Slightly Lucid

The brownie camera and sharing photographs

Aislinn Leggett — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 13:12:59 +0000

Happy New Year to you all and all the very best for 2012!

I have a question for you. Did you take any pictures when ringing in the new year? most likely you did or somebody at your party did. I know I did and I know I took a lot and I wasn’t the only one at our little gathering. What was your camera? I was going between an iphone and a Leica M6. It used to be that people took a few snaps a year but now we’ve seemed to gone trigger happy, having an obsession of documenting every second of our life. I recently found these photos of people being photographed with their Brownie cameras and then coincidentally came across the images of Erik Kessels installation at Foam Gallery of what it would look like when printing the amount of images uploaded to Flickr in 24 hours. Photography has come a long way.

I might print the images I took new year’s eve, if I ever get around to it. For now they will stay on the iphone album. It’s become so easy to take pictures. He don’t have to wait for our photographs to be developed and everything has become instantaneous. Cameras are cheaper and smaller and now come with every cell phone we buy, making it easier to upload and share our personal life with the world. It’s become the norm to upload our images and the simplest and easiest way to share our photos with family and friends. I mean, it’s pretty amazing. I still remember my great aunt and uncle having a slide show party to show their family and friends their recent trip photos. The people in the black and white images posted here want to be photographed with their cameras. As I go through my newly found images and flip through the carefully laid out albums, I can’t help but be amazed at how fast our lifestyles have changed and how photography has continued to be a part of it and evolved enormously as a medium itself. Kessels has printed 24 hours of uploaded images to Flickr, imagine a whole years worth of Flickr and Facebook combined?

Erik Kessels installation at Foam Gallery

Happy Holidays, 2011

Aislinn Leggett — Sat, 24 Dec 2011 17:00:14 +0000

This is my grandfather dressed as ol’ Santy, posing for a Christmas snap with his grandmother. My grandfather is now 95 years old, although less nimble and less of a partier he still gets that twinkle in his eye and is very much alive. So for this holiday season I wish you all to never loose that spark and happiness. Enjoy your family and friends and I’m looking forward to another year with you all.

Alexander Henderson – Winter 1870s

Aislinn Leggett — Thu, 22 Dec 2011 04:02:45 +0000

Winter hasn’t yet arrived in Montreal. Sure it’s getting a little cold but no snow. I haven’t really been wearing my winter boots yet. Every year winter seems to be arriving a little later and summer stays a little longer. I don’t love winter, on the contrary I’m one of those that usually hibernates and only goes out when necessary. All this to say is that it feels odd this warmish weather. So to revive winter and all it’s whiteness and coldness here are some photographs taken in Montreal in the late 1800s by Alexander Henderson.

Henderson moved to Canada in 1855 from England and started his career as a photographer in 1866. He became known for his landscape photography and was hired as a photographer for the Canadian Pacific Railway to document the construction and the landscape they needed to construct through. Henderson worked around the same time as William Notman and his company, a recognized name in the city and the Country. I was introduced to Henderson a couple of weeks ago and was really excited. His landscapes of Canada have been (to say with lack of better words) an “ah YES” moment. I’m working on a new series and these images have been an inspiration and reference I have been looking for and to add to that I’m looking forward in researching his work further as I’ll be involved in a really interesting project starting in the new year.

Henderson’s work seems to be not as well known as Notman’s work. If somebody asked me to name a Canadian photographer of the 19th century I would no doubt, without hesitation say Notman, but now I think I’m converted and a fan of Henderson’s. I find Henderson’s photography to be more aware of the people and their relationship within the landscape, compared to Notman or I should his son William McFarlane Notman (the company) who also worked on and for the CPR at roughly the same time as Henderson. Maybe this debate is for another post because the images presented fall short of comparisons as I’m attempting to conjure winter in Montreal. - Look at that ice!

Iva Zimova

Aislinn Leggett — Fri, 16 Dec 2011 21:42:26 +0000

I don’t know many photographers, or I should say people, like Iva Zimova. We have been friends for a while now but I had heard so many stories about Iva before even meeting her that I can’t pinpoint the exact moment we talked or met. I know it was between 2003 and 2005 because I was in the photography program at Dawson, which she had aslo studied at and consequently had the same teachers as I did, hence the stories. I do remember being a little intimidated at first because it was one of the first times I was meeting somebody that made such compelling and honest images. Iva immigrated from former Czechoslovakia in 1982, coming to Montreal and developing her photographic eye. I don’t know when Iva caught the travel bug maybe she was just born with it, regardless her and her cameras have and still capture some of the most interesting places and people.

