Out of the Woods of Though is an exhibition of photography curated by ‘Inside the Outside’, a group of contemporary photographers who share a similar, though diverse approach to photographing the landscape. The four founding members; Al Brydon, Rob Hudson, Stephen Segasby and Joseph Wright, alongside a number of hand-picked guest exhibitors, present a quite different and refreshing approach to landscape photography; just exactly what I hoped for when I responded to Hazel’s invitation to join her and Mike on a visit to the Argentea Gallery in Birmingham.
In the event there were 5 of us. Holly, Kevin, Hazel, Mike and myself met that the Navigation street exit at Birmingham New Street station, had a bite of lunch and viewed the huge mosaic on the floor of the central hall of New street station before heading out to the Argentea Gallery and I need to say something about this mosaic first.
This giant mosaic of suffragette, Hilda Burkitt is the work of artist Helen Marshal who appealed to women in the West Midlands for photographs of themselves, from which she created the portrait. Burkitt’s claim to fame was that she threw as stone and broke a window in the train that prime minister. Hubert Asquith was travelling in, as a result of which she went to prison for 2 months. The result is absolutely amazing, not just in terms of the creativity of the artist but the sheer logistics of putting this into place in a very busy station. This mosaic will be on display until Friday 14th December, ‘which marks the 100th anniversary of women being able to vote for the first time’. (Network Rail Media Centre, 2018)
Out of the Woods of Thought
A 15 minute walk took us to the Argentea Gallery in the corner of St Paul’s Square. I have not come across this gallery before but according to their website, they are committed ‘to showing the very best contemporary photography from both British and international artists’. (Argentea Gallery, 2018), so definitely on to keep an eye on. On entering the bright airy gallery, you are met with the work of 4 photographers; Al Brydon’s ‘Solargraphs’, Joseph Write’s ‘The Floods’, Lynda Laird’s ‘Dans le Noir’ and JM Golding’s ‘Transitional Landscapes’.
In the beautifully presented exhibition catalogue, also produced by exhibitor Joseph Wright, Al Brydon reflects on the time between placing the solargraph and collecting it, ‘A newborn’s first breath and another person’s last’ (Brydon, 2018) and that this time takes its toll on him too and he is a different person at the end of the process. I have never taken much notice of solargraphs before but found Al Brydon’s images really fascinating. This is something I have to experiment with and have already looked up the process – all I need is some dark room photo paper to give it a go.
Although I enjoyed Lynda Laird’s infrared photographs printed onto silk, they didn’t seem to me to fit with the rest of the exhibition.
This is a story of the landscape along the Normandy coast where the D-Day landings took place and depicts what is left of some of the old bunkers. It is accompanied by a diary entry from 6th June 1944, by Odette Brefort, a member of the French Resistance, which can be seen here. It is a really moving story and I loved the photographs and will certainly explore more of Laird’s work. I just felt that this warranted an exhibition in its own right or would perhaps have sat better with work of other women photographers portraying the second world war, for example, ‘No Mans Land’, which I reflected on here.
JM Golding is a US based photographic artist who uses pin hole and vintage cameras as her main tools to create quite dreamlike and almost surreal images. Her ‘Transitions’ landscape, although quite different, reminded me of Helen Sears’ ‘Stack’, here, where she used slices of many photographs, printed on aluminium to create a new panel which filled the wall and moved as the viewer moved.
From talking to the young woman in the gallery, I learned that Golding’s work is created using multiple exposures where the film is wound on a fraction at a time, so it is just one print. My other interest in this work is that for a little while I have been wondering how I might present assignment 6, conveniently called ‘transitions’ and given that I will have at least 12 photographs to work with, had thought I might try to replicate Helen Sears’ approach, although mine will be printed on paper rather than aluminium and probable A4 rather than wall sized!
For me, the stand out exhibit has to be Joseph Wright’s ‘The Floods’. Described in the exhibition catalogue as a ‘visual narrator’, Joseph Wright somehow manages to make the bleakest, most chaotic, scruffy patches of woodland look enticing. Is it the light or the way the different elements come together, I’m not sure but I will certainly look differently at some of these ignored and forgotten places in future.
Joseph Wright is also a publisher and maker of books and one book that I failed to photograph was the gallery copy of Wright’s own handmade book of his ‘The Floods’ project. Photographs printed onto photo paper and vellum and with text printed on vellum, Japanese Stab Bound; a real work of art in itself. Sadly though it is now out of prints although I wonder if he may consider producing a few more copies as a result of this exhibition.
Downstairs, the work of 5 more photographers; Guy Dickinson’s ‘Stations’ consists of images of the detail of sandstone rock from a cave in the Arann Islands in Ireland.
