Worth a Look: Pentti Sammallahti

Pentti Sammallahti, Solovki, White Sea 2, Russia (1992)

Pentti Sammallahti’s retrospective book Here Far Away was one of the best books to be published last year. If you have read any online or magazine reviews in the past six months you will almost certainly have seen this book glowingly praised in reviews. I have a copy (a very nice Christmas present); every word of praise for this book and the pictures within is fully justified. I have seen Sammallahti’s photographs in the past but never as a large collection. This book puts together some 300 images drawn from an impressive number of books that he has had published over the years.

Pentti Sammallahti, Solovki, White Sea, Russia (Dog with Bag), 1992

Sammallahti is famous for his pictures of snowbound, bleak Arctic environments, sparsely populated by brave people in heavy coats and thick hats. Always he seems to have his lucky dogs wherever he goes. These dogs that act as people substitutes; dogs bringing in the provisions, dogs enjoying the breeze, dogs hanging out with their mates. As Mike Chisholm commented, Sammallahti seems to be a dog whisperer who can conjure them up when needed and get them to perform a vital pictorial role. When dogs are not needed he seems to be able to muster similar assistance from almost any other species; cats goats, monkeys, you name it.  Sammallahti has travelled to many other places other than his native Finland and snowy wastes of northern Russia. Indeed, there are pictures from every continent within the covers of the book. I particularly liked his pictures from Morocco and some lovely group portraits of Roma.

Pentti Sammallahti, Solovki, White Sea, Russia, 1992

One obvious, striking feature of his photography is his wonderful use of the panoramic format. His images often read as mini cinematic sequences or Chinese scrolled pictures. In some pictures he manages to capture two decisive moments in the same elongated frame, with critical actions happening simultaneously on the both the left and right of the image. His pictures have a consistent elegance, sparseness and humanity. In all my reading and research about him and his pictures I’ve not found out which camera he used for his wide format pictures. No matter, the important thing is the eye and his sense of design.

Pentti Sammallahti, Cilento, Italy, 1999

It’s worth a word or two about the manufacture of the book. This book is a fine example of the book maker’s craft.  Given the large number of panoramic images it is hardly surprising that the book’s designers have chosen a landscape format for the layout. At 242 by 300 mm the book sits nicely on the lap when opened. The pale blue cloth binding with tipped in photo on the cover is nicely understated and the paper is a nice cream heavyweight mat that works well with the neutrally printed monochromes.

Pentti Sammallahti, Solovki, White Sea, Russia (Man Walking Away on Snowy Road), 1992

The first edition of Here Far Away seems to have sold out from most online retailers, but is currently being reprinted and should be available again in a couple of months. If you would like a copy it might be worth pre-ordering. 

Here Far Away by Pentti Sammallahti is published by Dewi Lewis Publishing ISBN: 978-1-907893-26-1

Worth a Look: Andy Hughes

Image by Andy Hughes

I’m not sure how I first came across Andy Hughes polemical work Dominant Wave Theory (I think it was the journal of the London Independent Photographers). It was love at first sight. His pictures are of the detritus washed up or left on beaches. His argument is that we all play a part, even if passively and carelessly, in destroying our coastlines and oceans.

Image by Andy Hughes

His pictures have an immediate resonance for me; close up, flash lit subjects set in context. The images are bright, colourful and highly detailed and the eye is immediately drawn to the subjects which dominate the picture space. Every detail is revealed by the additional lighting, and skies are often rendered dark and heavy. The images are often beautiful, even if the subject is not, and it is this counterpoint that make them so compelling. While the viewer decodes the image, a realisation dawns on how this sandal, sandwich wrapper, oil drum might have got there. Bright, happy birthday balloons are either left or lost on the beaches; left for others to clear up. Other flotsam and jetsam will have had a longer journey onto the rocks and sands of the shore and keep adding to the problem. It easy to think that this has always been the way, but the diversity of subjects and the durability of many of the modern materials presented indicate that this is a big and growing problem.

