The Brief

Cut out some pictures from a newspaper and write your own captions.

1. How do the words you put next to the image contextualise/re-contextualise it?
2. How many meanings can you give to the same picture?

Try the same exercise for both anchoring and relaying.  Blog about it.

The Pictures

I cut these three photographs out of the The Times newspaper and removed the text that went with them.  They were taken from different sections of the newspaper that cover different types of story.

I chose this photograph for its powerful imagery but also for the lack of any textual messages within it.  I wanted there to be no distractions from the visual messages in the picture, that is the woman and what is assumed to be her child in a classical protest pose.  I added the words ‘We are brave’ to contextualise the image as a rally against struggle.  The image is actually taken from a recent protest at the senseless killing of George Floyd in the US, which has vastly increased the racial tension across the country.  When I consider my caption, it is firstly a much shorter and ambiguous text to accompany a news item.  It suggests a brave struggle against something, but not what specifically isn’t made clear.  The subjects both appear to be of African descent, but with part of their faces obscured by the medical masks, it is difficult to be sure.  The raised arms speak to the Black Power movement of the 1960s, which famously had John Carlos using this gesture at the 1968 Olympics to protest the treatment of black people across the world, in particular in his home country of the United States.  The actual photograph caption was:

Hundreds of people lined a rally in Barcelona in support of protests in the United States where activists have called for the abolition of the police departments

Now we have the specific context in the form of an anchor.  We now know that this is a rally in solidarity with the US, rather than a protest itself.  We know that it is in Barcelona rather than the US and the extra information about the demand to abolish police departments sets the political backdrop to the image.  If the viewer has similar or contrary political opinions about the police, the photograph is intended to put only one side of the argument through its anchoring caption.  By contrast, my caption could be referring to COVID-19, which is the currently the dominant news story in the world.  It finds its way into this photograph because of the medical masks, so this image could have other meanings through my caption.  It could be interpreted as a defiance of lockdown rules, families determined to conquer the virus or a show of unity with the rest crowd that can be seen in the background.  The general narratives are similar, though, but my caption doesn’t seek to constrain the viewer in the same way as the newspaper.

I chose this image because there is something obvious about it, but without the caption that the newspaper used, it could be interpreted in different ways.  For my caption, I wanted to be more descriptive in explaining the scene than in the previous photograph.  Here we see a man with a heavily modified motorcycle that holds kegs of beer and he is serving a very happy looking customer.   In the foreground there is further evidence of the delivery being made by the biker with the wine adding something different to the beer being poured.   This photograph is actually of a landlord who’s novel way of staying in business during COVID-19 is shown in the newspaper as testimony to the resilience of the British people in times of crisis.  The original caption was:

Rob Galvin, landlord of The Feather Star in Wirksworth, Derbyshire, serves a happy customer

Now we have lots of information about the picture that we didn’t have before.  The caption is similar to mine, in that it is a mobile bar but where there are no real pointers to where the picture was taken added by my caption, now we know that it is a place in Derbyshire.  If the viewer knows about Derbyshire, they may know that Wirksworth is a very small market town in the Derbyshire Dales National Park, so this is a service to a remote part of the country.  The use of the landlord’s name is almost a tribute to him, where my caption keeps the anonymity of the principle subject.

We can interpret this image in a number of ways ranging from the intended show of inventiveness during COVID-19 to a crackpot inventor’s money-making scheme.  What is clear, though is that the messages within the image are positive ones. The expressions of both men and the implied transaction point to this being part of a ‘feel good’ piece.

This photograph was taken from another story but is aesthetically similar to the previous shot.  This time, I wanted to lead the viewer away from the story by adding an unrelated caption.  Here we see a man sorting through the clothes on the rack whilst wearing a medical mask.   The caption suggests that this is a shopper, although the clothes appear to be very different from what the man is wearing.  Perhaps he is shopping for someone else, or perhaps he’s the proprietor.  The visual signs are of an outside street market illustrated by the bright light, the building exterior and the price tag on the rack that has the appearance of being handmade as opposed to a professional ticket.  The inclusion of the face mask points to the story of the moment, COVID-19.  The recent announcement that some business can reopen with protective measures in place.  The caption that accompanied this photograph was:

A seller takes stock at Petticoat Lane market in London

Now we have confirmation that the man is the seller of the clothing and we know his location.  My interpretation of the image now shifts away from buyer to someone trying to overcome the effect of COVID-19 on his business.  The inclusion of the location could almost be and advertisement for the market or simply an indication of the vulnerability of open-air markets in a normally bustling city such as London.