These images and others on his website remind me very much of some of Anna’s ‘Body of Work’, the rocks with fault lines and another of Dickinson’s series entitled ‘Isolated Forms’ which can be found here by scrolling down the page. I can’t see from his website what his process is or how he creates these images although I’m fairly certain that the ‘Peripheral’ series, which I found on the ‘Kozubooks’ website, here, are created using multiple exposures. This is another technique that I have very little experience of, although I did dabble whilst on holiday back in the summer.
In the case of the photographs of the trees, I was on a boat and took one image of the scene, turned the camera upside down and took second exposure of the reflection in the water. Although my camera allows you to see the first exposure which helps with the composition of the second, I had no idea what the result would be. Suffice to say that I think it is worth exploring further.
Brian David Stevens takes an alternative view of the beauty spot at ‘Beachy Head’, i.e. that of a notorious suicide spot. The is an element of menace in the processing of the images and the accompanying text is taken from call outs to the emergency services.
I must confess to finding the next two artists a little unremarkable and quite samey. Both depict black and white landscapes and both seemed to me rather dull, perhaps I had been spoiled by the previous 6 exhibitors. According to the exhibition catalogue, Tom Wilkison’s work ‘Blotts Pit and Skylarks’ ‘came about from a need to untangle the various ideas and interests Tom has in photography, to commit them to paper in words and images’ (Inside the Outside, 2018)
I’m not sure how successful he has been in untangling his ideas because this seemed something of a mish mash to me and I couldn’t really work out what it was about – maybe I was looking too hard for a story.
Stephen Segasby’s ‘Malevolence’ didn’t really speak to me either. I was always taught than if working in black and white, the blacks should be black and the whites should be white and Segasby’s photographs of the Forest of Dean seemed to me to be various shades of grey. Apparently, what sets them apart is that on developing the film, Segasby found that most of them were marred by dark shadows which he could not explain and he put down to ‘Spirit of Place’. Despite not really liking the images in this exhibition, I have found the work of Stephen Segasby’s website much more varied and satisfying
The final exhibitor did intrigue me, partly because of his approach, which again involves multiple exposures but also the mysterious and slightly scary feel to the images. Rob Hudson’s ‘Mametz Wood’ is influenced by the work of war poet, David Jones. ‘In parenthesis recounts his (Jones) experience of WW1 in th Royal Welch Fusiliers culminating in the battle of Mametz Wood’ (Inside the Outside, 2018) Again, quoting from the exhibition catalogue, ‘Using double exposures to both disturb reality and create a strange surreal landscape that explores the experience of post traumatic stress disorder, or what was then known as shell shock’. It certainly does all of that.
The lighting in the small room where these photographs were hanging made it quite difficult to photograph them but the result is really disturbing images. There seems to be layers of… something – fear, stress, anxiety. Maybe the bright light shining on the photograph actually adds to this. Either way, I found myself really drawn in.
This is one of the best photography exhibitions I think I have ever seen. Varied, refreshing and inspirational in terms of both approach and content and providing me with a number of artists and techniques I will explore further.
Face of Suffrage on display at Birmingham New Street Station until 14th December 2018
Outside the Woods of Though is showing at the Argentea Gallery, 28 St Paul’s Square,
Birmingham from 2nd November to 21st December 2018
Sources:
Unique ‘Face of Suffrage’ artwork unveiled at Birmingham New Street station (s.d.) At: https://www.networkrailmediacentre.co.uk/news/unique-face-of-suffrage-artwork-unveiled-at-birmingham-new-street [Accessed on 10 December 2018]
https://argenteagallery.com/about/ [Accessed on 10 December 2018]
Solargraphs (s.d.) At: http://www.al-brydon.com/solargraphs/ [Accessed on 10 December 2018]
Dans le Noir (s.d.) At: https://www.lyndalaird.com/dans-le-noir [Accessed on 10 December 2018]
Transitional landscapes (s.d.) At: https://www.jmgolding.com/transitional-landscapes/ [Accessed on 10 December 2018]
The Floods – Exploring the antithesis of the pastoral landscape, grounded in its Englishness (s.d.) At: https://www.josephwright.co.uk/the-floods/ [Accessed on 10 December 2018]
Guy Dickinson ‘Peripheral’ (s.d.) At: https://www.kozubooks.com/blog/guy-dickinson [Accessed on 10 December 2018]
Journal (s.d.) At: http://www.tracingsilence.com/journal.html [Accessed on 10 December 2018]
Stevens, B.D. (s.d.) Beachy Head. At: http://briandavidstevens.com/albums/6uzRUb/beachy-head-nbsp [Accessed on 10 December 2018]
Tom Wilkinson Art Photography (s.d.) At: http://www.i-m.mx/tomwilkinson/ArtPhotography/blotts-pit-skylarks [Accessed on 10 December 2018]
Stephen Segasby https://www.stephensegasby.com/blog (s.d.) At: https://www.stephensegasby.com/blog [Accessed on 10 December 2018]
Rob Hudson (s.d.) At: http://www.robhudsonlandscape.net/ [Accessed on 10 December 2018]
Anne's Landscape Learning Log 