WHAT IS A PHOTOGRAPH?

We meet Thursdays and Fridays, 9-5, in Photoland and Library 1326, from Aug 3 to Sept 1, 2017.

Expect to spend at least 8 more hours per week, outside of class, working on assignments. Photoland will be open for you to use outside of class time.

Our FIRST meeting is Thursday August 3 in Library 1326. 

Beyond required fees, expect to spend up to approx $100 on your own for various art supplies specific to your projects and a lab apron.  You will need to purchase a box of 8×10  black-and-white RC photographic paper by or on the 1st day of class.

Expect to also spend up to approx $50  for our 2 REQUIRED TEXTS, available in the Evergreen Bookstore.

I highly recommend that you spend time reading these once before the course begins and exploring the artists that Rexer discusses. There is an excellent series of lectures and interviews related to the book available on YouTube. Search for “Edge of Vision Aperture” or “Lyle Rexer”

1. Lyle Rexer, The Edge of Vision: The Rise of Abstraction in Photography  (2009)

2. Vilem Flusser, Towards a Philosophy of Photography  (1983) 

An OPTIONAL text The Book of Alternative Photographic Processes (3rd ed.), by Christopher James, is approx $80 online. It provides rich and detailed technical and historical information on most of the historical processes still in use today. If you are serious about engaging in depth with these processes and have the funds, this text is highly recommended. We will be reading PDF sections of the book (see “Readings” section)

MORE TO EXPLORE:

BOOKS/ESSAYS:

Photography’s Antiquarian Avant-Garde: The New Wave in Old Processes, Lyle Rexer (2000) Out-of-print, available used. 

Shadow Catchers: Cameraless Photography, Martin Barnes (2012) We will be reading the introduction as a PDF (see “Readings” section)

What is a Photograph? Carol Squiers (2014) [LINK to the related exhibition at ICP, NY]

Photography Beyond Technique, edited by Tom Persinger (2014). We will be reading essays from this collection as PDFs (see “Readings” section)

ONLINE:

Process and Abstraction: Jessica Eaton, Mariah Robertson, Alison Rossiter 2015 exhibition site with links to interviews with each artist

Interview with Barbara Kasten, part of the Edge of Vision series to complement Rexer’s text

Abstraction in Photography. Panel discussion with art historians Lyle Rexer and George Baker, and artists Susan Rankaitis and James Welling.

Vilem Flusser lecture excerpt Budapest, April 1990.