In discussion over the new exhibition of Rhodri Jones’ China photographs at the Side Gallery, some of the visitors from Cleveland CAD were questioning whether the high grain in the photographs automatically makes them look um, timeless, and if it does, is its use in some way a commentary on today’s China and the way its industrialisation connects with say, the documentary photography of the north-east’s mining traditions?
In a highly saturated world, is black and white always a signifier of the culturally traditional in photography, or does it merely strip away a lot of extraneous information? I simply don’t know, but was good topic, and the pictures are interesting. China is more frequently represented in full colour, so perhaps stripping it away leads the eye more to the detail in the pieces, the shapes. My favourites were the slag heap photographs, the horror of another Aberfan-in-waiting, and those showing the roofs weighted down with bricks against the wind, just as the allotment shed roofs are held down all along the Durham coastal villages.
And yes, any skyscraper block might well have been built within the past 100 years. The coexistence of high rise capitalism and street level poverty might be cliches here, but they work as social commentary in the China context. China, the supplier of all cheap goods, Primark tops at £1.99, is simultaneously the big new bogeyman of industrial pollution. The new red black country.
So what does high grain monochrome have to say?
Similar Posts:
- Picturing China in Durham
- City Doodle
- The Peterlee Pasmore: research photos
- True Grain
- Without Sanctuary
Popularity: 4% [?]
12 Comments
I had a quick check and of the 3000+ photos I have on Flickr currently, over a 1000 of them are black and white (assuming my tags are correct).
If I think about it, I don’t think my decision to convert those photos to black and white was anything to do with them looking older and more traditional. I think it’s more to do with seeing things that I like the look of, composing a shot because I like the shapes, lines, contrasts and other things and then discovering that in my image, colour is one extra complication that muddys the waters!
Now that is probably a really bad reason for doing black and white, rather than using the colour as well as the other things. In my defence, the other 2/3 of my photos on Flickr are in colour! :)
I have also heard the phrase “If it’s sh*te make it black and white”.
I don’t know where this ramble is going – my intention wasn’t to say that because I’m crap at taking photos, I try and make a lot of them black and white to divert attention from that fact.
Overall, I just like black and white and I do like grainy photos too. It probably says something about me that I got hold of that Ricoh GX100 and the two “My” modes on there are both set to black and white with fairly high ISOs that produce noisy black and white images when the light starts to fail. I know noise and grain aren’t the same, but some digital cameras produce quite pleasant noise, and others produce well, quite horrible digital noise.
Grain does not make a photo timeless, imho, in fact until recently it placed them very firmly in the 70’s, Ralph Gibson anyone? b&w on the other hand does subtract certain visual cues in placing a photo in any point in time, but the idea of timelessness is not why I choose black and white, nor is it what b&w says to me. [Don't get me started on the misconceptions about Sepia toning]
Personally I don’t like grain OR noise in my work if I can avoid it, with the exception of my mophone project/s, which are not about a finely crafted photo-object.
I’m not ignoring either of you, I’m still thinking about this.
There’s a conscious decision that goes on when you shoot film, to take rolls of b&w or colour with you when you go out. I’m thinking I usually decide to do one or the other in a session, and that’s because the brain works differently when I shoot b&w. I’m actively looking for interesting shapes, and not colour in my subject matter.
It’s a different process to deciding to make something b&w afterwards.
One time I always choose to photograph in colour, is when doing night-time long exposure work. I think because at wintertime I need more colour in my life. But last year I saw some b&w night long exposure work in the photography museum in Bradford, and was just blown away. So…
None of that is answering the question, mind.
that’s coz there’s no short answer, like the inevitable and ongoing “discussion” about art and photography
;)
If you want to see some REAL 1970’s B&W grainy shots take a peek at my site! :-)
Hi Robert, thanks for the pointer: they’re interesting. What film did you use for those?
The photos in the links above were shot with either Ilford HP5 400 pushed to 1600, or with Ilford Delta 3200 ISO.
Brenda, most of what I shot was done with TRI-X @ 400 with various developers. Thanks for taking a look!
Robert: I’ve recently purchased a dozen rolls of Tri-X since it gets such good recommendations, and I’ve not used it before. I generally dev with ID11. Have you got any better suggestions?
Brenda, I ended up using HC110 for most of my work. Try Rodinal if you want to play with grain. For the ultimate grain develop your film with paper developer! :-)
Tri-X…
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4583051
Paper developer? Hmm, will try it! The Tri-X results are lovely, btw.
I also agree that grainy black and white photos do look old. Making them black and white gives them this classic touch that makes it look old and timeless.