Iva has a huge body of work. She has traveled around the globe and to many places that I would never dream of going to. Though, whatever the city, village or country she captures the essence of the place and people without judgement. She truly cares about the subjects she photographs. When she recounts her time in some of the places she has visited, there is always this sense of attachement to a family, or particular person that she has spent time with. Her work is her life, a camera constantly around her neck, Iva never stops seeing. I’ve picked some of my favorite images to show here but her website is overloaded with work. The one below makes me think of a Dali-esque painting.

Restoring Photographs

Aislinn Leggett — Tue, 04 Oct 2011 19:08:31 +0000

still from "Back in the frame" on Guardian UK, August 31, 2011

March 11, 2011, the devastating tsunami hit Japan and killed over 15,000 people and left thousands without homes. I couldn’t imagine then nor can I now, how it would be to experience such a traumatic event. Recently, I came across a documentary on the Guardian website, showing a mass movement of volunteers restoring photographs that were damaged in the diaster. It is a short documentary but very much worth your time.

I work with found photographs, I buy discarded family albums and what it seems is that the photographs take up too much space physically and maybe even emotionally. The images are abandoned, forgotten and probably done willingly. This wasn’t the case for the tsunami survivors. Their personal belongings and their life were scattered and destroyed. The found and restored photographs take on an entire new meaning, they become a physical link to their past, potentially the only object that was rescued and the photos become a reminder of the disaster and survival.

Diane Borsato – The Photograph as Document

Aislinn Leggett — Tue, 13 Sep 2011 16:21:44 +0000

Mois de la Photo is in full swing. For the next month, Montreal is hosting some stellar exhibits and artists. I’ve had the chance to see some of the exhibits and attend some the artist talks and looking forward to the upcoming events. Last week I caught Diane Borsato‘s talk at Concordia University and was swept away, not necessarily by the work itself although I do very much enjoy it, but by Borsato herself, as a person, an artist and the methodology of her work.

My background in performance art is not that elaborate, I sometimes find it difficult to understand the art form and also find it difficult to find performance artists that I like. My reservations aside, Borsato pulled me into her world of curiosity and creativity.

Borsato’s performances are usually intimate, presenting to small groups of people or simply performing without an audience and to prove or document her work she uses photography. The photographic medium is secondary but without it our visual interpretation of the performance might be quite different. These images are not the most compelling but what becomes important is the story or events that come with the photograph. Borsato’s work emits a love for learning and connection between her and the subject but most of all, I believe, she reveals a desire of connecting with various types of people and the relation that grows from the performance.

The image above is her piece titled Italian lessons. Determined to learn Italian, Borsato immerses herself in situations where she has no choice but to speak Italian. To make matters more complicated, Borsato chooses a subject that she is somewhat unfamiliar with. The lessons become not only learning Italian but also learning a new subject in Italian. The image posted here is herself in Italy learning about bee hives and cultivating honey and obviously being taught in Italian. During her talk she explained this performance and the difficulties of learning a new topic but also having to speak and learn the key words to try and converse in Italian. Her description of the process and the unfolding of the event was so interesting and hilarious. Borsato is quite comedic and this aspect comes out often in her work. The image below is from her performance Artifacts in my Mouth, which was performed at a museum, where she literally inserted various objects into her mouth and experiencing artifacts in an entirely sensorial way. The last image posted is her performance titled Terrestrial/ Celestial. The piece was organized where by day, amateur mycologists where to host amateur astronomers to forage the forest for mushrooms and by night the astronomers where to host the mycologists to search the cosmos. I find this incredibly witty and humorous…..

Most of the time artist talks are good and interesting to actually hear the artist talk and describe their work but Borsato’s talk was great. She explained her work but was engaging, she was like a story teller and I seemed to hang on to every word and she was funny. I guess a sort of small performance in itself. I think I would have liked her work regardless but hearing her talk has engaged me that much more to appreciate and understand her work.

Diane Borsato is exhibiting at Articule till October 9th.

The Dead in Photographs

Aislinn Leggett — Wed, 31 Aug 2011 18:32:06 +0000

Unknown photographer. Found in Maine, U.S.A

Rummaging through flea markets this summer, I came upon the portrait of the child above. The picture is a tintype, which was most likely taken in the mid to late 1800s (c.1850 to 1880s). To have a child sitting this still, with such clarity and no movement in the eyes could only mean that the child, at the time when the photograph was taken, was deceased. This was not uncommon during the 19th century. Taking pictures of the deceased was a way to remember and to have something physical that represented the person. The photographs at that time could be seen more as mementos, contradictory of how we use vernacular photography today, which is more about remembering a moment rather than specifically remembering or immortalizing a single person.

