Inspired by the work of a photographer friend, Tom Ferris (whose fabulous work ranges much more widely than currently represented on his website), I followed a route he and other photographers have trodden before: to the junkyard. My “junkyard” was billed as an antique lot by the owner, while the city considered it an auto sales shop, but both were happy to let me photograph.
Old cars and decrepit structures, especially in the western U.S., are a favorite subject and make up a genre unto themselves, one that seems to fit in particularly well with the landscape here. Though having said that, I think that natural destruction and decay always takes on the local character of place and climate. Having said which, I realize one could say the same of the destruction and decay that occur with human assistance in urban environments. I guess that the way things die is just inherently a part of what we understand by “place.”
Though I made a few descriptive photographs, the one above represents a big step into abstraction. It’s a close-up of a car fender, rotated to be vertical. The lack of context and scale, along with the rotation, make it hard to recognize immediately. I’ve also increased the saturation somewhat in this color version, though I also like it in straight black and white.
The abstraction road must follow a slippery slope, for I soon began getting much closer to the subjects, which were no longer cars, but weathered surfaces of peeling paint and rust. This was no surprise, as many others I knew of had done the same. What was a surprise to me was the world of color possibilities that open up once one decides to leave reality behind and fiddle with that saturation control. Having almost always worked in monochrome, I was blown away by both the strength of the emotional impact of the raw color, and the endless nuances possible. This is the closest I’ve come to appreciating a painter’s choices. To a newcomer, it can be rather overwhelming, but it’s also a blast to play with!
I think I have a whole new voice to find here. Not that my old voice has changed really, it’s more like an alternative voice for saying different things. I’ll probably overdo it a lot as I learn my way, but I’m going to have fun exploring. So give me a peek at the territory ahead. How did you discover color?
Steve,
I love this junk. Seriously, this is amazing work. How do you discover color? I think you are doing a great job at finding the answer yourself.
I think this work has an intensity lacking in some “normal” abstract art, because it is not in fact abstract at all, it is an unusual view of something real. That gives it a meaning that I sometimes find lacking in some non-representational paintings.
I’m impressed by your willingness to take chances — collaboration last week, finding a new voice this week. To a non-artist, this might seem like no big deal. But artists themselves often hesitate before doing something that could affect their carefully crafted “individuality” and brand image. You are standing up to the system here, Steve. Bravo.
Picture 1 reminds me of the big statues on Easter Island. I like it a lot.
Picture 2 makes me feel crazy at a first glance. I will keep looking at it over the day.
Steve,
Wow! Huge leaps in your work here. I see Birgit’s connection to Easter Island and love that first image. the second one is psychedellic and full of dizzyiing movement, schieved by both the complmentary color scheme and movement of the marks. It looks like something a non-objective painter tried really hard to achieve. I know there are artists out there who base their work on such surfaces as you have found. It is such a physical surface, if that makes any sense. It would be interesting for a painter here to do a study based on that image! I agree with Karl that your willingness to embrace experimentation is wonderful to witness and an inspiration for me in my own work. thanks for showing this stuff. Show us more!!
Steve, these are great! I like them both a lot, but especially the second one, which could be exactly what it is, or a lake in an industrial wasteland.
I discovered color the same way that you’re doing it, but without a camera. Don’t worry about it being a slippery slope. You can always return to straight representation, but you’ll bring a new perspective to it.
Steve,
I wonder if you can make an art form of photographing abstract paintings. Aside from specific patterns of color and texture, what is the real conceptual difference between a junk yard photo and a photo of a Jackson Pollock?
Karl, like most good ideas, someone got there first. Check out Robert Weingarten’s photgraphs of artist’s palettes:
Palette Series
Steve,
Perhaps it is World Events, and in particular our (US) role in it, that makes me particularly sensitive about how we crop (and then recrop) and then realign and reposition our thoughts and visions. The photos are abstractly nice but… are their consequences? I suppose it can remind us that our world can be a beautiful place if we choose to see only what we want to see.
I do not want to take this too seriously as it seems like a learning exercise, so…
I wonder about this: Antique or Junk? I wonder how the owner would represent his place with photographs? Or how the public official would? Have you considered showing your work There?
David,
A good idea is one thing, good art is another. I find Steve’s photos far better than the palette images.
Karl, I wasn’t talking about Steve’s photos. The link was in response to your suggestion about photographing abstract paintings.
David,
I understand. Still, I think Steve could do far better at photographing either junk or palettes or abstract paintings than the images you linked to. I like the idea, I appreciate the link, but the images did not move me, despite the big names behind them. That’s all I meant to say.
In science there is a saying: it doesn’t matter who discovers something first; what matters is who discovers it last. The idea of photographing palettes or paintings is not taken or used until someone does something amazing with it. Then all the earlier attempts will be forgotten.
Steve, let me know if you start collecting palettes.
Steve —
Whew! I like these.
The overlay of philosophical questions that D. poses are fun to play with — (I myself have a perennial fascination with the magnificent concrete curves of urban interstate highways, even as I have a greenie’s dislike of their impact on my life) — but in my experience, sliding down the slope you’ve found is enough fun to begin with. You can ask yourself the questions about rust and decay and junk and your world views after the initial joy of color and manipulation slows down.
