The Blue Room from foto8 on Vimeo. |
Eugene Richards is a photographer, writer, and filmmaker and was born in Dorchester, Massachusetts in 1944. In his project - The Blue Room, Richards shot with film, often having to repeat the process for the photo to come out correct. He became obsessed with old, abandoned houses which he thought were very beautiful and wanted to take pictures of. He didn't want to photograph people and basically wanted to get away from the idea of people in photos. He did not know the stories of the people who lived or worked in any of the places of the pictures he took. However, there is a story behind why he wanted to take the photos and how he went about it.
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It gets 40 degrees fahrenheit below 0 where he was taking the photos. This one shows a bedroom with snow and ice coming through the cracked window onto the bed. You can tell it is a derelict home as the window has not been repaired, it is no where for someone to stay. The fact that the photo is in colour allows us to see exactly where the ice is and the feel of the room. You can tell it has been abandoned due to the less homely feel and dullness of the photo. The bed is left with just a mattress and the walls look quite dirty.
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This photo shows a North Dakota school house. The only thing that saved it from being totally taken apart was that the front part of the school had fallen down so you had to crawl through all the debris to get into the room. The photo portrays the abandonment very well as you can see that a place which was once full of many people has now fallen apart.
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This photo shows a persons belongings in what is most probably a shed. The feel of the photo is quite warm and also has a vintage feel to it. The picture makes the viewer feel as if the allotment belongs to a person, they have a connection. The straw hat and plaid shirt have strong connotations with an allotment also making it evident where the photo has been taken. The photo looks as if it has been taken close up with a digital camera and has been edited increasing the saturation and contrast to give the vintage feel.
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This photo is one taken of a whole area of the allotment which has mostly green spaces and plants. There are man made structures that have been left such as the chair. You can also see the shed in the background making it evident it is an allotment. The lighting is bright and the colour green gives off a positive feel of the photo.
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Using a film camera, we took photos of the allotment and derelict swimming pool. In the dark room I exposed the photo, first using a test strip with 1 second each time across it. I found that 2 second exposing time was the best as it came out quite well and you could see the whole photo. I wanted to experiment with different exposure levels and ways to develop the photo such as using developer in a spray bottle, and using a paint brush to get a different type of effect.
I also used photoshop to overlay a pink colour on the last photo as the photographic paper already had a pink effect which I wanted to recreate and thought looked very effective. |
I liked the idea of man vs nature and also the relationship between them. I also liked the fact that we are surrounded by nature all the time and that by incorporating it we can make man made structures more beautiful.
I chose these photos due to the effect that they give. The contrast between the building and tree in the first photo by Richard Wood struck me at first. I find it interesting that man needs to introduce nature to complement the man made structures, more so in urban settings. The way that nature is climbing up the wall in the second photo also fascinates me, I wonder how it got there, and if it was by man. |