ABSTRACTION IN PHOTOGRAPHY

The Pictorialism Movement arises in the late 19th century, it was characterized to create images with the use of soft focus, atmospheric effects, and artistic manipulation of photographs. Instead of capturing the reality, Pictorialism highlights more on the beauty of subject matter and aimed to express their emotion and thoughts. In order to achieve this goal, Pictorialists often uses various techniques such as involving natural elements, manipulating exposure, and filters to make the photos more effective.

The Straight Photography Movement emerged in the early 20th century,  it mainly emphasizes on the clarity, detail, and the inherent qualities of the photographic medium, this helps the pictures to portrays with a more objective and realistic style. As the cameras and the lens improves, photographers began to capture more photos with rich details, the unique style of the photos sought to reflect out more about the realities, which quickly aligns straight photography as the broader artistic trends and the mainstream in photography.

In summary, Pictorialism and Straight Photography shows two styles of capturing photos, while straight photography aims for realism and objective representation, which capture realistic scenarios with clear details, sharp focus and a documentary style. Pictorialism, on the other hand, emphasizes more on the artistic expression and emotions, which often features idealized subjects with artistic effects.

As a popular style in photography, straight photography influenced many artist and photographers, Edward Weston and Aaron Siskind was two of these who had been significantly influenced.

Edward Weston’s work demonstrates Straight Photography through its attention to the different details and shape forms, he mainly focused on natural subjects, exploring their textures and shapes with a precision that revealed their inner beauty. This commitment of authenticity fits with the principles of Straight Photography, which emphasizes the reality of what can be actual seen rather than interpreted by the art piece. Aaron Siskind, on the other hand, focused on the principles of Straight Photography in the realm of abstraction. He often photographed surfaces and textures by focusing on the aesthetic qualities of the image rather than representing the accuracy of the actual reality. Aaron Siskind’s work reflects the movement’s influence by pushing his drawing style boundaries towards abstraction while showing the unaltered representation of reality.

Eventually, the two contemporary photographers Andreas Gursky and Uta Barth created works that can be classified as abstract, however both of them do not fit into the two categories of Pictorialism or Straight Photography.

Andreas Gursky is known for his large-scale photographs, which often demonstrates an vast landscapes or crowded scenes. The use of digital manipulation technique had resulted a view with hyper-real clarity and creates an abstract experience. Although, Andreas Gursky incorporates elements of Straight Photography, but his focus theme and the use in technique put his position closer to the contemporary abstraction. Furthermore, photographer Uta Barth focuses more on the perception and the act of view, her work often shows a blurred images, which helps to draw attention to the act of looking rather than the subject. This creates an abstract quality, which helps the audience to engage with the image in various ways.

Overall, both Uta Barth and Andres Gursky creates an work with an abstract effects, however, due to their focus, using of techniques, and the conceptual themes, neither of them completely fits in with the two categories of Pictorialism or Straight Photography.

Citations:

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