Image by Andy Hughes

Dominant Wave Theory is one book that I keep returning to. It is a photo book that genuinely has something to say and says it well. This large square book of 189 pages is also well designed, and carries no less than four essays that are directly relevant to the subject of coastal pollution. The book was published in 2007, but I believe that there are still a few copies available for purchase out on the web.

Michael Kenna: Images of the Seventh Day

Back in the 80’s Camera magazine that was, for me at least, a compulsory purchase. As its name suggests, it carried a camera review or two, and usually a technique section. The one thing it excelled at though was the presentation of portfolios, usually from an acknowledged master of the craft, an up-and-coming star and a talented non-professional. It was here that I first saw the mesmerizing night-time images from Michael Kenna, as the ‘rising star’ portfolio. Shortly after I bought a slim softback copy of Night Walk, a collection of nocturnal images shot on 35mm film. Since then, Kenna’s star has continued to rise, to the point that he is one of today’s undoubted masters, and a feature on Michael Kenna will always be the main billing in any journal.

Bill Brandt's Snicket, Halifax, England 1986 © Michael Kenna

Today, Kenna’s bibliography is longer than most photographers, and each new addition to the library is eagerly snapped up by avid collectors. To date, his principal publisher, Nazraeli, has produced two major retrospectives of his work, in 1991 & 2004. Images of the Seventh Day is a catalogue to accompany an exhibition of Kenna’s work held in Reggio Emilia, Italy in 2010. As such it makes a new retrospective that includes many of his most famous images from the past as well as some of the best of his most recent work. In some ways, the composition of the book is like one of those ‘Best of’ CD compilations, where the collection of old favourites is fleshed out with a few new tracks in an attempt to make the completist fan purchase the new product. In the case of this book, it looks like Kenna has taken a commission of the area of Reggio Emilia in Italy and this has been appended to the ‘retrospective’ section. No matter, the new Italian pictures are very beautiful and well worth seeing.

Light over Dinard, St Malo, Brittany, France 1993 © Michael Kenna

The book is beautifully printed in duotone and the images are rich, clear and show the work well. The layout is appealing and well paced, from large single images to small multiple images on the page. In all the layout of the pictures is excellent and it is a joy to read through the book. The images are of course, classic Kenna. Always beautiful, simple clean geometries, often wide angle, often long time exposure, and since about 1987 always square format and always monochrome. His style and approach has been widely copied and imitated to the point that it has almost became a cliché, such as jetties and piers stretching out into smooth blurred water at night. To my eyes there is something about the simplicity and elegance to Kenna’s work that elevates it above the other pretenders. The book covers many of his key projects – Early British power stations, French formal gardens, the Rouge Steel works, Easter Island, Japan in winter, lace makers. Some projects are missing, such as the series on Concentration Camps for example. But overall, this is a comprehensive compendium of Kenna’s work and is very enjoyable.

Island Shrine, Taisha, Honshu, Japan 2001 © Michael Kenna

The one area in which the book does fall down however is the accompanying text. There are three essays which are meant to illuminate the images, but all fail to do so. Originally written in Italian, the text is terribly translated, appears to be pretentiously arty-farty, and is completely indecipherable. I gave up on all three essays; my time was better spent looking at the images, which in contrast are clear, lucid and intelligible.

I would recommend this book to anyone who admires the work of Michael Kenna but does not have many of his previous tomes. Kenna’s books are usually quite expensive and sell out quite quickly, so at a around £30 currently available from Amazon and Beyond Words, this is a book that you should get before the opportunity is lost.

Worth A Look: Rinko Kawauchi

The Deutsche Börse Photography Prize is perhaps the most prestigious art photography award in the UK. Today the newly refurbished Photographers Gallery hosts an exhibition of the four finalists; Pieter Hugo, Rinko Kawauchi, John Stezaker and Christopher Williams. I must admit that I've rather lost interest in most of these big-ticket photo prizes over the years. Curators and judging panels seem to value the conceptual over the visual in most of these events and most of the victors' work is usually pretty dull & dour. I'm sure that they talk a good story...


