The reviews are by no means exhaustive but rather a short investigation related to my personal interest in environmental photography and book making. I have picked these two books for their great image quality but also because they are not as populist and well know as other photo books. Furthermore the reviews are meant to encourage my students to look at a larger variety of references.
I will start by looking at the August Sander exhibition catalogue:
This catalogue (I also call it book or booklet from here on) is beautifully presented with a solid 82 pages, a knowledgeable introduction, a sensitive collectors' perspective and an insightful essay. The first and last page is printed on very fine paper. It looks recycled and even handmade with remains of green fibres (image on the right).
The book consists of 40 landscape photographs grouped by region and theme. I picked up two new copies in a Brighton bookstore for £14 in December 2010. I felt it may have collector's value and perhaps I wasn't so wrong: it currently sells between £49 and £97 on Amazon, which is a good indication that it may be on the rise.
The intention of the catalogue was to celebrate the occasion of a unique exhibition: "August Sander: Photographs of the German Landscape", shown in Washington, D.C. in 2004 (organised by the Phillips Collection). A collection of 40 Silver gelatin prints was donated to the Phillips Collection Washington, D.C. The catalogue was designed by Ken Karlic to accompany the exhibition. Notes suggest that there was a further book produced for the occasion.
The catalogue is presented in a contemporary way, with the title caught on the bottom cut edge of the book cover. Only two colours are used throughout the catalogue (green and black, with shades of grey)- I wonder if this was also an environmentally friendly choice? Image reproduction is very good with great tonal range. Some images are a little small and the black edges framing the images are a little too bold for my taste.
On the whole, however, I really enjoy looking at the catalogue and in particular I like reading about the background of the images and the artist's intention. I did not know much about Sanders landscape work before I came across this little treasure. It was a huge delight as I was in the middle of picking up loose ends on a variety of environmentally concerned projects. What stands out to me is the mix of landscape art and scientific interest but I can also sense an emotional response and the familiarity to the land.
When showing the book to Phil Coomes, he immediately drew a comparison to Sander's "People of the Twentieth Century". Phil felt that Sander had portrayed the trees similar to the people. This is in deed confirmed in the curators introduction: "Sanders portraits of plants and trees provide natural analogues to the human studies"(Phillips, p.23).
The Collectors ((Minichiello, p.33) go further calling them "intimate landscapes". They speak about the solitude visible in the set of images they call paths in the woods. The paths suggest a human presence without any humans visible in the pictures. They also suggest that Sander took strength from making these images. They have spoken to Sanders grandson, Gerd Sanders, who confirmed that under the Nazi regime it was difficult for Sander to continue his portraits.
The catalogue alternates text with images some of which display a similarity to Ansel Adams inspired, broad views. Other images show more intimate details of paths, wild woods as well as botanical studies. Sometimes the texts in the book take you away from the images and I wonder if the text should have perhaps been separated from the flow of images.
Nevertheless, it is well worth the effort to follow up the essay taking you through the second half of the book. It gives a brief overview of the history of landscape within the arts and goes on to reveal some more details about Sanders background as a painter/ photographer.
August Sander started out with landscape photography yet advertising himself as an interior and industrial photographer. His work progressively moved from landscapes to cityscapes. The essay (Lange, Conrad-Scholl, p.61) summarises: "In general Sander's work combines the tradition of topographic documentation with a modern interest in its intellectual ramifications."
The essays mentions that Sander has left behind an archive of over 4000 landscape negatives.
It goes on to discuss the major regions Sander has focus his landscape work on such as the Rhein area, Eiffel and the Siebengebierge and reveals that Sander has applied the exact same systematic approach to his landscapes than he did when organising his portraits into book form. A good example can be seen in his portfolio "Der Rhein und das Siebengebierge".
In the view of the writers, the botanical studies associate Sander with Goethe. He had a collection of books by Goethe and was inspired by him. It seems that this encouraged Sander to work intuitively and not feel limited by one genre, bringing science and art together. Although it has to be said that not all images in the catalogue display the same technical quality (some appear blurred due to long exposure times) on second glance, the front cover choice seems to celebrate Sanders marriage of technically brilliance with intuitive flair.
My personal favourites are "Eibe im Fruehlingskleid (Yew in Spring), Birken im Wald (Birches in the woods) and Baumgruppe auf dem Hohen Venn bei Windstille (trees on the "Hohen Venn" during calm). All 1930s. The latter in reminds me a little of Alfred Stieglitz's cloud studies "Equivalents" (also known as "Songs of the Sky").All images © August Sander
I leave you with a Sander Quote:
"In landscape we recognise the spirit of our time, which we are able to capture with the help of the camera"
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Fay Godwin's book: "Our forbidden land" was first published in 1990 and won the Green Book Award. It starts with a long introduction by the photographer laying out our relationship to the land. Again, I bought this book for a bargain of £7.50 through Amazon.It is rather different to Sanders e.g. far more critical about the landscape and varies greatly in it's approach to image making (mix of formats). It includes 132 images over 192 pages with extensive text and captioning. Reproduction of images is very good. It also contains various snippets of poetry.
The themes covered in the text are: Good and bad farming, walking access and dogs, support industries e.g. chemical and machine production, nuclear, defense, water companies, polluted food vs organic food.
Photographs cover a wide span of themes including: public woodlands, allotments, small/ bio dynamic farms, blocked and dangerous paths, caravan parks, Stonehenge, power lines, private estates and beaches, dying trees, littered landscape, the Channel Tunnel works, former military land, food and farming festivals, inner city natural spaces, erosion and repair of food paths.
In my view it is a greatly educating book providing food for thought and an insight into land management. The one minus point is that pages start to yellow on the edges. Nevertheless, it strengthened my idea to set my students an environmental photography project and convinced me to take them out for a trip once again this year. Thank you Fay!
All images © Fay Godwin
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I have been so inspired by books lately that I started to archive my own images in book form. As I had just been invited to submit some photos to the Ningbo Photo Festival in China, this has given me an occasion to group a few of my images of bicycles in Dalian. To see a preview just click on the picture below or to the right.
One thing I can't stop thinking about is: how acceptable is it to still print books on environmental subjects (ethically speaking) and what other/ environmentally friendly ways are their to show photographs to the same standard/quality? (not based in a computer!)Any feedback welcome. Still work in progress.
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