Exercise2.1: 'Territorial Photography'
Mitchell, W. J. T. (ed) (2002) Landscape and Power. The University of Chicago Press
Territorial Photography : Joel Snyder
Main Points:
· This essay discusses developing photography from mid 19th Century and how it was perceived as ‘other’ from art. That it appeared machine made was an attraction for progressive, technological thinkers
· Set against this was the upper class photographers brought up on artistic values of landscapes.
· Two American landscape photographers are compared
· Carleton Watkins and Timothy O’Sullivan
· Watkins produced beautiful and ‘accessible’ pictures, making his name with his photographs of Yosemite.
· O’Sullivan’s work was a portrayal of the ‘sense of an area’ which did not seek in any way to encourage visitation. Most of his work was not seen by the general public. Rather it was for scientific survey and the army.
My notes made from Joel Snyder's essay: 1850-1870
Perceived ‘otherness’ of photography due to precise detail and high finish.
Machine-made appearance.
Why? To please the clientele (middle class) who were allied to culture of technical progress.
Photos were passive recordings of pre-existing sights, whether portraits or people, or pictures of architecture and landscape.
1860-1880 Approaches to scenic photography were invented and refined Why?
Combined photographic and publishing houses dedicated to production and SALE of travel, architecture and landscape prints and views. Prints were often sold close to points of geological and geographical interest. Networks developed by publishers selling to each other making prints available to a national (US) audience. Therefore the reason for the proliferation and availability of photographs, prints and views was commercial. Profit motive.
However… why did they come to look as they did?
1. Upper class photographers brought up on artistic values (eg. Eastlake 1st RPS President) were trained as artists. They shunned the commercial photograph (class issue – for the masses?)
2. Photographers started to arise from less educated circles transforming photography technologically and in the values the audience expected. This resulted in highly articulate and resolved pictures – leaving suggestiveness and the lack of finish behind. Matte was replaced by gloss and sepia tones introduced giving the look of machine production.
Salon 1859.
Charles Baudelaire saw the direction of photography as corrupting Art due to its availability to the multitudes and their stupidity.
Olive W Holmes however spoke of ‘fanciful portraits ‘ to please a client, but that the honest sunshine was nature’s sternest painter. In this they at least appear to agree that photos were transparent and true (in superficial aspects).
Thus photography became ‘free’ of art conventions and the aesthetics of suggestion and free to record. This led to a move away from photography as an art form.
Carleton Watkins and Timothy O’Sullivan
Carleton Watkins produced huge negatives (20x24”) and printed highly finished detailed views of Yosemite Park, Pacific Coast, Utah and Nevada. These set the standard and his approach was emulated by almost all the important photographers including Ansell Adams.
They were perceived as true likenesses of place and not the construction of an idealized landscape.
His photos did not escape landscape conventions, rather he adopted and reformulated them. He used soft, vigorous foregrounds and delicate and barely distinct backgrounds. There was also intricate detail.
The photos of Yosemite were said to combine the gardenlike grace with breathtaking grandeur. His views of later photographs give the impression of an un-spoilable Garden of Eden – a place to visit , but also to live in.
Even his pictures of developing industry seemed to show progress merging into the landscape.
His photographs are essentially invitational. This must have made them very saleable and also approved of by the Establishment.
Were his pictures apolitical or did they seek to porthray the new lands of the west as picturesque and an alluring place for progress and development?
On the other hand Timothy O’Sullivan’s work portrays the harshness and barreness of landscapes taken in the Great Basin. (Nevada, Arizona, ~Utah and New Mexico). They are contra-invitational.
A former war photographer, O’Sullivan was employed by Clarence King’s survey to give a ‘sense of the area’. He was not concerned with the scientific accuracy.
He uses figures in his landscape but they do not mediate between the viewer and the scene. They act as indices of a precarious and frightful relationship between the explorer and the explored. Often they are dwarfed by the enormity of the landscape, this interior of boundless isolation, contrasts of light and deep shadows. They are anti-picturesque.
They do not reassure as do those of Watkins and William Henry Jackson. They are of the ‘alien, the unknown and unintelligible.’ Something to be probed, the subject of scientific examination.’ They allow no imaginative access and are like pictorialized ‘No Trespassing’ signs.
They mark the beginning of and era (the present one) in which expert skills are the sole means of access to what was once held to be part of our common inheritance.
Territorial Photography : Joel Snyder
Main Points:
· This essay discusses developing photography from mid 19th Century and how it was perceived as ‘other’ from art. That it appeared machine made was an attraction for progressive, technological thinkers
· Set against this was the upper class photographers brought up on artistic values of landscapes.
· Two American landscape photographers are compared
· Carleton Watkins and Timothy O’Sullivan
· Watkins produced beautiful and ‘accessible’ pictures, making his name with his photographs of Yosemite.