This year's prize is a bit more interesting, and I'm looking forward to seeing the exhibition this weekend; I'll post my thoughts about the exhibition next week. I think I'm going to like John Stezakers juxtaposed torn postcards and found filmstar pictures (not actually his photography), and I'm very keen to see the work of Rinko Kawauchi, whose work I have been interested in for the past couple of years.

I first came across Rinko Kawauchi's work from a blog article by Martin Parr on photographic genres. She was cited by Parr as example of the poetic approach to photography and fits this description well. Her work examines the incidental, the everyday, the intimate and personal details. Throughout her work there are references to birth & death, and fragility and impermanence. 

The work that was considered for this year’s Deutsche Börse is Illuminance published by Aperture, and is her first book to be widely available in the west. I bought a copy prior to her nomination for the DB, after researching her work on the web. The two best places to see her work online is at FOIL and at her own recently launched website. Her work falls into a particular genre or ethic of Japanese photography, of personal, intimate and often of near-field pictures, square and in colour. This style has a natural resonance for me. Whereas I am comfortable working digitally, Kawauchi and her peers often work with old medium format film cameras, the favoured instruments being TLR Rolleiflexes.

I really liked most of her images that I found on the web, and a good deal of what I found in Illuminance. Many of the pictures do indeed show Illuminance; bright contre-jour images, light and airy pictures with a lot of sky, bright lights, myriad rainbows scintillate out of water droplets. There are pictures that are very high key, almost on the point of being over-lit or over exposed. As a counterpoint there are some very dark, dense images such as this shoreline at dusk that provide a more sombre balance. 

However, I have to admit that I still feel some disappointment with Illuminance. For a start, the narrative of the book does not seem to hang together. There are pictures that don't fit with the general concept of the book; pictures of elderly tourists walking around a rock in Japan for instance. There are often pictures of the same subject matter repeated - soap bubbles, road kill, a lame mural, that occur without enhancing or reinforcing the sequence of photos. And there are some pictures that just don't seem very good.

As a physical object, the book production too is something of a curate’s egg. Colour prints are tipped in on both the front and back covers, which are finished in a rather nice muted blue canvas. The title however is embossed in sparkly rainbow metallic, which looks more suitable for a schoolgirl’s annual. 

The book is put together in what is described as a 'Japanese Binding'. What results is something akin to a concertina book, with all the pages bonded to a paper spine, and the whole block bonded to the back cover of the book.

The effect is rather peculiar; pages curl to a tubular 'S' shape when the book is opened.

Even stranger is the choice of paper. Creamy in colour, it has a very matt finish and rough tooth, which has the effect of sucking all the contrast and density out of the images. This sort of surface might work well with gritty monochrome, but seems completely inappropriate for the delicate high contrast colour images. The printing does seems to lack a certain Illuminance... In comparison, Ernst Haas' ColorCorrection, published by Steidl, has images that just jump off the page. Steidl are the gold standard for printing these days, I guess. 

Illuminance can hardly be considered as Kawauchi's magnum opus, and for this reason seems a strange nomination for this year's Deutsche Börse - nominations are for books or previous exhibition. Nevertheless, I look forward to seeing actual photographs in the flesh and I hope that they will have rather more illuminance than the book does.

The newly reopened Photographers' Gallery is exhibiting work from the four finalists in the Deutsche Börse Photography Prize 2012, 13 July - 9 September 2012. The winner will be announced September 3rd.

Worth a Look: Mareen Fischinger

Panographie Times Square © Mareen Fischinger

One of the great things about the internet is the way you can come across a new page and then discover something new, fresh and exciting. This happened the other day when I read a rather nice article about photocollages over on DPreview by staff writer Barney Britton, which laid out an easy to follow method for building photocollages in Photoshop, along with some good examples. One of the bad things about the internet is the way that some people will post negative and even rude comments about a subject that they have no knowledge of, and Mr Britton got some of those (why?...).
 

