Presentation and Care of Photographs 101?

The topic of last night’s panel discussion in the Lubar Auditorium at the Milwaukee Art Museum was “presentation and care of photographs.”

That may not sound like the most exciting topic, but sparks flew from the beginning.

Zoe Strauss, a contemporary photographer, began by with the incendiary claim that “it’s the idea of the piece that’s the piece,” rather than the photographs themselves. While that’s a common conceptual artist’s conceit, she went on to show slides of her various cameras – which ranged from an inexpensive point and shoot to a top of the line DSLR – paired with images she’d made with each. Then she announced, “I don’t give a s**t which camera I’ve used.” She places equal value on the images made with all of them. (It was an amazingly refreshing thing to hear! I’ve been telling students for decades not to obsess about equipment – that cameras don’t take pictures; people do.) Strauss is known for displaying photocopies of her images on pillars underneath a freeway. To their credit, the three other panelists didn’t visibly blanch at her disdain of the preciousness of the original print or her ephemeral style of exhibition. In fact, they were up to the challenge. It was a provocative start to a stimulating discussion of the various ways to value photography.

Michael Foley, a gallerist from Foley Gallery in New York, followed Strauss. By contrast, his primary considerations, he said, are the quality of the materials used by the artist and the way the photographs are presented. His responsibility is to clients who want to invest in an artist’s work and the material worth and perceived longevity of the object is central to that end. But of course!

Although Nora Kennedy, a conservator from the Metropolitan Museum of Art, did come down predictably on the side of maximum control of the environment to preserve precious artworks in the museum’s collections, not all of her responses were so predictable. She cited two works at opposite ends of photographic history as posing particular challenges. One was an unfixed and therefore fugitive – highly fragile – photogram by William Henry Fox Talbot, one of photography’s progenitors. It can never be shown to the public because it would simply disappear if exposed to light. The other was Jeff Wall’s enormous photographs that are constantly illuminated because a light box is part of the presentation. Those incredibly expensive images inevitably will fade. Knowing this, she said, when a collector or museum purchases a print/light box from Wall he provides a second print – and even keeps it in storage – as insurance against the day when it will need to replace the first. (Of course that just kicks the conservator’s can down the road, doesn’t it?)

Max Yela, a specialist in book arts at the UWM Libraries, wrapped up the panel. He pointed out the special – and natural – relationship that photographs and books have always enjoyed. But from his perspective when an artist’s book is the goal then the images become subordinate to the book itself.  Agreed. Of course books can and are made from a wide variety of materials, both stable and unstable, just like photographs.

A lively discussion followed the opening remarks. It centered on questions such as, what constitutes an original in photography – the negative/digital file, or the vintage print? What is the proper role of reproduction in the viewing experience? And, how can a reproduction accrue value?

To all such questions the consensus of the panel was unanimous: “it depends!”

As I see it, the problem stems from a museum’s dual – and contradictory – responsibilities. Yes, a museum must preserve and protect original artworks. Yes, a museum must make their collections accessible to the public. Yes, these two goals can be incompatible. The solution for the fugitive Fox Talbot print is obvious: it can only be seen in reproduction. Kennedy mentioned a recent exhibit of similarly fragile autochromes (early color photos) at the Metropolitan. The originals were on display for a week before replacing them with reproductions. Were viewers of the reproductions duped? Did they have a less satisfying experience of the exhibit than the lucky few who went the first week? Assuming the Met informed its audience and created unimpeachable reproductions – and I’m willing to bet on the Met to have done both – I don’t expect so.

Why does the idea of displaying reproductions of art works rankle so many art museum curators when other kinds of museums use the practice routinely? Not long ago the Milwaukee Public Museum exhibited an “authentic facsimile” of the Dead Sea scrolls without irony, apology – or public outcry. Are art patrons so much fussier?

Don’t get me wrong, I would never argue that a reproduction would be a proper substitute if the original is available and circumstances permit it to be displayed safely. But I wouldn’t be calling this Arts Without Borders if I were not flexible in my thinking about how art can be viewed. And again to their credit, the curator, conservator, and gallerist all agreed with Strauss that artists should be encouraged to create with whatever materials are available, archival or not.

Bring on the temporary and ephemeral!

Evolving Practices in the Presentation and Care of Contemporary Photographs was hosted by the museum’s Photography Council.

Please feel free to leave a comment and continue the discussion.

