Environment Unit - Introductory thoughts

In today's lecture about the Environment unit we looked at several artists and their work of the Environment.

- Walker Evans - American Photographer -Best known for Photographing the Farm Security Administration during the great depression - 1930s.

Evans began the project in 1935 and wanted to capture the spirit of the American people, but due to the depression increasing Evans began Photographing white middle class, African+Latino neighbourhoods as well as people in mining. The misery of the depression is portrayed in Evans photographs.

Jitka Hanzlova
Czech republic Photographer

The body of work called 'The forest' by Hanslova are beautiful but yet quiet dark and vaguely disturbing.

They also give me the impression that the environment is not as safe as people may think it is.

The forest is in the village where the artists grew up which is her environment from when she lived there as a child. Her images are three things; unpredictable, dangerous and fascinating. 

Edward Burtynsky
The canadian Photographer is known for his large format industrial landscape Photography

Burtynskys work consists of stone, minerals, oil, transportation, silicon etc

The artist searches for subjects that are rich in detail such as recycling yards and mine tailings in order to make his ideas visible. Also he looks for scale with open meaning in his places. 

I think his work incites pity and Burtynsky finds the natural beauty in processing synthetic waste and the machinery of humanity.  

Whats led Burtynsky to spend 17years photographing large industrial landscapes is that he believes we are aware of the fact that the world is suffering for our success as we are drawn by desire - a chance at good living. 

http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2011/04/25/edward-burtynsky-oil/

In this video, Burtynsky talks about how he feels the world of mines is unseen which led him to create a large format colour images to illustrate symbolism of landscape that we use.

He believes Photography is perfectly suited to contemplate the industrial landscape and that everyone should take a chance to analyse it - take it on board

Moreover, he wants to show through his photography how we should think about dealing with energy crisis, which is why he did a series called 'End Of Oil' 

500 years of oil growth

30 billion barrels used per year

Naoya Hatakeyama - Japanese Photographer

Series called 'Blast' which focuses on Limestone and how the world is dependant on it for concrete, steal, glass, plastic and even medicine. 

To capture the deconstruction of Japans Limestone, Hatakuyama used remote-control cameras from point- blank range. He began working on the mining operations in early 1980s and published in book in 1994.