Panografie Notre Dame © Mareen Fischinger

The exciting thing on this page, buried in the comments, was a recommendation of Mareen Fischinger’s Panography pictures. And what pictures they are; energetic, lively and exciting images of mostly communal urban spaces. Familiar landmarks look as though they are dancing.

Panographie Landschaftspark © Mareen Fischinger

Mareen Fischinger is a professional photographer from Cologne, and the panographs she has created are her personal project. Unlike the joiners of David Hockney and Noel Myles, her pictures are always based from one viewpoint, but of course, capturing many moments in time. She talks about how she likes to capture the changes in the scene, and this results in the lively, busy feel to many of her pictures.

Panographie Arc de Triomphe © Mareen Fischinger

Although shot from a single view point to give a very wide angle of view, she subverts the big picture by slightly altering the arrangement of the constituent images. Combined with arbitrary angles of each individual frame, the resultant complete panograph looks as though a pile of transparencies have been thrown onto a lightbox and magically rearranged themselves. Fischinger presents iconic, familiar places with a fresh perspective, such as the Arc de Triomphe above and the Beauborg below.

Panografie Centre Pompidou © Mareen Fischinger

This fairground scene crackles with energy and movement.

Panografie Kirmes © Mareen Fischinger

Mareen Fischinger makes no secret of her technique, and has generously shared her working method in an article on Photojojo. But technique alone won't make a picture; a vision is required. To find out more, hear Fischinger talk about her interests, motivations and approach to panographies in this neat little video.

»Panography« from Mareen Fischinger on Vimeo.

Worth A Look: Vivian Maier

I have a fairly catholic taste in photography, and have collected books that cover many genres. In the past, I've always found it difficult to go into a bookshop with a good photographic section and not come out with a purchase. I hope it’s not a case of me getting old and set in my ways, but in recent years the number of books that have really appealed to me seem to be getting a lot thinner on the ground. There seems to be a lot of really dour, dull books out there by contemporary photographers, and a large number of re-hashed, re-assembled compilations of the very famous names, who are already well enough represented in my library. And so recently I found myself in the bookshop of the Tate Modern, looking for new titles to excite me. The only book, by some distance, was the really quite excellent Vivian Maier Street Photographer.

Vivian Maier Street Photographer by John Maloof

For those of you who don't know the story, Vivian Maier spent most of her adult lifetime working as a nanny in New York and Chicago. She lived alone, never married, but she had one passion, and that was taking photographs. It would seem that she was not one for putting herself or her work forward, and her pictures were never seen outside of her meagre home. Her work was not even forgotten, it was simply unknown, and would have remained that way if a Chicago historian, John Maloof had not purchased a major part of her archive, now around 100,000 negatives, from a storage container sale. Fortunately, Maloof realised that he had stumbled across something extraordinary and in the four years since the discovery has responded to circumstances and become the curator of the Vivian Maier archive.

Sept. 29, 1959, Esther St., New York, NY by Vivian Maier

Vivian Maier Street Photographer is Maloof's first book to emerge from the legacy of pictures, and no doubt more will come as the archive is explored and understood. The images presented are wonderful. Shot square format on her Rolleiflex, she has captured street scenes of New York and Chicago, beautifully composed, timed and exposed. It is interesting how a loner or maverick, as Maier apparently was, felt comfortable in taking pictures of people at close quarters. The pictures speak of a curiosity and enthusiasm of life.

Jan 26, 1955, Uptown West, New York, NY by Vivian Maier

Her work invites comparisons: pictures of down and outs hint of the work to come from Diane Arbus, some street place shots remind one of Walker Evans, self-portraits seem to herald Lee Freidlander’s later images. For me, these comparisons ask some awkward questions about one’s own involvement and relationship with art. Maier’s pictures were effectively unseen before Maloof’s discovery. They had no influence on any other photographer and did not become milestones in the development of the medium. She was undoubtedly a skilled photographer and had some style of her own, her work as good as many of her contemporaries, but she does not really fit into any history of photography. She may yet influence later generations, but she had no impact on her contemporaries. This is where many artists find themselves, unable or unwilling to get the publicity to bring their work to a large audience. Given different circumstances, it could have been Vivian Maier who was held up as a leading artist in post-war American photography.