And re: the work itself — aside from the curved lines, these images seem very unlike one another. The first one has power but the second one has a complexity, like the work of abstract expressionist Joan Mitchell, that I like even better. Perhaps it is, as Karl says, the real thing that lies behind the manipulated imagery. But if I had painted that second one (oil on canvas, naturally) I would be delighted. Oddly enough, I don’t think it would work in textiles nearly as well, although it would be fun to try.
Thanks for the comments, I’m glad you’re finding these interesting, maybe even appealing. I agree with June’s impressions, and with the reminders of Easter Island, though I thought more of African masks. Most of my pictures are more like the second.
One thing I find with these color images is that viewing it on different computer monitors can really affect the experience. My monitor here shows thing lower contrast and bluer, which alters both images for me.
D,
Consequences are definitely a fair question, though I have to say I haven’t much considered it yet. That’s certainly something I’ll be thinking more about and would mention in a statement for a show, if one materializes. An update on the antique/junk controversy is that the cars have recently been moved to a new location out of town; not progress as far as I’m concerned.
The palette series David pointed to are very interesting in a different way. I mainly like the ones that are actual palettes, because they tell more about the painter and how he works (all I saw were men!!!?? — to punctuate like my Aunt Shaney). I suppose my photos are more about the remnants of a once-expensive beauty, and how it can still be beautiful in a different way. I should say that I like some of these (I’ll be putting more on my web site eventually) in their natural, muted colors, but I tend to like them best with more saturated color and/or in black and white.
David,
Did you mean you discovered color (in the sense of a new awareness, not necessarily the first) via digital manipulation? Not in your earlier painting?
And hey, does anybody else see the strange dragon/bat-creature facing left in the upper part? Do you see anything else that affects your feeling about the image? Or is it purely abstract color shapes for you?
I have trouble looking at picture 2, because, as seen on my monitor, for me, the blues and oranges are biting one another
Did you mean you discovered color (in the sense of a new awareness, not necessarily the first) via digital manipulation? Not in your earlier painting?
No, I just meant that I discovered color through painting. My work in other mediums, including digital ones, is part of the same ongoing discovery process. There’s a lot there to learn, not just conceptually, but also in terms of continually finetuning one’s perception and intuition.
I doubt you’ll get bored :)
Steve
I have very ambivalent feelings about these photographs. In the medium of photography, “abstracts” like these have been done to death. It is very easy to lapse into cliche when creating photographs like these and I think that’s where my ambivalence resides.
I am “conditioned” by the ubiquitousness of camera-club abstracts. My first impression is that I’m not suppose to like these.
On the other hand, I just purchased this entire set of photographs which I am hanging just as they appear on the page.
signed
Confused and Ambivalent in the Mountains
Mark,
Thanks for your comments. I have some ambivalence too! If I really got you confused, I consider that a major achievement. Here are a few things I think about this:
Certainly generic abstracts and even peeling paint abstracts have been “done to death” in some sense. On the other hand, what hasn’t? Surely there are a gazillion photos of Mt. Marcy, but that doesn’t mean a good photographer can’t make a good image of it, and maybe even one that says something a little bit new. I’m not claiming that mine fall into that category, but I aspire to it. That’s what “finding my voice” means to me. I haven’t found it yet.
There are different kinds of photography, and this one actually feels completely different to me from most of my other work. I’m in a different frame of mind doing it, I’m looking for different things, and I do very different things in the later processing of the image. David’s probably right that whatever I do in this mode will inevitably influence other things I do, but to me the connection still seems rather weak. It’s more like a different art altogether.
I agree with the point Karl made that the real foundation of the image can give it a curious kind of authority that would be lacking if it were fully invented. My goal in this project is to make strong images that have “abstract” appeal and also real referents. I have chosen one version of my second image; I have a number of similar frames of this area and others where it’s still clear that this is on a car because of some edge or holes or other metalwork. I’m actually not sure which I like best at this point.
I also love the abstracts that stay closer to true colors and more discernable objects, such as those Mary Dennis does. With my particular subjects, most of the time, I just find them more interesting with the color jazzed up (or down to monochrome, also unrealistic).
In the medium of photography, “abstracts” like these have been done to death.
Mark,
If you told Paul Butzi, “In the medium of photography, ‘landscapes’ like yours have been done to death,” I think he would just laugh.
For my part, “the medium of photography” is not an entity that interests me. What interests me is what artists in what I consider to be my artistic community are doing. If Steve is doing something interesting, I value it, whether it has been done to death by others or not. If Steve sees a value in doing it, that is an indication to me that there is something worthwhile in it. To attempt to evaluate every photograph and painting ever done in order to evaluate Steve’s would be counter-productive. Historically, great art has been the product of small communities in which the members felt they were doing something important. They perhaps took inspiration from some specific works of the past, but they were not intimidated by or even interested in much of the other art that had been created during human history. It is this ability to focus on an area of interest (something which the internet makes difficult because of the easy access it gives to EVERYTHING) that is essential to creating something new. If along the way there is a repetition of past effort, so what?
Enjoy the mountains; set aside confusion and ambivalence, unless these are valuable to your creative process.