Final images

Artist Statement

This series of work examines man’s relationship with natural elements within landscapes. All the images for this project are shot from the point of view of a bench, using the same camera angle and often not even looking through the viewfinder, to build up cohesive collections of views. By photographing these views I want to raise questions of the manmade decisions that primarily affect these landscapes, the most obvious being why put a bench here?

 

By presenting the viewer with these enforced landscapes, I aim to evoke questions of space and control within what might at first appear like a banal image. Playing upon a deadpan aesthetic I aim to subvert trends in contemporary landscape photography and painting by creating similarly composed images through a randomised process. This juxtaposition between artistic intent and process is a recurring theme in my documentary work, leaving elements of the final piece up to the subject or completely up to chance.

 

With most of the views taken in suburban parks and gardens there is evidence of human influence within each picture, whether his be a building I the background or the fact that there is a bench there in the first place. Pursuing this project made me question the logic behind some of these benches placement, some places had a bench every 20 feet others had benches that seemingly looked out at nothing. This duality of aesthetic purpose and function was the main reason I initiated this project and influenced how I choose to approach my subject.

shoot 10

I think these are some of my strongest images and I now have a much better understanding of what lighting is suitable while trying to do this kind of landscape work.

Water seems to be a recurring theme through alot of this project, I seem to find these images more appealing and I think if people are attracted to it visually the idea behind the project will have more impact.

shoot 9

Again light conditions held me back abit when trying to shoot these images, but compositionally (particularly the image above) they are exactly what i want to do for my final series.

shoot 8

I quite like the image below, was wandering along the river looking for potential shots, when i noticed a set of steps cut into the mud leading to the bank, followed it down a found a bench! (I think I’ve been spending too much time doing this project if benches excite me….) the view looked out right across the river which made an interesting image.

shoot 7

Went to Kielder water only to find one decent picnic bench (above)…..

Nothing amazing really, I don’t like the images with restricted views from trees, I think the more open landscape create much more effective photographs.

shoot 6

Im not sure how these images will look if your screen isn’t colour corrected as they are quite subtle. I started to use the same technique for every shot I do, basically setting the camera up on a tripod on the centre of the bench, making sure its exactly horizontal using the spirit level built into the tripod, setting the exposure using the top dial on my Nikon D700 and taking the shot without looking through the viewfinder to compose it. By doing it this way (hopefully) the images should be similarly composed and the position of the bench will dictate the outcome of the image rather than myself composing the image within the camera frame.

shoot 5

Now i knew what direction I wanted to take the project I could go out and shoot for it alot more effectively. The next week weeks basically involved gathering as many shots as I could when the light and weather conditions were right. This turned out to be extremely frustrating as the Blackpool weather proceeded to be bright and sunny for 2 weeks straight making shooting for the brief very difficult.

I found that if the light was too bright it was very difficult to expose both the sky and the foreground correctly. I could have got around this by shooting several exposures and merging them in photoshop but I felt that this would undermine the credibility of the work. Instead I decided to persevere to just make the most of the light when it was favourable.

A New Direction

Having struggled so far to create a comprehensive body of work or this brief, I have decided to take it in a new direction.

Wandering around various parks and gardens I noticed the distinct lack of planning in regards to where benches were put within that environment. This made me think that I could imply manmade intervention without necessarily showing it within the frame by taking the photograph from the bench. This in turn could raise questions of space and control within these environments and give me the direction I need to be able to create a more cohesive body of work.

Shoot 4

I think I need to rethink this project to give it a clearer sense of direction and subject matter rather than a vague theme.

These two images (above and below) to me feel the most effective from this shoot, I think this is because of the flat light and compositional strong subject matter. I think if I’m going to continue shooting this project I need to use similar lighting conditions and compositions to tie the images together.