Hmmm, the blues, not the music or the mood, the colour palette. I wasn’t a big fan in my school days navy and pale blue uniform yuk, but over the last couple of weeks my attention is increasingly being attracted to blue images.
The first one was a cyanotype in the photography exhibition, A World of Its Own: Photographic Practices in the Studio, at MoMa, “Allover (Genesis, Travis Tritt, and others)” by Christian Marclay (American and Swiss, born 1955). At approximately 51 x 97 inches, it was very large, but the light sensitive paper was criss crossed with the small components and magnetic tape from pulled apart audio cassette tapes.
Two defunct technologies in one. Although of course the more laborious and old fashioned the photographic medium, the more in vogue it seems to be currently. The same cannot be said of tapes though, I haven’t seen anyone sporting a walkman on the train lately, not even ironically!
You can see the image here: http://www.moma.org/collection/object.php?object_id=156674
The second image I saw last week was also at MoMA but in the education wing. As a part of the program Create Ability, for individuals with learning and developmental disabilities and their families, Picture This! : Photography saw the participants collaborate on a cyanotype. The photograph I took of the piece on the wall in MoMA is below:
The third image, keeping to the theme of studio photography, is the one of mine from my archives that I will post today. It is not a cyanotype in any fashion. But, it has stuck in my mind for many years and the colours I saw at MoMA reminded me of it and made me dig it out to share with you.
The objects are not layered on paper as with the cyanotype but there is a feeling of overlay as I made several photographs of the objects with colour transparency (slide) film which I then sandwiched together after processing.
When I look at this picture I can smell the scent enveloping the objects and feel the smooth and rough plastic. These objects were kept in a jumble in a small drawer-string leather bag, so it is apt that it is not just a straight forward documentary shot.
You may not understand even what this image is about, as it is somewhat abstract but that makes it more magical to me in the way it so completely holds my memory.
I don’t often title my photographs but this has one. The title is “Teddy’s Curlers’
