Photograms
Laszlo Moholy-Nagy.
Laszlo Moholy- Nagy, is a Hungarian artist born in 1895. After serving in the Austro-Hungarian Army and being severely wounded in the first world war, Moholy began to draw and paint in 1917. He drew influence from Malevich and Lissitzky and painted abstract images. His first solo exhibition was held in 1922 in Berlin. After this, he became more interested with experimental photography, including photograms, of which he became most well known for. Below are some of these, Click to enlarge...
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Laszlo Moholy-Nagy's approach to Photograms is very abstract. He presents objects in ways making them look different. He uses specific placement and composure of his objects in order to make them look different to their original forms. In a lot of his pieces, they are made to look 3D and in some ways active. This can be achieved by moving the object mid way through expire, which creates a faded drifting effect. Its a simp way to create another interesting aspect in your photograms. On the contrary, I'm not sure if he has even done this, it is more likely that he has just used partially transparent objects in order to create this ramification.
Man Ray
Man Ray is an American Artist/ Photographer who revolutionised Photograms to the extent that he named them "Rayographs". The thing that made them so different to the existing ones made by others is the objects he used. Man Ray was famous for using everyday objects in an abstract way to create his photograms. Man Ray was born in 1890 in Philadelphia, US and passed away in 1976 in Paris, France. He spent most of his career within France painting and perfecting his Photograms.
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Man Ray's approach to taking Photograms is very different to that of Laszlo Moholy-Nagy. Ray's photograms are on the whole, a lot flatter. As a result, it is clear that he is more interested in the presentation rather than the representation of the object. That is not to say that his work has kind of narrative or meaning as some of his work does. For example, the photogram on the far right. This photogram of a gun placed on a pile of jewellery is easy to have meanings connected to it. Man Ray's method and approach to photograms was so influential at the time that 'Rayograms' became a model for photographers taking photograms.
First set of photograms
These photograms were all made from the same fly. I found it in the school and kept it in an old film canister until I got to the dark room. When I was making them, I found that the real reason I wanted to make photograms of a fly was because of their detailed wings and legs and through simply capturing them as they were would not let me achieve this. So, I found a sheet of glass and placed it gently on top of it each time I went to expose the light. Through doing this, the wings were flattened, leaving on show the detailed wings of the fly.
Second set of photograms
This set of photograms differ from the other as they do not share a theme and are not of the same things. I made these with a variety of exposure times and f-stops, as a result, they look very different to one another...
The most successful photogram of this set it the one to the right. It was made from a selection of jewellery. Although not completely in focus, I believe that it is easily the best (in terms of technique) of the set. Coincidentally, it is my favourite of the set.