Research Task:  Relay

We’ve had the concept of relay introduced through the writings of Barthes, but this task is to explore it further using examples in contemporary photography.

Sophie Calle – ‘Take Care of Yourself’

Calle’s work begins with a letter from her boyfriend informing her that their relationship  was over.  This letter, which has been translated from her native French into English, is to begin with an anchor that directs the reader to a state of confused, negative emotions. The sender begins with his own self-pity, explaining to Calle that he’s throughout his recent malaise, he has acted honourably.  The references to ‘the others’ suggests that he had more relationships than just Calle’s during their time together.  His noble gestures of not having seen them, but instead to do the right thing by her are interpreted by me as a warm up to blaming her for the break-up.  The letter goes on to suggest that Calle had precluded any notion of them remaining friends which effectively made the break up and the need for the formality of writing, her fault.

Little wonder then, that the letter left Calle in a state of shock.  Her reaction, that she states was an idea that came within days of receiving the email [1], was to create an artwork that addressed the sender through the eyes of women.  She asked 107 women to read the letter and respond in some way, which Calle captured using mixed media.  The reactions ranged from the letter being reimagined as a crossword puzzle to the more extreme shooting of a copy by a professional sports markswoman.  Each woman brought their own perspective through the context of their professional lives as well as their emotional response to the words.  The result is a curation of many cultural narratives, with no guidance through them by the artist with the exception the initial text of the letter itself.  The viewer joins the narratives together by bringing their own feelings toward the events and the players.  As the subject matter is something we all encounter at some point in our lives, the effect of parallel experiences further enhance the meaning of the works.  For me, it aligns with the post-modern narrative that Barthes was referring to in Death of the Author.  On the surface, it appears as lazy, almost getting other people to create the piece for her.  However, the use of the mixed media to draw attention to and enhance the reactions of her women, make it an impressive piece of work.

Sophy Rickett- Objects in the Field (2012)

Rickett’s work is different but similar to Calle’s. Here we have an artist telling the story of her encounter with a renowned astrophysicist and the way she purloined his photographic documents of celestial bodies for her art. The project seeks to explore the relationship between what is created and what is appropriated [2], namely Rickett’s use of Dr Wilstrop’s old negatives to create her story. The collection is brought together by a written essay that walks the viewer through Rickett’s relationship with Wilstrop. For me, perhaps the most compelling use of media to support Rickett’s work is her video [3]. The video is a loop of Wilstrop polishing the optics for the telescope that he pioneered in a small workshop at his observatory. The audio track that is dubbed over the video is of Wilstrop reading Rickett’s essay account of their meeting and subsequent ‘collaboration’. When we are first presented with the video, it is difficult to understand how the words align with what we are seeing. As it becomes clearer, the impact of Wilstrop speaking the artist’s words is evident. His belief that his negatives taken through his telescope had no intrinsic value outside of his scientific field is contradicted by what he is saying. At no point does the video show his images or how Rickett worked them through her own use of photographic process, but it does in its own right offer a big contextual point to the narrative. Like Calle, this additional information in video and text doesn’t support the image series but works equally to tell the story. In the case of Rickett, her decision to use someone else’s photographs rather than her own may appear controversial, but the piece is as original as the previous examples of non-sequential story telling we have encountered so far.

Duane Michals – This photograph is my proof (1974)

This image is a further example of how the additional information can have an equal standing to the image, but in this case the wider interpretation of the photograph leads us to something almost unrelated to the subject.

Michals presents us with a photograph of a couple in embrace, sat on bed and obviously posing for the camera. This then is a self-portrait similar to the sort that we see everywhere with the advent of ‘the selfie’. There is clear affection in the way the couple are connected in the image, but the accompanying text seeks to steer us to a situation; the affection that was once there but no longer. In this sense, the text has a feeling of ‘anchor’ about it; directing the viewer to a certain conclusion. However, the text also offers something more broad than the instant conclusion that we may have already reached:

“This photograph is my proof. There was that afternoon, when things were still good between us, and she embraced me, and we were so happy. It did happen, she did love me. Look and see for yourself.”

