Mia/Captain's Log

29. 10. 2018 - Javi's tutorial

think about the subject that points out the relationships your camera is discussing (photo - drawing - layering)
how can the subject (what is in the picture you make) emphasize this "conflict" of image and text or photo and drawing
objective vs. subjective/poetic
photography vs. (handwritten) text
basics of semiotics: Charles Sanders Pierce
fundaments of the medium - Wilem Flusser: Towards a Philosophy of Photography

1. PHOTOBOOK - BRUSHSTROKES (working title):

juxtaposition with paintings would be too straight forward, too flat, a single layer
think about CHANCE and ACCIDENT (as fragments of reality)
reading on the topic: George Brecht - Chance Imagery
artists: Bruce Nauman - Coffee Spilled;
references on traces/fragments dealing with time and past, accidents etc. Pierre Huyghe - Gallery Wall
chance - gesture
the selection (photographs) of found drips, stains, strokes is interesting enough to work with it
important phase of trying out, printing, matching, replacing in physical form to make decisions
interaction with the user: first intention is that user can add drawings, brushstrokes, that the object is between the photobook and a sketchbook - BUT! - how to not make it with instructions, to not make it obvious but natural, spontaneous (just as chance and accidents that are represented in the book!)?
potential answers: to make a binding that can be changed (with screws), paper that is thicker, resembles sketchbook features, TITLE
balance between open and fixed structure
text included in the book? probably not (just as an explanation besides the project)

2. FOCAL CAMERA - DRAWING CAMERA

for presentation is interesting to also see the camera as an object, a methodology
seeing pictures all together is different than observing them separately
from mere experiments try to focus on one aspect of the research and develop it in detail (either abstraction, text as a comment on the image, etc.)
relation between the drawing layer and photograph is important!

performance with transparent layer with gestures
photography with transparencies
references of artistic practices above also include photographing (or seeing) through transparent materials (glass, plastic, water, steam etc.)
how can this transparency be used to tell something about the subject (could be hiding, veiling, obscuring the truth/someone's true self, emotions etc.?)
importance of gesture
focal camera and photobook project feel related to each other
continuous process of researching is encouraged

[What kind of writer do you want to be?]

I like analysing art work and exhibitions. I think notes are impotent in this process. Analysis might take different forms: it may be very personal. To me analyses is a way of organising thoughts. I try to write something about every exhibition I see, which I store on my wiki. It is often the case that I need to go back and remind myself. I have found the synopsis exercise useful. I would like to finish the text I am working on by the xmas break.

[About your own work:]

For image analysis I just typed out people’s work and I did the interview and the descriptions. It was also good to work together with Cem on the same text today
[Steve suggests: Try to take the different sessions where you discuss your work and make one text out of it. By wich I mean: Use the texts as notes and make a new text which describes your work and identifies underlying motivations in your work]
The relation between, drawing, painting, and printmaking – the last makes a link or crossover with photography.
Cameraless photography. One section is a photogram, which seems closer than other things to printmaking, camigram which only uses chemicals and photo-paper and does not use light.
[shows photographs]
The relation between drawing and photo.
The next stage, to go to the studio and make a photo of a figure and play with that. I want to do tests with the depth of field. The studio gives me a more controlled environment. The human figure provides more of a challenge. I don’t often work with figures. If you have a portrait it triggers a feeling or narrative. It might also be more obvious the difference between a photo and a drawing of a person. I imagine a female subject.

(Mia asks for feedback on the (photo)book without first explaining it)

you are dealing with very fundamental formalist questions - a lot of potential derives from them
questions like: why we make images? How (deliberately, by chance)? What does it mean to leave a mark?
Photocopy is basically dust on paper - echoes the idea of marks left by leafing through the book with dusty fingers
INDEXICALITY

the book is like three books in one (makes a bit of confusion)
three categories of pictures: archeological (documenting specific - urban - place and time), abstract (like fragments of drawings), tests (like cleaning a brush or test on the negative)
interested more in the process and not yet in end result (being a photographer-anthropologist/archeologist)
Lothar Baumgarten
very gentle approach, delicate
the project could go in many ways
the book seems precious
another type of binding? (spiral, wooden newspaper holder - might go with archeologist pictures, >>I do not see that screws can be taken apart to change the pages<<)
whichever path you choose, be radical in it
FOCAL CAMERA reference: William Kentridge