Henry Wessel Jr

Henry Wessel is photographer that documented the change in the urban landscape across California in the 1970's. This movement in documentary photography was known as "New Topographic's" which means the change in urban landscape and the may man has altered the landscape and the way humans use the "New" landscape. This is shown in photography through images of parking lots, shopping malls and new houses.

Wessel is known for his quality of light in his photographs and prints. This is to do with his obsession with the soft Californian light. He achieves this by being generous with exposure and creating low contrast photographs that highlight the quality of soft light in that part of the world.

Below are some of Wessel's work from a series called Incidents, Credit to Henry Wessel:

William Eggleston

William Eggleston is a photographer from Memphis Tennessee. His family are wealthy cotton planation owners so he was born into wealth. This aspect is important in Egglestons style. Eggleston is a photographer that played a very important part in getting colour photographs recognised as Art. This happened when John Szarkowski Recognised Egglestons work of having potential for an exhibition in New York MOMA. This exhibition took place in 1976 and was titled Eggleston's Guide.   Critics slammed the work at first but now critics hang off his every word and anything Eggleston puts his name to would sell.

As he was born into a wealthy family and business that could of had a influence on the way he created photographs as he didnt have to worry about creating work from it, he was able to experiment with style and show the world his world through his unique style of photography. Egglestons colour photography was so highly recognised because of his unique style of printing. He create his colour prints with a process that was predominantly reserved for advertisement. This was called Dye Transfer and creating prints where colours were highly saturated and balanced.

Eggleston is also known for only taking one photograph of each thing, this can sometimes mean that compositionally they can be slightly imperfect with un-straight horizons and small obstructions to the frame, but to me they all add to the photograph. 

Below are examples of his work, Credit to William Eggleston:

Daniel Arnold

Arnold is a New York City based street photographer, he shoots on film and also iPhone. From looking at his street photographs is is clear that the angle he takes on street photography and documenting America is one that is tilted towards photographing the slightly strange or eccentric people of America. Documentation of this nature could be considered unethical and the photographer would have to consider that aspect. But ultimately taking photographs in public places is legal so it is just left to personal ethics and confidence to what you shoot. Personally I don't see an issue with what Arnold does, however if he was to pose the subject is slightly provocative ways that hints at segregation and perhaps snobbishness then I would see it as an issue but he points his camera in there direction and tries to create candid moments that reflect that person in the environment of the street, they are not portraits of people or judgmental propositions to what illness, if any they have.

All image credit to Daniel Arnold:

Harrison Boyce

Harrison Boyce isn't a photographer that you're likely to come across. The reason I know his work is because he used to ride BMX and as did I so I heard of him through that. However he has since stopped riding BMX as has taken a more direct approach to image making. He has directed music videos and made short films about New York City, one of which was inspired by William Klein's film, Broadway by light.

It is his photography that interests me the most. He has a very formalistic approach to image making, particularly when shooting street photography. He creates documents that more homogenise the architecture and light in places rather than trying to comment on any particular social groups.

Below are some of his images, from looking at them you can see that there is a conscious decision being made to make a formally aesthetically pleasing image where shapes compliment each other and light compliments form.

All image credit to Harrison Boyce.

Martin Parr Bad Weather

Martin Parr is an English photographer famed for his passionate approach towards documenting the unique aspects of British culture. He has created numerous works on British culture ranging from The Last Resort (1983-85) project which was a document on New Brighton, Wirral. This series of photos was actually a key contending into colour photographs being recognised as "serious" documentary as colour had previously been reserved for advertisement. Parr's colour work differed from this as it wasn't trying to sell anything, it was just a documentary on a place. Other works from Parr include Think of England and We Love Britain. 

All of Parr's work is now in colour but Parr's early work was all black and white. One project in particular that is an interesting aspect on street photography is his Bad Weather series. A document on some of Britain's worst weather (something we are famous for) and our cultural behaviour towards it. 

The series is taken mostly with flash, this element creates another layer to the photo, a layer that causes some of the element in the photo to "pop out", rain drops for example. They would not usually show up in a  photograph in that clarity if it wasn't for flash. Another thing that stands out in the photographs is that this part of British culture and street culture is rarely documentary because of its very nature, it is miserable to be out in cold wet weather and can cause damage to equipment. So these photos give us a personal look into our cultural behaviour. 

Below are the some photos taken from "Bad Weather" Credit to Martin Parr.

Contact sheets

Below are the contact sheets from both shoots in Oxford city. From looking at the sheets and from my own experience of the shoots, it is clear that the first trip and shoot in Oxford was very much about myself becoming familiar with the city and the type of people that occupy it.

 I had no clear concept at first but the longer I spent in Oxford, I realised the amount of tourists present. With them in mind I began to document tourists and people looking at things, turning the observing back onto them to a certain extent. Another thing that interests me and is present in the contacts is people that are already still and are waiting around. For single images they might not appear that intriguing but as a collection they become some what of a study about human behaviour. It is also a play on how a photograph freezes a moment so when the person is already stationary you begin to know what the photo will look like before it is taken. 

Joel Meyerowitz

Meyerowitz is a New York based photographer and street photographer. He was an early pioneer of pushing colour photography into serious documentary work in the 1960s. 

The photographs below are examples of his colour street photography. They show unique moment in everyday life. There is moments where a gesture is captured, human interaction, public housing living and relationships between patterns and colours. They are all taken using either a 50mm or 35mm lens, this means the photographer has to be close in order to fill the frame. It also means the photographer is in the streets, walking amongst the people they are photographing which gives a more personal feel to the photographs.

Photo credit to: joel meyerowitz