The text starts with a suggestion of dishonesty. The photograph is ‘my’ proof, as if it has been suggested that the claim was false. It then proceeds to describe a point in time when things were good between the couple, clearly not the current situation. The relationship could have ended for a number of reasons, but I naturally find myself assuming an acrimonious split. The element of disbelief continues with the claim that it was real; it DID happen. The last sentence invites the viewer to see for themselves. This is perhaps the most interesting element of the text, because it now asserts that the photograph must be telling the truth. We already know that the truth of an image is entirely subjective as opposed to objective, so what the photographer is saying here is that this proof cannot be challenged by the viewer. It could almost be seen as the evidence in a court case, perhaps even a divorce proceeding. What I see when I put the image and the text together is someone daring me to disagree. As the photograph was taken in 1967, the additional context of the time that has passed suggests to me that perhaps this is a take on ambivalence in a relationship, a taking for granted of the people we love. Perhaps this is supposed to be a warning to me and my generation that love is something that evolves in a way that we don’t necessarily expect, the longer we have it in our lives. I guess that depending on our own life experiences, each viewer is going to be inclined to either agree or disagree with Michals’ version of events.

In a similar vein, I was drawn to the other work in the course notes but Sharon Boothroyd. The series Disrupted Vision tells a story of clashing perspectives through a series of instant photographs. Boothroyd asks her subjects for their perspective on the picture that she has just shot of them, which in itself is a major advantage of using instant film. The immediate reaction of the subject is more often than not contrary to the intentions of the photographer. There were three images from that series that I wanted to discuss here. Unfortunately, I am unable to find the series on Boothroyd’s website (or anywhere else online) to include here.

The first is of a man standing in front of a fairground stall, holding his bag of chips. His reaction, written a on the bottom of the photograph is his commentary on his appearance rather than anything to do with the setting of the photograph. It’s undoubtedly not what Boothroyd had in mind with the selection of subject, background and his relaxed pose for the portrait. However, like the other examples of Relay, the inclusion of the text gives alternative meaning to the image. The subject has a voice with regard to his appearance in the shot that he agreed to and we are going to hear it.

The second image is of a man standing in front of a leafy background, holding some flowers. Again, the pose is simple enough and again the subject offers their opinion on the image but this time its about how to improve the picture. His reaction that it would have been better without his coat suggests that there was something more interesting in his clothing underneath or that the picture is fairly dark already; his coat doesn’t really contrast with the scene. The viewer can decide for themselves whether they agree with the sentiment which leaves plenty of ‘space’ for the narrative to be created.

The final image is of a man seated on a park bench. This time, the text is a very pointed question of the artist’s photographic skills and knowledge. His reaction is potentially based in some knowledge of the medium and rather than being a passive voice in the final result, is vocal is what appears to be disagreement. When the text is used with the picture, instead of a clash of meanings we have something that is almost in agreement. The subject’s expression is uncomfortable, his agreement to be photographed looks like it was more of an inconvenience than the other two shots and the whole demeanour of the image lends itself nicely to the text. The ironic inclusion of the criticism of the lack of the use of the rule of thirds is contrasted with the use of a Polaroid camera, which in itself is more artistic than of technical photography.

Conclusion

This exercise has been very interesting. We have the contrasting use of additional media that supports or contrasts with the seemingly obvious interpretations. We have the very specific Anchor text that leads us straight to the predetermined meaning, such as the traditional addition of photographs to written journalism. We then have the interesting takes on how media can be used and where it can be sourced from. I liked the way that Rickett had the subject of her work read her description of their encounter and subsequent collaboration over footage of him at work. That video highlighted the difference in their perspectives on his scientific work, while showing her clear respect of his achievements. The series of reproduced photographs are uplifted from their original context to be part of Rickett’s narrative. It’s a fascinating piece of work. I also loved the way that Boothroyd included the perspectives of her subjects to challenge the obvious imagery in her Polaroid photographs. I’m reminded of the reactions of some people to my use of film in my photography, which on occaision poses the question “why would you use that? It’s not as ‘good’ as digital”. The ‘goodness’ being referred to is their perspective on what makes a good photograph rather than what the artistic message may be. Boothroyd’s subject who challenges her for not following the rule of thirds is a powerful statement on photographer vs. subject vs. viewer and it’s my favourite of the series.

References

[1] Fisher C, 2009, “Sophie Calle: Take Care of Yourself, The Brooklyn Rail, https://brooklynrail.org/2009/06/artseen/take-care-of-yourself

[2] Ricket S, 2012, “Objects in the Field”, Artist Website, https://sophyrickett.com/work#/objects-in-the-field-1/

[3] Rickett S, 2013, “Moving Image: Afterword (Polishing, Not Grinding), Artist Website, https://sophyrickett.com/afterword-polishing-not-grinding/

[4]Carnghie Museum of Art, Unknown date, “This Photograph is My Proof”, CMOA Collection, https://collection.cmoa.org/objects/83a3b886-95ca-4456-8e68-946ebdaba2cc