January, 1953, New York, NY by Vivian Maier

The book is well designed, and pictures are printed very nicely in a warm black that suits the images well, and the paper is an opaque clean white with a good weight and sheen. At 128 pages long it is a good read and a book that I keep returning to. I have seen some rather critical comments about the print quality and book design on the web. Let me assure you that book design is very good, and the printing is excellent too. I have no complaints at all with my copy, which is a fourth printing.  

One thing the book does lack is a good history of Vivian Maier, but this is an understandable omission as it is still early days in piecing together an accurate record of Maier’s life. A current history can be found at the Vivian Maier website, and I recommend a visit. I think this book will appeal to many photographers, and  John Maloof should be applauded for the excellent job he has done in bringing Maier’s images to the public’s attention.

Vivian Maier Street Photographer is published by Powerhouse Books. 

Worth a Look: Colin Summers

© Colin Summers

Last Sunday I had the good fortune to catch up with Arena colleague Colin Summers. It had been over a year since I had last seen Colin at an Arena meeting; he had spent most of the past year with the rebel army recording the fight which would eventually end in the overthrow of Gaddafi’s troops in western Libya. The pictures that he showed us were stunning, emotionally charged images that encapsulated many small fragments of the fierce battle for Tripoli.

© Colin Summers

I first came across Colin’s images in 2007 in an issue of Ag magazine. Colin had gone to Banda Aceh to witness the aftermath of the 2004 Boxing Day tsunami. These monochrome pictures were, at the same time, both beautiful & horrific. Poignant images of bloated bodies floating in flood pools, personal belongings washed up inland, survivors anxiously searching for news of loved ones. What made these images special were the way in which he dealt with human frailties set against overwhelming natural forces. Shortly after the Ag publication Colin was invited to show his pictures to Arena. We had no hesitation inviting him to join the group, and since then we have seen him rapidly grow to become a ‘conflict’ photographer par excellence.

© Colin Summers

I must admit, before I met him I wondered if there was a touch of ‘disaster tourism’ about his work. However, when one looks at the impressive body of images he has built, and meet Colin in person, you soon find that this most gentle of men wants to tell the story of those less fortunate, more desperate than ourselves. His quiet, unassuming nature helps him to make friends easily and gain access to other’s lives. But a story can only be told if there is an audience. Because the tsunami images were self-funded, Colin found that there was no ready outlet for his picture essay, and the pictures were simply too late to get exposure in newspaper and magazines. But one thing leads to another and since Banda Aceh Colin has taken commissioned assignments for NGOs and charities, such as covering AIDS/HIV in India.

One can only wonder at the anxiety that his family must have felt whilst Colin was away in Libya, so it was a great relief to find that had survived the campaign unscathed. As his images showed, he was never far from death and injury, and the deaths of Tim Hetherington and Chris Hondros underlined the fact that journalists do not have any special protection in conflicts. For his protection, remaining level headed and not taking undue risks were his main protection, with a helmet and body armour his back-up.

© Colin Summers

In a conflict like the Libyan uprising, one can only get meaningful access to events when ‘embedded’ with one side or the other. One cannot be an interested bystander. In the case of Libya, this meant being with the rebels, who relied on external support for munitions and food supplies. Colin worked alongside the same group in the rebel army, earning their trust, and spending every hour with them, photographing, eating & sleeping. One can only wonder at the privations he went through, sometimes sleeping in caves in the mountains. Certainly no returning to a 4 star hotel at the end of the day.

This closeness of living is what gives his pictures immediacy and impact. You can see the dust and concrete flying around, the rounds of bullets jerking violently as they are drawn into the machine gun. You see the sweat and blood on the skin, eyes wide open with fear or rage. Photographs can’t hope to show the dynamic action of battle, but in the hands of a skilled artist, the still image can give context and layers of information and meaning. This is what Colin does so well. 