The presentation was videotaped and is available in segments on you-tube: click here.

"Too Hard to Keep" at Riverside Arts Center

Do you have a photograph – or an entire album! – that, for whatever reason, you don’t want to see again but also don’t want to destroy? What a concept! “Too Hard to Keep” is a premise and the name of a new archive compiled by Chicago photographer Jason Lazarus. It is also the title of an installation from that archive currently on display at the Riverside Arts Center in suburban Chicago.

I went there recently with the Photo Council of the Milwaukee Art Museum. We saw great exhibits at the Art Institute and Museum of Contemporary Photography as well (and if I have time I will try to write them up, too.) The small storefront gallery has two rooms. As you enter the gallery the walls you see mostly 4x6 prints widely scattered around the walls of the room. There is no apparent order or coherent theme to the images.

In the back room is a more focused installation (above). One wall is filled with a collection of images donated by a single person – consistent with the private nature of the theme none of the donors are identified. They are mostly images of her with her ex-boyfriend. One is left to wonder at the particulars of the relationship, assuming a breakup of a sufficiently unpleasant nature to incite the donor to rid herself of all these reminders.

Opposite that is a wall with a single image that requires little imagination of the viewer to understand the reason for it being too hard to keep. The "negative space" of the wide, white wall adds to the power of the expressive image.

The photo council was treated to a lively explanation of the project and installation from its curator, Jason Lazarus. Lazarus, who teaches at Columbia College Chicago, has established himself as a bit of an iconoclastic photographer. Most of his efforts these days go into projects like this one that involve the collecting and/or curating of other people’s work. As a teacher, I admired his poise and energy as well as the deft and good humor with which he addressed questions from the group that crowded his small gallery. The project is fascinating in itself; the twinkle in his eye as he discussed it was a delightful bonus. I expect his students are lucky to be his students.

If you have a picture that’s too hard to keep yourself and you want to send it to someone who will not only keep it but treasure it, go to TooHardtoKeep. Or you can go there just to learn more about the project and to see additional photos of the installation.

Milwaukee Art Museum Photo Council annual photo review

At its premier annual event the Photography Council of the Milwaukee Art Museum votes to to donate funds for the Museum to acquire one from several candidate prints that  Lisa Hostetler, the curator of photography, has selected for the occasion. There were three candidates at this year’s event, which was held on May 13.

And the winner is…Russian born American artist Anna Shteynshleyger. (If you’ve never heard of her before, I’m there, too.) Her photograph (right), entitled Sukkoth, is a very large (I didn’t get measurements, but I’d guess 4’x5’) archival pigment (inkjet) print. It’s encouraging to see the growing acceptance of inkjet prints by museums of this caliber.

Sukkot is a Jewish holiday observed in the fall and the Sukkoth, which is depicted in the photo, is a temporary shelter that a Jewish family builds next to their house especially for the event. Meals are eaten and prayers recited in the Sukkoth. Hostetler provided this explanation: “For the artist, the image crystallizes her heightened sense of anxiety as she negotiated between the claustrophobic atmosphere in Des Plaines [Illinois] and the daunting prospect of leaving for experiences unknown. Her expert rendering of light and careful composition impel the viewer into her emotional space, one in which the tension between restlessness and trepidation is broadly familiar and decidedly human.”

My personal favorite was the more standard sized (16”x20”?) black and white image, also an inkjet print, by Fredrik Marsh (right). It’s titled Abandoned Apartment, Königsbrücker Strasse and is from a series he did in Dresden, Germany as part of a Guggenheim fellowship. I particularly like how the strong, abstract formal relationships—repeating rectangles, ambiguous spatial relationships—balance with the content of the image. It depicts a moment in time, a particular place, while simultaneously acquiring an archetypal quality of abandonment and decay. The picture within a picture conceit is perfect. It depicts a love of nature in an utterly unnatural setting. Then, because the poster of a lovely mountain scene is torn, it establishes a metaphor for loss. The abandonment of the apartment was preceded by an abandonment of the values the poster represents.

And I am happy to say that, although the Marsh print lost in the voting, MAM acquired it anyway. This has happened at these (cleverly orchestrated) events before. People (like me) join the Photo Council because they love photography and want to enable the acquisition of new work. When a work is not selected by the majority but is liked well enough, individual donors often contribute towards its purchase. The museum ends up with a win-win for its collection.