a Photo Blog, from swerve of shore to bend of bay, brings us by a commodius vicus of recirculation back to dear dirty New York
Whilst waiting to meet my wife for the train home, I was taken by the wavy reflections of the many passersby on the floor of the station whenever the sun shone in brightly through the skylight. Thus end the series of photographs from my London excursion 3 weeks ago in mid-October.
One more little joke before we leave Sugimoto and the Hayward. When you left the exhibit, you could go up the stairs to the cafeteria where a small theatre had been set up, screening a short video about his work on the Enoura Observatory in Japan. There was no one there when I entered, nor when I left. I couldn’t resist the opportunity to make my own homage to his theatre pictures by brightening the screen and adding a small glow and darkening the side windows.
And, as always when I’m visiting a museum or gallery, I’m as interested in the space and the geometry as in the art exhibited (and finding some place for my reflection). Click any of the images below to see them full-size.
I never knew about these metallic constructions of his. In the first image below I’ve centered and isolated the structure in black and white on its mirrored plinth, in the next I show a little more, including the reflection of a passerby and, in the final image I show the whole room with the object centred so as to cover the structure shown above (click on any of the smaller images to see them enlarged – clicking through to the web site first if you’re seeing this in an email).
It would be hard to overstate the scale and impressiveness of the Hiroshi Sugimoto survey now at the Hayward. My pictures of both the exhibit and the gallery will occupy these pages for the next few days. Click on any image below to enlarge them all (you may have to click the post-title above to get to the website first if you’re seeing this in email).
After the Tate Modern I made my way over to the Barbican Centre, expecting to see an exhibit of Simryn Gill photos adverted to me by the Saltoun Gallery. As it turned out, Gill was just a small part of a much larger exhibit on ecofeminism and its illustrious (photographic) history with works by Gauri Gill, Francesca Woodman, Simryn Gill, Fay Godwin and many others.
Continuing with the theme of museums’ use of geometry, here’s a look at (and through) windows at the Tate Modern. Click any of the images below to see them larger.
I continue to be struck by museums and galleries’ use of space. All the whiteness, openness, vastness and what this says about wealth in the hegemonic metropolises. This is particularly seen in empty space, and the use of geometry in defining spaces like staircases. The Tate Modern is a little bit of a special case, situated as it is in a former power station but the vastness of the space continues to echo the theme. Click on any of the images below to see them full sized.
Click on any of the images below to see them full sized.
Intended to see 4 or 5 shows in London on Friday but in the end I spent a lot of time at the Tate Modern and only managed to fit in the Barbican Centre afterwards.
Projector, drum string, bridge saddle, 16mm film strip, microphone, and audio.
A 3-part film installation. Click any of the 3 images above o see them all enlarged.
More than the art in the sole, hallway exhibition mentioned in yesterday’s post, was the architecture of the Chicago Cultural Center which was quite ornate. Click on any of the pictures below to see them all larger.
University for the Creative Arts, Farnham
Wai Yi is in the Fine Art MA program and was on an presentation team with me back in the Fall. Her Temple of Time was an intense experience at the UCA Grad Show in late August. Check her Instagram (@waiyi.chung.art/) to see some reels on the effort that went it to making it that I’ve been following for the last little while.
Wai Yi Chung, Temple of Time (2023)
Immersive installation space.
3.5 × 3.8 × 2.4 m.
Acrylic, enamel, emulsion paint,
MDF board, timber, muslin, one-way mirror film.
This is a slightly disorienting view but it’s no more than the view from the top of a staircase, showing 2 stories of this local gallery.
Nothing much going on here. I was struck by the sharp shadows and the combination of modernist shapes and lines with the wood grain and plant shadows so, of course, I had to see what it would look like in a photograph.
I had an idea for a series of photos on insomnia. I thought of images of a woman lying in bed, in the dark, unable to sleep, eyes wide open, staring straight up. And I imagined another with a couple lying in bed, each on their own with no connection, both stuck in their own insomniac mental wanderings. Setting it up I would ideally have liked the camera looking straight down at the bed. The best I could manage was an awkwardly contrived tripod with one leg up at about an 80° angle, propped on a suitcase, with the other 2 legs pushed up against the bed. I left the room lights off but allowed street light in through the window behind the camera and room light through the door at the opposite side of the room. I used the Fuji’s base ISO of 160, resulting in exposures ranging between 2½ and 4 seconds, using a remote. Here are a couple more from the shoot, which in the end I decided was more about anomie than insomnia.
The lobby of my block of flats has these modernist lights suspended from the 1st floor (that’s the 2nd floor for Americans). I took a couple of pictures of them from the stairwell about halfway between. Both images are in colour but I’ve shifted the colour balance to make them match better.
