Another London

is a splendid collection of Black & White photographs much lauded by the critics in the press so in order to make the best of collecting my rejections from the Taylor Wessing National Portrait Prize 2012 I trundled over to have a look.

I was not disapointed. Most of the images enthralled me but those that stood out were;

Willy Ronis’  ‘Gaston Berlemont’s pub, The French House, Soho, London 1955’, and Irving Penn’s ‘Cleaning Women, London 1950’ and  ‘Young Cricketer (Adam Roundtree), London 1950′

The atmosphere conveyed in Willy Ronis’ print was so real I could smell the smoke, hear the banter and taste the beer. With Irving Penn’s work, what can I say say other than they exuded quality and depth and feeling even though they were staged photographs and many in this collection were of the moment and seized on the street.

A Walk Through the Twentieth Century

was another eye opener in that I was challenged as to why marker posts and maps of the the oil pipelines to strategic oil services was in there but more for the facts that the Becher’s and Gursky’s works were there for me to see for real rather than on film or in books.

Let’s take the Bechers first. ‘Coal Bunkers’ was the typology on show. Until now I had been indoctrinated into the discipline that they exhibited in making their images and presenting them. If this specimen is anything to go by then I was less than impressed. Each of the prints were slightly different in size and the spacing between then was irregular.  So much for highly stylised presentation. I have seen better ‘A’ Level presentations. I have to ask the question why we as a profession or should I say artistic genre are still locked into their typological presentation? I saw much in this style at Free Range and wondered why we are still locked into this way of presenting work. Surely this genre has had its time? In a word, disappointed.

Gursky

Two large prints adorn this collection;

Chicago Board of Trade II and Bahrain I.

I have always liked the latter and was quite impressed at seeing it life size. I know that the circuit is not as it is but I can forgive him that for the rather attractive abstract representation and also for the portrayal of the cars on the circuit and merely inconsequential.

The former had me wondering and questioning just what was original and what was cloned in this image. Bahrain I looks more ‘honest’ in the way it has been presented almost as a patchwork but I could not help wondering whether the population of the trading floorin  Chicago Board of Trade II  had not been manipulated too far. I could not detect any Portuguese tilers on the floor but then that was maybe due the fact that the movement within the picture made me somewhat dizzy. Was this intended? Should I always look at Gursky’s work and try and detect the manipulation applied to the final image? Much as I like some of his work, I have to question why it should stack up against the likes of Burtynsky for instance whilst not quite as large still conveys an almost Biblical message.

I suppose at the end of the day I have been pre-programmed to dismiss his work owing to the fact that most of the making and taking is undertaken by others in his team. Loading the dark slides seems almost inconsequential given the pre and post processing that goes on to produce a final image.

The Turner Collection

This is a joy to see. The colours, the sketch books, the interactive exhibition. All image makers should go and see the works on show if only for inspiration and to wonder how he managed to capture such details of light and colour in such small workbooks and on such arduous journeys – no Easy Jet or Ryanair for him.