The Mishka Henner exhibition is in two parts. The first is a number of images where the artist has taken satellite imagery and made huge prints of cattle farms and oil fields living side by side in Texas. His aim was to show the effects these industries have on the landscape. The second part of his work brings together a selection of work that questions the photobook form and examines the relationship between photographer and this form of media. He has taken Robert Frank's book, Les Americains and digitally altered some of the images.
Canal Street, by Mishka Henner 2012
An image that will stimulate debate between Yvette and I. Is this photography or an artist using photography. I don’t believe it is “photography”, it is a photograph but it is a photograph taken by someone else then digitally altered. The process of photography, for me requires the photographer to take the image not to use someone else’s work. It can be argued that it is art, however. This image has sparked debate in the wider photography community. The relevance, in today’s digital world of the ownership of a photograph. Once a piece of work is published and out there for the world to see, is it then perfectly alright for someone to appropriate that work, alter it and then call it their own.
Edit Tudor-Hart's work was more to my taste. A great selection of her work that documents a wide time scale of her working life. From her early days in Vienna to her time in the UK. A social documentary photographer that used her life experience and political views to shape her work.
: Gee Street, Finsbury 1936. Edith Tudor-Hart
Great shot showing the social deprivation of London in 1936. Clearly shows the times and the policy or practice of people to have large families at the time. Knowing that infant mortality was reasonably high for the times, families tended to over compensate by having large amounts of children. However, in some instances this would lead to extra burdens on the families and poverty. Socially the evidence shows that wealthier families had fewer children but due to the healthier life styles their children survived. This image shows the poverty and hard life the lower classes endured at this time. Edith Tudor-Hart made many of these images. Her politics coming through her work. A communist that had escaped persecution from Vienna in 1933, she fled to London. She did a lot of commissioned editorial work and her work was used to support political campaigns. Right through to the 1950’s her work concentrated on social care and children with special needs and disabilities. All her work reflects her own beliefs and life experience with her own son suffering from schizophrenia. She was instrumental in setting up the Cambridge spy ring which worked and spied for the Soviet Union. This was not dissimilar to the Muslims of today, accepting British hospitality and sanctuary while also working against their adoptive state.
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