Images like the one above were most likely to be well thought out and prepared. There is a reason that this child is wearing the garments that she is dressed in, maybe her mother or aunt made it. Most often the objects and environment that the people were photographed with or in would be significant to how the family and friends would remember them. There was not much candid captured for these types of photographs.

Matching Dresses. c. 1850. From The Tantos Archives

Geoffrey Batchen in his essay Vernacular Photographies (I believe this is from his book Forget Me Not: Photography and Remembrance) when writing about the photographs as a memento mori and this photographic period, puts it perfectly when he writes that “Photography insisted that if one wanted to look lifelike in the eventual photograph, one first had to pose as if dead.” (p.62) Because everybody seems absent and expressionless, the dead babies with painted pink on their cheeks, seem alive and well. The Tantos Archive has a selection of deceased photography on their site.

It might be difficult for some to grasp the idea of it being ok to photograph the dead and I think it has become quite taboo to show the dying or the dead through photographic imagery. Today we have albums and hard drives filled with pictures of our friends and family and we rather, quire normally, not remember them at the point of death but rather alive and happy. The technology that we have today permits us to see our past through thousands of photographs, unlike having ones picture taken once in their lifetime. When doing a little research for this post I came across this interview. A Mother that had lost her child at birth was asked by the hospital if she wanted pictures of her son and she refused but the nurses took the photos regardless and sent them to her. I don’t agree or disagree with the interview but what I find interesting is comparing this problem with photography of the late 1800s and how the process and the meaning of a photograph has changed drastically.

Ian Wallace

Aislinn Leggett — Fri, 01 Jul 2011 13:24:26 +0000

Ian Wallace, an artist and art historian, has been producing, teaching and leading the contemporary photographic art scene in Canada since the late 1960s. I only came across Wallace’s work last year when visiting the National Gallery of Ottawa. The image above was my introduction to his work and this past May Wallace was exhibited in Montreal’s biennale. I was excited to see a full room of his work.

My knowledge of the history of photography up to the 1960s, I would say, is pretty good but after those years I’m pretty scattered. I guess after that point it was simply my preference and style of photography that brought me to learn about specific photographers. Now I hit myself on the head in disbelief that I don’t know certain photographers or photo-based artists. Regardless, I still remember standing at Wallace’s image and just nodding. It was that rare moment of the “Ah Ha!” “Yes, that’s it” without really knowing what the “it” was, but more like feeling the “it”. At about that time I had started mulling over the question “what is photography?” Typically, Wallace laminates his photographs onto monochrome paintings on canvas and for me at that specific moment, that question resonated strongly because it wasn’t a photograph, it wasn’t a painting and it wasn’t an installation. This may seem simple as an explanation but seeing Wallace’s work, so clean and canny, it was like a switch was turned on and permitted me to ask more questions.

Wallace, not only played a critical role in contemporary photography but also taught the likes of Jeff Wall and Rodney Graham. Behind every great artist it seems that there is often somebody just as brilliant. Still influential with his work, Wallace exhibits internationally. There is a film of the three Vancouver artists that I would love to see, here is the trailer for Picture Start.

The arts? Who needs that?

Aislinn Leggett — Fri, 17 Jun 2011 18:04:17 +0000

In the past couple of months there has been discussions in the media about art, artists and the funding that artists receive for their projects. Funding for the arts and culture related projects have been an ongoing debate for a while now but it seems that recently there has been more attention to the subject.

With the Conservative party having a majority for the next four years, the artists and culture related associations will and have already felt the cut backs in funding and support from the government. At the beginning of May, after the elections, there was a short article in Le Journal de Montreal by Nathalie Elgrably-Levy (article in French) questioning the funding for the arts and asking if artists should even be allowed to complain that there are cutbacks. The article is a very black and white look on the industry and what artists do. Following this article was a quite elaborate and intelligent counter reaction by Simon Jodoin from Voir (article in French).

Even if I don’t necessarily agree with Elgrably-Levy’s article, essentially because of how she approaches the subject and the tone of the article, I do think that it’s healthy to have questions raised and to have a healthy debate, like Jodoin’s counter article. What made me really irritated, and the reason why I’m writing this post, was an interview done with Margie Gillis, a prolific dancer-choreographer in Canada, at the beginning of the month by Sun News. Essentially the anchor Krista Erickson, takes the 20-minute interview to not only disrespect an artist that has worked for the past 40 years but also ridicules the entire art industry.

