to paint it over however many days is really something amazing to me: a photographer who just has to press one button to capture every detail that lasts but a moment of what's in front of me. 

Blandford Fletcher, England 1858–1936 | Evicted 1887 | Oil on canvas

The scene is overall a fairly bright one (though the colours are muted), and so the mother stands out starkly in her full black attire - likely a deliberate choice to match her mood and the sorrow of the situation as well as an indication that she is likely a widow - in contrast with most everyone else there. Note that the man in the top hat is the only other person in full black which - along with the fact that he is looking towards her and is dressed well - draws the link that he is the one who evicted her.

Understandably, the mother looks resigned to her fate, and the feeling is that she most likely has nowhere else to go. The child looks a little frightened, though perhaps she doesn't fully comprehend the situation. She is mostly in white which reflects her innocence, and the viewer's attention is drawn straight to her in large part because she is gazing directly at them almost in a beseeching way. The fact that she is dragging a toy sadly on its side behind her also contributes to the drama and feelings this painting evokes.

I find it interesting that the girl is carrying an umbrella rather than a bag or another toy. Obviously they don't have anything much to take with them anyway, but it makes me think the umbrella is a symbol of rainy days - or rather, more tragedy and sorrow - ahead, and perhaps that the mother is trying to prepare her daughter for it (by giving her the umbrella). It also makes me consider that that one umbrella is all they have now for shelter, which just adds to the emotiveness of the scene.

The composition is quite effective, with the mother and daughter nearer to the left edge and quite deliberately walking out of the scene into the unknown "wilderness" as implied by the increased number of leaves on the ground in the direction they are heading. The other people are all in groups and really quite distant - emphasising just how alone the mother and daughter are - with some looking as though they are just continuing on with their lives and ignoring the evictees without a care, and others quite clearly having stopped to watch with some derision or judgement. By comparison, the young girls in the background and the lady beside them - perhaps neighbours - actually look sad and sympathetic, knowing that this could easily happen to any of them, as was often the case during the industrialisation of England in the 19th century.

Tim's Story - Ryan Muirhead

 These three images were captured by American photographer Ryan Muirhead. Born in 1981 in Orem, Utah, USA; though still relatively young when the digital age flourished, he has all but completely rejected the use of digital cameras continuing to shoot solely in film. Muirhead is known mostly for his portraiture, however he is also well known in the music photography industry after touring with well known bands such as The Used documenting their tour and album production.

These photos are of a man named Tim who Muirhead met walking home through the streets of St Johns, Oregon as he tried to capture an image of the bus stop seen in the first image when this man started yelling  "You taking pictures?! Take a picture of this!". He was drunk and disorderly, he divulged his life story to Muirhead; his wife had recently died of alcoholism and he was dying of leukemia."His fits of yelling were punctuated with several moments of intense calm."After one of his fits of rage Muirhead asked if he could make a frame of him, the real him, and he managed to capture the third image shown above.This series of photos stood out to me immediately, not only did they appeal to me aesthetically with his composition and use of black and white vs colour film, but also because of the raw emotion captured.

To me, these three images are a narrative, it starts off with a setting and an intriguing character, you get a little closer and learn more about the character and as it draws to a close, everything is calm.

Muirhead has shot the first two images in black and white and chosen to shoot the last portrait in colour which I feel adds a certain warmth and human character to an image, showing Tim as the real man he is. Both images of Tim are focused sharply on his face, drawing attention to the raw emotion on his face.

Bernie Boston - Flower Power

Bernie Boston 1967

This photograph was taken by Bernie Boston during a 1967 protest march against the Vietnam war. The location was the Pentagon. Armed Federal soldiers had surrounded a group of protesters, ready to engage as deemed necessary. As an act of peace, a young man named George Harris placed a flower in the barrel of a gun held by a soldier.

"I knew I had a good picture" - Bernie Boston

Bernie Boston was born on May 18th 1933 in Washington, D.C. and grew up in Virginia where he became the photographer for the newspaper and yearbook of his high school. Boston joined the army practising radiology and left after only two years, returning to Washington. He started working at Custom Photo Finishing and eventually started his own news photography company in Ohio. He was hired by the Los Angeles Times and has gone on to win many awards including National Press Photographers Association award, the Joseph A. Sprague Memorial Award and induction into the hall of fame of Sigma Delta Chi.