© Colin Summers

Colin started the conflict self-funded, and later managed to be a freelancer for AFP, which meant that he had a ready outlet for his images. The conduit for his pictures was the mobile satellite uplink, essential for any journalist or photographer needing to file their stories. He was able to wire a dozen or so of his best pictures each evening, which were then distributed via the agency to the world’s newspapers. His pictures have been widely published, netting him a couple of front page covers.

You might be interested to know what gear Colin takes with him. He told us that his rucksack is full with satellite uplink and battery chargers. And one Nikon D3, a 35mm lens and a 24-70 zoom. That’s it; no spare camera body, no arsenal of expensive large aperture telephotos. Just a simple one camera two lens setup that is reliable and predictable. The short lens means that the only way to capture the action is be up close, and being close makes the images ring with presence. F/8 and be there indeed…

© Colin Summers

Some of the Libya pictures are just sublime, such as this Rembrandt like scene of three weary combatants resting during a lull in the hostilities.

© Colin Summers

 

Or this breathtaking image of a woman in supplication, giving praise for the removal of Gaddafi whilst the menfolk plunder his ransacked home.

© Colin Summers

It is the human element, the struggle of real people, which interests Colin and energises his photography. One question a colleague asked him was "would you put down your camera to help someone who was injured or dying?" “Oh yes, of course” was his reply. As if we needed to ask...

For more of Colin Summer's pictures please visit his website.

Worth A Listen: On a similar theme, you might like to catch up with an interesting programme on BBC Radio4, Life and Death on the Frontline, in which veteran reporter John Simpson examines the pressures and constraints on journalists in modern conflicts.

Worth a Look: Roy Mehta

Whenever I feel in need of inspiration, whenever I tire of the pictures I see in magazines or on the web, I invariably head over to Roy Mehta’s website to revisit his wonderful images. It must be almost 10 years since I first came across his work on the now largely dormant Fotonet-South website, around about the time he had completed his ‘Coastline’ series. A slim hardback book was published to accompany the exhibition. It's print run had sold out when I tried to purchase it, but I was fortunate enough to find a good copy at Abebooks.

© Roy Mehta

His work is always focussed on the personal, either in the form of calm, relaxed portraits, or in elegant observations of personal effects. He also produces beautiful pictures of nature, landscape and flowers, which too are very personal. The landscapes are of cultivated land, farmland and gardens; details of flowers and poppies are taken in these environments too.

© Roy Mehta

He concentrates on details, and through the use of close, low viewpoints, concentrates our gaze on these features whilst placing them against the wider background. Shallow depth of field too is used to draw the viewers attention to the detail and at the same reduce the clutter of the background.

© Roy Mehta

Some of his images are very sensuous. In this languid picture of a young woman on a beach you can almost feel the freshness of damp sand on the feet and legs, and the grittiness of the sand on her toes. You can feel the pleasure of being on the beach in the towards the end of the day.

© Roy Mehta

Mehta’s portraits are often shot on location, and often as double portraits. Fill-in flash is use to more clearly depict the face. The portraits show empathy between the photographer and his subjects; they look relaxed, the camera held close to eye-level.

© Roy Mehta

Mehta’s skill in mixed lighting carries over to his unpeopled photos. In this seemingly simple photograph, a discarded cigarette is energised by a small pop of a strobe, the wands of smoke alive when backlit. The intensity of the green in the grass and the purple of the sky suggest that Mehta has filtered the camera and gelled the flash to get this colour combination. 

© Roy Mehta

In this picture a falling leaf, like the smoke in the photo above, achieves a state of suspended animation through the use of fill in flash, whilst at the same time highlighting the yellow-brown leaves against the cold winter blue of the forest and sky.

© Roy Mehta

  Roy's photographs have been widely used commercially, for advertising, magazine journalism and for a wide variety of book cover. I'm sure you will enjoy seeing more of his work on his website, which he regulary updates with fresh, new, exciting work.