According to Erickson, the artists are simply benefiting from and taking the taxpayers money. I had difficulty watching the entire interview because it was uncomfortable to watch this anchor be completely ignorant, aggressive, disrespectful, who didn’t even care to discuss but rather judge and bully her interviewee. She even, somehow managed to compare the death of 150 soldiers with Gillis’ work on stage. I was blown away to see how well Gillis handled the interview and tried so calmly to answer the questions and tried to partake in a discussion. The most fitting line of this interview was at the complete end, while Erickson is cutting Gillis off again, Gillis smiles and says “how strange?” An article by Stéphane Baillargeon from Le Devoir counters this interview and a humorous, witty spin at the awful spectacle is an article by John Doyle in the Globe and Mail. If you want to understand the numbers, taxpayers money and the income of the art industry read Louis Laberge-Côté’s article.

It’s easy to get upset after viewing something like this but if this interview and the article in Journal de Montreal exist it’s because people really do think this way. And that’s a problem. Artists have become categorized or labeled as people that get by on other people’s money, that are lazy, sitting around doodling and the best line that I’ve got was “you go to school to learn how to press a button?” There are stigmas but the artists that I know, the artist that I’m inspired by are the ones that get up at 5:00am, that constantly work because an artist cannot leave work at work, they are their work. It’s not only a question of creating or making art but it’s about where the art goes, who sees it and the impact that it has on an individual and a community. “The cultural sector has about 600,000 workers, which is about double the level of employment in the forestry sector in Canada (300,000) and more than double the level of employment in Canadian banks (257,000).  Source: A Statistical Profile of Artists in Canada: Based on the 2006 Census, Hill Strategies Research, 2009″ quoted from the The Coast.

After talking with Eric from RatsdeVille about this whole debacle, he told me that the Canadian government has a Children’s Art Tax Credit that gives a $500 credit for kids under 16 years of age enrolled in art or cultural related activities. The eligible activities for the tax credit are: contributes to the development of creative skills or expertise in artistic or cultural activities; – provides a substantial focus on wilderness and the natural environment; – helps children develop and use particular intellectual skills; – includes structured interaction among children where supervisors teach or help children develop interpersonal skills; – or provides enrichment or tutoring in academic subjects. (quoted from the government site) I think this is a great idea and why shouldn’t their be funding for projects like this, but it does seem counterintuitive. The government encourages parents to immerse their children in art activities, getting them to think differently, creatively and when the kids become of age and want to be an artist all they get is “sorry there’s no funding for that”. Personally I think interpersonal skills, intellectual skills and enrichment in academic subjects should continue through out ones life, Miss Erickson could benefit from something like that!

Cuts are happening everywhere and I’m not saying that artists are owed or deserve funding. But when funding for the arts goes to zero, like in Arizona right now, it makes one think of the importance that museums, music, theaters and education in the arts have in our society. I obviously agree with funding for the arts because I’m an artist. I’ve also received a grant from the province a couple of years ago and now I see how my project, that was funded, creates work for other departments in the arts like printing, framing, on display for the public in a gallery, which employs people, pays rent and pays taxes. Everybody in this circle pays taxes even the artists.

We need to educate the social circles that don’t know artists, that are scared to understand art or who are uncomfortable to even go into museums or to the theater. Not every kind of art is good and I think that’s why there’s so much of it because there’s something for everybody and so many ways of experiencing art. Questions about art, artists and funding should be asked, but they should be asked with civility and respect and they should be answered in the same regard. We’re creative people, let’s think creatively to help people understand how art surrounds them everyday, how without it we just become greay.

To make a point as to how culture is important to our society, author Yann Martel sent over 100 important novels to our Prime Minister Stephen Harper (the last one was the six volume box set In Search of Lost Time by Marcel Proust) and with each book there was an elaborate letter as to why the book was important and why Harper should read it. All of it is documented on a dedicated blog called What is Stephen Harper Reading?

We can come together and sign the petition and “like” the Boycott Sun News Facebook page. This is a good start but our actions need to speak louder than that. We’re creative people, let’s start finding creative ways of explaining the arts to non-art people.

Krystel Marois – Partir

Aislinn Leggett — Wed, 25 May 2011 16:47:55 +0000

I was briefly introduced to Krystel Marois‘ work last year and have recently been reminded of her. The series posted here is titled Partir. I first saw this work projected but from what I understood by the explanation was that the original work was printed as large as the projection. The space in these images are stunning, it envelops as if embarking on a voyage of freedom and adventure yet the black void holds you still with fear of the unknown. I love how the sea and beach are places of pleasure and relaxation but at night it becomes a whole new world of noise and uncertainty. I think this aspect of the space is successfully reflected in Marois’ work.