It's a Digital Moment
Saturday 12 May 2012
Experiments
Experiment I - punctum
For this experiment I will represent one of my interpretations of new punctum, which is nostalgia. Although Barthes defines the new punctum as death, for me is much more about longing for the past revealed in an image, combined with being aware that “that is dead”, that is over and it is not coming back. I will explore the history of buildings that are today abandoned. For that I will compare old images of the building from the period when they were occupied for it’s initial purpose, with images of these buildings when they were emptied or turned into something else.
For this experiment I will represent one of my interpretations of new punctum, which is nostalgia. Although Barthes defines the new punctum as death, for me is much more about longing for the past revealed in an image, combined with being aware that “that is dead”, that is over and it is not coming back. I will explore the history of buildings that are today abandoned. For that I will compare old images of the building from the period when they were occupied for it’s initial purpose, with images of these buildings when they were emptied or turned into something else.
Experiment II - aura
For this experiment I will digitally reproduce an old photograph bought in the Camden’s antique market, as an attempt to attest Walter Benjamin’s idea of the lost of presence of a piece when it is mechanically reproduced. The first part of this experiment implicates in a reproduction by scanning the photograph, and then printing the scanned image, this print will be scanned again, and printed, and so on, until the image becomes blurry and unrecognizable. For the second part I will photograph the old image acquired in the antique market using a digital camera. I will then print this digital image and then I will photograph this print, and then print it, and so until this image is unrecognizable.
For this experiment I will digitally reproduce an old photograph bought in the Camden’s antique market, as an attempt to attest Walter Benjamin’s idea of the lost of presence of a piece when it is mechanically reproduced. The first part of this experiment implicates in a reproduction by scanning the photograph, and then printing the scanned image, this print will be scanned again, and printed, and so on, until the image becomes blurry and unrecognizable. For the second part I will photograph the old image acquired in the antique market using a digital camera. I will then print this digital image and then I will photograph this print, and then print it, and so until this image is unrecognizable.
Experiment III - evidence
For this experiment I will revisit my Foundation project, done in 2008, in which I simulated a family’s collection of framed pictures of themselves. However, I presented the family’s images mixed with images of skin marks which someway illustrated Sontag’s critique about family photographs and how they are evidences that something happened; in my project the evidences were skin marks compared with family photographs, which was another kind of evidence of a fact.
For this experiment I will revisit my Foundation project, done in 2008, in which I simulated a family’s collection of framed pictures of themselves. However, I presented the family’s images mixed with images of skin marks which someway illustrated Sontag’s critique about family photographs and how they are evidences that something happened; in my project the evidences were skin marks compared with family photographs, which was another kind of evidence of a fact.
Final, or almost final text for the Digital Moment brief
Three years ago, when I was doing the
Foundation course, I started a project in which I presented framed old family
photographs mixed with photos of skin marks, such as scars or daily skin marks
caused by the pressure of objects. I didn’t know exactly why was I doing it,
but I knew that I wanted to represent evidence in a way; I wanted to show that those things indeed happened
and there was a proof of it. I was always interested in old photographs,
especially when I didn’t know who was in the photo. It is a mixture of
curiosity and an odd excitement about people’s privacy.
Sometimes I go to Camden antique’s
market to buy old family photographs, acquired in house clearances, and somehow
every time I look at the images I feel like I have known those people, or have
been to those places. These photographs have an aura that brings this kind of feeling on.
After presenting the Foundation
project, noticing my great interest for old photographs, my tutor told me to
read Camera Lucida, from Roland Barthes. I bought the book, but I did not
understand what Barthes wanted to say, so I gave up on reading it at that time
and put it in the shelf. There the book stayed until I started this new
project. I decided to give it another try; I knew that there was something in
Camera Lucida that would let me understand my curiosity for old photographs.
In the first half of the book, Barthes
describes the differences between studium - the obvious symbolic
meaning of a photograph - and punctum - an unexpected emotional
response when seeing a photograph; each person will have a different response.
He says that the punctum is a detail, sometimes
tiny, that fills the whole picture. In the second half of the book, he
describes the new punctum, which is the perception
of time; when he sees a picture he thinks “that is dead, and that is going to die”.
At the limit,
there is no need to represent a body in order for me to experience this vertigo
of time defeated. (Barthes, 1980).
I realized that the punctum was what my Foundation tutor wanted
me to comprehend.
In relation to old family photographs,
I believe that the concept of new punctum involves not only the
notion of “that-has-been”, but it is also imbedded
with an aura that radiates from those images.