· O’Sullivan’s work was a portrayal of the ‘sense of an area’ which did not seek in any way to encourage visitation. Most of his work was not seen by the general public. Rather it was for scientific survey and the army.
My notes made from Joel Snyder's essay: 1850-1870
Perceived ‘otherness’ of photography due to precise detail and high finish.
Machine-made appearance.
Why? To please the clientele (middle class) who were allied to culture of technical progress.
Photos were passive recordings of pre-existing sights, whether portraits or people, or pictures of architecture and landscape.
1860-1880 Approaches to scenic photography were invented and refined Why?
Combined photographic and publishing houses dedicated to production and SALE of travel, architecture and landscape prints and views. Prints were often sold close to points of geological and geographical interest. Networks developed by publishers selling to each other making prints available to a national (US) audience. Therefore the reason for the proliferation and availability of photographs, prints and views was commercial. Profit motive.
However… why did they come to look as they did?
1. Upper class photographers brought up on artistic values (eg. Eastlake 1st RPS President) were trained as artists. They shunned the commercial photograph (class issue – for the masses?)
2. Photographers started to arise from less educated circles transforming photography technologically and in the values the audience expected. This resulted in highly articulate and resolved pictures – leaving suggestiveness and the lack of finish behind. Matte was replaced by gloss and sepia tones introduced giving the look of machine production.
Salon 1859.
Charles Baudelaire saw the direction of photography as corrupting Art due to its availability to the multitudes and their stupidity.
Olive W Holmes however spoke of ‘fanciful portraits ‘ to please a client, but that the honest sunshine was nature’s sternest painter. In this they at least appear to agree that photos were transparent and true (in superficial aspects).
Thus photography became ‘free’ of art conventions and the aesthetics of suggestion and free to record. This led to a move away from photography as an art form.
Carleton Watkins and Timothy O’Sullivan
Carleton Watkins produced huge negatives (20x24”) and printed highly finished detailed views of Yosemite Park, Pacific Coast, Utah and Nevada. These set the standard and his approach was emulated by almost all the important photographers including Ansell Adams.
They were perceived as true likenesses of place and not the construction of an idealized landscape.
His photos did not escape landscape conventions, rather he adopted and reformulated them. He used soft, vigorous foregrounds and delicate and barely distinct backgrounds. There was also intricate detail.
The photos of Yosemite were said to combine the gardenlike grace with breathtaking grandeur. His views of later photographs give the impression of an un-spoilable Garden of Eden – a place to visit , but also to live in.
Even his pictures of developing industry seemed to show progress merging into the landscape.
His photographs are essentially invitational. This must have made them very saleable and also approved of by the Establishment.
Were his pictures apolitical or did they seek to porthray the new lands of the west as picturesque and an alluring place for progress and development?
On the other hand Timothy O’Sullivan’s work portrays the harshness and barreness of landscapes taken in the Great Basin. (Nevada, Arizona, ~Utah and New Mexico). They are contra-invitational.
A former war photographer, O’Sullivan was employed by Clarence King’s survey to give a ‘sense of the area’. He was not concerned with the scientific accuracy.
He uses figures in his landscape but they do not mediate between the viewer and the scene. They act as indices of a precarious and frightful relationship between the explorer and the explored. Often they are dwarfed by the enormity of the landscape, this interior of boundless isolation, contrasts of light and deep shadows. They are anti-picturesque.
They do not reassure as do those of Watkins and William Henry Jackson. They are of the ‘alien, the unknown and unintelligible.’ Something to be probed, the subject of scientific examination.’ They allow no imaginative access and are like pictorialized ‘No Trespassing’ signs.
They mark the beginning of and era (the present one) in which expert skills are the sole means of access to what was once held to be part of our common inheritance.
Part 2
Find and evaluate 2 photographs from any of the photographers mentioned in the Snyders text. Evaluation should reflect points that Snyder makes as well as other reference
Carleton Watkins, Cape Horn, Columbia River, 1867
Find and evaluate 2 photographs from any of the photographers mentioned in the Snyders text. Evaluation should reflect points that Snyder makes as well as other reference
Carleton Watkins, Cape Horn, Columbia River, 1867
My first impression of this image is that it is a peaceful scene accentuated by the still water and the gentle reflection of the huge but strangely unthreatening cliffs. Although I seek to look around the corner as to where this stretch of water leads I keep returning to the boats temptingly positioned to suggest arrival or departure. The angle of view suggests inclusion of the viewer into this scene and we feel free to walk down to the boats and inspect the activity. The strong rock on the left hand side gives a feeling of permanence and shelter to this position of rest.
