#researchtasks

What is the significance to us of the ‘Photographic Journey’ in three decades from the 1950’s?  Photographers set out for new territories to see what these worlds looked like photographed and this is what they discovered. The desert. The open road. The city street. The beach. The suburban nowhereville. The man-altered landscape. These are the places that photography owns
 and shaped documentary photography as we know it today.

Joel Sternfeld is seen using what type of camera? Why would he be using this as opposed to digital? 
 Large format - Can capture in fine detail, great depth as the film is much larger than smaller formats and 

 Why has Robert Frank’s book ‘The Americans’ had such an impact on modern photography. 
What ‘narrative’ is pervasive throughout his book? 

He brought an honest and outside perspective of culture he seen within cities and neighbourhoods and forgot about perfectionism and link to abstract expressionism in the way he shot. - narrative - optimism that has died. William Klein had one particular photographic outlet for the expression of his photography – How would you describe his attitude to photography? 

The street - very free and experimental,  he liked how you can make things look strange, over exposed - under exposed and you wouldn’t do that in a drawing or paining - photography is about the accidents.

 What made Joel Meyerowitz reject Henri Cartier Bresson’s decisive moment concept for his New York Street Photography? 

 Europe was organised and elegant, new york had so much energy and big and almost like bull fighting as how close people are. Because of the different environments the approach had to be different.

 Iconic NY Street Photographers Garry Winogrand, Diane Arbus & Lee Friedlander and English Photographer, Tony Ray Jones who was heavily influenced by the above noted the key pointers to being a successful Street Photographer. Can you list them? Be more aggressive, get more involved, talk to people, stay with the subject, be patient, take simpler pictures. Don’t take boring pictures. Get in closer.


Why have British ‘street photographers’ gravitated to the beach as an ideal location for their subject matter? 

 The pictures he took showed the magic of the beach at work. Here at least it was possible to forget for a while what being Victorians could forget what being victorian meant and was the place where the nation reclined and bared its soul. Family dramas. Displays of eccentricity. Dreams of love.The damp disappointments of everyday life. The beach and the seafront were the stage on which these classic themes were played out. ‘Surface rather than soul’. What does that mean to you?  What is going on around people, the backdrops taken for granted when life is present - beauty in everyday humdrum without the need for a person, expression or emotion.

The Road trips of Stephen Shore & Joel Sternfeld. Your observations....... Their journeys seemed, interesting, cheap and working with what you had but exploring and seeing new things all the time which energised them to make images. It shows you can make something great and interesting with the simplest means and an open mind in new locations.