According to Walter Benjamin, the unique existence of a piece - a work of art,
in his case - results from the changes it may have suffered in physical
condition over the years as well as the various changes in its ownership. He
says that the prerequisite to the concept of authenticity is the presence of
the original, and the uniqueness of the original is its aura.
The authenticity of a thing is the essence of all that is
transmissible from its beginning, ranging from its substantive duration to its
testimony to the history which it has experienced. (Benjamin, 1955).
Benjamin’s notion of aura is related to the old family photo
albums because of their authenticity. The dirt of the images, or the notes
found behind them mentioning names or dates, affirms their uniqueness, it shows
that it has history and it belonged to someone else.
In one of my visits to Camden market
I’ve found a family album with photographs from the 1940’s. What caught my
attention in this album were some pictures taken in a family trip to Egypt,
where I was with my family a couple of months before the visit to the antique
stall.
What impressed me the most in this
trip was a visit to a temple called Abu Simbel. A spectacular and imposing
monument built between 1244 BC and 1224 BC, it is a temple to the greatness of
Ramesses II. It consists of two constructions, The Temple of Ramesses and the
Temple of Nefertari, who was his favorite wife.
I was not only amazed by the
grandiosity of that ancient construction, but also by the history behind it.
Lost once to the sands of the desert, Abu Simbel was almost lost for a second
time when the construction of the Aswan High Dam threatened to submerge the
site under the waters of Lake Nasser. The Egyptian government along with UNESCO
and a team of engineers, scientists and archaeologists worked for four years to
relocate the monument 200 feet from the original site. The relocation started
in 1964.
Flipping through the old family album
I found the photos of the Abu Simbel temple in its original site, in the
1940’s. For me, to find the photos of something that does not exist in that
place anymore was very exiting; it was punctum. At the same time I really wanted to buy the album, but was
also terrified of having a photo album of unknown dead people in my house. It
once belonged to a family, and surely they wouldn’t want their album to be held
by a stranger.
According to Susan Sontag, the
earliest popular use of photography was to memorialize the achievements of the
members of a family or other groups. The family photograph is used as a rite of
passage; the photo album is about the extended family and gives people an idea
that they own an unreal past.
Photographs will offer indisputable evidence that the trip was
made, that the program was carried out, that fun was had (Sontag, 1977)
Sontag says that family photographs
are a way to prove that something happened and are to be shown as trophies of
their achievements or trips, for example.
Like every mass art form, photography is not practiced by most
people as an art. It is mainly a social rite, a defense against anxiety, and a
tool of power (Sontag, 1977)
Going back to the Foundation project,
it somehow illustrated Sontag’s critique about family photographs and how they
serve as evidences that something happened; in my project the evidences were
skin marks compared with family photographs, which was another kind of evidence
of a fact.
The concept for this new project ‘It’s a digital moment’ is to exemplify the ideas
of Roland Barthes, Walter Benjamin and Susan Sontag combined with my thoughts
on punctum, aura and evidence. The idea is to show how these concepts can be adapted (or
not) to digital technology. I will illustrate the three theories by making
visual experiments for each of them.
(Renata Westenberger)
Tuesday 8 May 2012
Lots road power station
"Lots Road power station was opened in 1905 to power the Underground
Group's new electrified underground trains. It originally generated
electricity using coal fuel.
The new Art Deco-style control room was built in 1932. It was part of a
reconstruction programme begun in 1927 to increase the capacity of the
power station.
It was the main control room from where the turbines were monitored.
When the station was converted to the petro-chemical system in 1968, the
control room was no longer used. This photo was taken in 1997.
The room was preserved until Lots Road power station closed in 2001.
Some of the panels from the room are now in the London Transport Museum
collection."
http://www.20thcenturylondon.org.uk/ltm-2003-6462
http://www.20thcenturylondon.org.uk/search/site/lots%20road%20power%20station
http://www.engrailhistory.info/r006.html
©Renata Westenberger
http://www.28dayslater.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?t=41883
Monday 7 May 2012
Chambers Wharf
In 2009, when I was already studying graphic design at CSM, I had to do a project about the river Thames. We had to tell a story, any story, about something near/in the river. It could be about the architecture, the typeface, the water etc.
I chose to investigate the abandoned constructions near the river. Most of them were power stations or factories. I researched about the history of those places and I went there to take pictures. Before going to the sites I would first see how/where it was on Google street view, and that's what I did before going to Chambers Wharf in Bermondsey.
The London Project - http://renataw.com/around-london
When I got there I couldn't see these buildings, the place looked very different, I thought I was in the wrong place. What actually happened was that Google maps was outdated and all those buildings had been demolished, I was in the right place, and there was only a tiny piece of the building left that was still going to be teared down.
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