A sense of equilibrium is generated by this same rock opposing the cliff and, to some extent, mimicking the shape of the spit of sand. The immediate foreground is shown in intricate detail, but the background gently fades away with only the line made by the reflection to encourage ones sight further into the picture. There us a hint of a further bank perhaps to be explored later in this expedition. Each element seems to connect with another – I am sure this is by design and not luck.
This is in keeping with how Snyder described Watkins ability to make the landscape accessible with the use of a figure in the foreground, and his giving a romantic air to the landscape. The grandeur of the landscape is made accessible and the impression of calm makes the place appear safe and alluring. It is enhanced by the smooth rendering of the mid tones.
Timothy O'Sullivan, 1867, Crab's Claw Peak, Western Nevada (United States Geological Survey).
According to Joel Snyder in Territorial Photography Timothy O’Sullivan’s photographs were the antithesis to those of Watkins. Where Watkins were invitational, O’Sullivans were the pictorial version of “No Trespassing” signs.
They are described as jarring in nature.
This is demonstrated by the photo above. The near horizontal line of jagged rock prevents us from looking further towards the horizon. The rock itself looks barren, barely supporting any vegetation. The very terrain looks difficult to cross on foot or on horseback. The far distance is obscured by mist or rain. As a viewer I do not feel drawn to explore further along this ridge.
Snyder dwells upon the bleakness of O’Sullivans landscapes, making a case of them giving a negative impression and perhaps fitting some of the written words about the Great Basin, by Clarence King , the expedition leader :-
“The bare hills are cut out with sharp gorges, and over their stone skeletons, scanty earth clings in folds, like shrunken flesh: they are the emaciated corpses of once noble ranges, now lifeless, in which their feet are buried.”
This is not describing the above picture but gives some idea of the attitude of the man.
In searching through other images of O’Sullivan I have found some which are not so dark and depressing. See below: this image is like one anyone might choose to photograph today to show the grandeur and beauty and wonder of the landscape.
According to Joel Snyder in Territorial Photography Timothy O’Sullivan’s photographs were the antithesis to those of Watkins. Where Watkins were invitational, O’Sullivans were the pictorial version of “No Trespassing” signs.
They are described as jarring in nature.
This is demonstrated by the photo above. The near horizontal line of jagged rock prevents us from looking further towards the horizon. The rock itself looks barren, barely supporting any vegetation. The very terrain looks difficult to cross on foot or on horseback. The far distance is obscured by mist or rain. As a viewer I do not feel drawn to explore further along this ridge.
Snyder dwells upon the bleakness of O’Sullivans landscapes, making a case of them giving a negative impression and perhaps fitting some of the written words about the Great Basin, by Clarence King , the expedition leader :-
“The bare hills are cut out with sharp gorges, and over their stone skeletons, scanty earth clings in folds, like shrunken flesh: they are the emaciated corpses of once noble ranges, now lifeless, in which their feet are buried.”
This is not describing the above picture but gives some idea of the attitude of the man.
In searching through other images of O’Sullivan I have found some which are not so dark and depressing. See below: this image is like one anyone might choose to photograph today to show the grandeur and beauty and wonder of the landscape.
Additional notes:
"Watkins achieved a poetic beauty in his 1861 Yosemite series that surpassed in quality and size any other landscape photographs made in America to that time," Weston Naef says. "The photographs elicited in people who saw them a belief that what he showed must be protected from harm, and as such they are the very beginning of a movement that had not yet been named.
Naef, Weston April 2009 Carleton Watkins in Yosemite J. Paul Getty
Watkins's style is certainly distinctive. He typically preferred high vantage points for his panoramic landscapes, which enabled him to develop a composition looking down on his subject. Given that his "mammoth camera" was so heavy and cumbersome to both carry and operate, it shows the lengths he would go to for his art, especially when some of the vantage points he favoured are a day-long journey, even today. Other characteristics of his images are the tell-tale shadows cast by early morning or late afternoon sunlight. He also liked to centre his images with a distinctive feature in the foreground such as a rock or tree and then frame it with either middle or far-distance trees or cliffs on both the left and right-hand side. And he kept returning to the same vantage points on each visit, meaning his archive allows historians and scientists to see how Yosemite changed over the decades Watkins was photographing the area.
"Watkins's visual genius was in knowing exactly where to position his camera to maximise the potential of each subject," says Naef. "His viewpoints were consistently so perfect they set the example for all future representations by those who walked in his footsteps – even Ansel Adams, the celebrated 20th century environmental photographer – and his viewpoints became conventions long after he was forgotten as their inventor. Like the painter Paul Cézanne, he structured his compositions as a network of tightly woven visual relationships that connect different parts of the picture as a delicate surface pattern."
Leo Hickman
The Guardian, Friday 30 December 2011
The Three Brothers, Yosemite. Carleton Watkins