My first impression upon visually taking the entire photo in is fascination and awe. A man no older than eighteen, still practically a boy, is standing up for what he believes in with dozens of soldiers ready to blow his face off. Showing no fear or even the slightest intimidation of a rifle centimetres away from his head, he slides a flower down the barrel. The image is all encompassing.

The entire photograph is focused and clean. Boston has managed to hide away any full view of a subjects face. The photo was shot in black and white, exposing the light of the protesters and the darkness of the soldiers. This can be interpreted to mean the protesters have the right view and message and all the goodness that comes with it but the overwhelming forces are trying to corrupt and destroy that.

Erik Johansson

Let's Leave by Erik Johansson

Erik Johansson, born in 1985, is a full time photographer and retoucher from Sweden. He has worked with Google, Adobe and Microsoft, and is perhaps most well known for his incredibly complex and realistic looking photo manipulations.

"I don’t capture moments, I capture ideas. To me photography is just a way to collect material to realize the ideas in my mind." Erik Johansson 

An artist since he was a child, he got his first digital camera in the year 2000 and is self-taught in both photography and retouching.

"For me the realism has always been very important and it’s a challenge to make a sketch come to life in a photo." Erik Johansson

Let's Leave
Creative Interpretation
Trapped in a dream. She wants to go. She's all ready for it. It's so real to her. But she cannot leave. What she wants is just a dream.

I considered at first that the two women were different people, that someone else was holding her back or giving her false hopes. But the longer I looked, the more I felt they represent the same person. The heart is young and naive, but the mind is older and wiser and sees what is and what cannot be. Yet the mind still wants to dream.

Technical Aspects
The compositing is virtually flawless, though there is something about the image that doesn't look quite right to me. It looks more CG rather than photographic. Perhaps it's the lighting. The clouds and general atmosphere give me the impression of a dark, perhaps stormy scene, but the highlights on the suitcases and bubbles clearly indicate a sun fully visible in the sky to the right. That said, it's clear the overcast sky and the sun being off camera to the right in the direction the girl is facing (and perhaps soon to be travelling) was a deliberate choice when composing this scene.

Colours have been chosen well and all contribute to the story being told by this image. In this scene of muted colours (which is perhaps soon to be left behind), the girl in the red dress stands out and captures the viewer's attention immediately as the main focus of the photo. She is certainly the brightest/lightest part of the image (and not only due to the bubble around her head) which emphasises her happy, hopeful, perhaps dreamy expression which is perhaps about a brighter future or path ahead.

The strong line of the handle of the bubble blower then draws the eye across to the other woman who doesn't stand out as much in her black dress and to the tub of bubble blowing solution beside her, which both complete the story being told by this image. The black dress matches the dark and gloomy atmosphere, both of which seem like they'll be left behind for something brighter ahead, whereas the tub of bubble blowing solution is done in somewhat brighter colours which match the main girl's red dress and the magic of what is about to happen.

The single bubble deliberately placed on the right is a third and final point of reference which completes the scene and balances out the image nicely.

Henri Cartier-Bresson

By Henri Cartier-Bresson

Henri Cartier-Bresson (August 22, 1908 – August 3, 2004) was a French photographer considered to be the father of photojournalism. He was an early adopter of 35 mm format, and the master of candid photography. (courtesy of wikipedia)

Technical Aspects
- Leading lines (the spiral) draw the eye inwards to the centre of the photo
- Depth of Field draws the eye first to the bottom left of the photo and adds depth
- Repetition of the children's heads adds to the leading line of the spiral
- Contrast helps the children's heads to stand out from the background and adds depth
- Composition: An uncommon angle looking straight up from the bottom of what appears to be a spiraling staircase
- Smooth spiral shape/line is uncommon but pleasing and interesting to the eye
- Children add further interest and emotion to the shot

Creative Interpretation
- N: The children's heads lose their distinctive traits with distance so they start to look like the same child.
- MO: All the children are lined up close together and all looking down (not necessarily at the photographer). None of them look particularly happy. It's generally what I think about when I think of "orphanage". Strict, unhappy, unloved, lonely yet not alone.