Cyclops

In Between Contact Print, 2010 © Amy Stein

“The images in Domesticated are my interpretation of real events. The journey to a final image is long. I start with an idea of the photograph, find the animal, scout the location and then assemble it all in front of the camera. What’s next, as revealed in the contact sheets, is a process not unlike that of a movie director, where I compose the elements in service of the narrative and the frame. Often, the elements are working against me and it becomes a race to find the perfect frame. Such was the case of the shoot that produced In Between.

The light was fading and I knew we had to make the photograph before the darkness closed in. We drove up and down the highway looking for the perfect spot where the built and natural landscapes intersected. When I saw the stretch of highway where the mountain sloped down to the road and the service road, which fronts the big box stores, came into view I knew I had found the right location. But the light was fading fast and the beautiful blue glow of dusk was darkening into black. After positioning the deer just within the safety of the median grass, I searched it’s eyes for a look of indecision and fear. Of course, this was a fool’s game because the deer was inert. But looking closer, there was some expressiveness in the eyes. Perhaps it was the light or my imagination. The deer stood frozen caught in between the two roads.” – Amy Stein

In Between, 2007 © Amy Stein

The First Wound
Statement by Ron Gordon

Comiskey Park Demolition Series, Infield, May 6, 1991 © Ron Gordon

“I was expecting it, waiting for it, but when the wrecking ball hit the old ballpark, it was as if I had felt the first wound myself.  Old Comiskey, with all its memories, all its ghosts, would soon be but a ghost itself.  These feelings have always fueled my need to photograph the demolition of old structures,

But this one was personal.

I had spent a lot of time here with family and friends, some of whom are now just memories themselves.  I have been compelled to leave a record of things in the process of disappearing, somehow to try to prove that they really existed, to answer the question of what used to be here.

In the fifties, I worked as a peanut vendor. The peanuts were 15 cents for a small bag and I made 20 percent or 3 cents a bag. One Sunday double header, I walked for about 6 hours and sold 600 bags. I made $18.00 and thought I was the richest teenager in the world.”

PROOF

“For me the proof sheet of a roll of film was the first chance that I had to see an image that I had spent time contemplating in the field. The subjects of my work existed in the real world outside of my darkroom. Somehow I managed to capture them and there they were, appearing in a darkroom tray in front of me, as if by magic.

This magic fascinated me from the very beginning. It is what attracted me to photography in the first place. I loved the chemistry and the physics, the machines and the materials, the film and the paper.

I believed that the contact sheet had to be as good as a master print because it was the first look and contained all of the magic. In this digital age the image is visible at capture. It is instant and contains no surprises.

Vision is the most important part of the photographer’s long and complex creative process. The proof sheet is the first look.”

Ron Gordon
July 2010
Chicago

Assault Contact Sheet, 1991 © Jeffrey Wolin

“We now live in a post-contact sheet era, of course, but for so many years, the contact sheet was the place where you could see how we as photographers felt our way through a photographic opportunity. The negative that became “Assault” was taken as I wandered in and out of apartments, photographing residents of Bloomington’s housing projects, known as “Pigeon Hill”. I only made 4 negatives that day of Teresa,  a young woman who had just been badly beaten for protecting a neighbor, a black kid that a local bully was threatening. I burned in the background surrounding the woman and her daughter to accommodate the text, which is handwritten on the print and recounts her story of the assault. I love Teresa’s expression and the gesture of her hand, wrapped around the straw in an inverted “OK” sign. The daughter regards me with curiosity. Other images on the contact sheet reveal more about the exact nature of Teresa’s injuries including missing teeth, but I chose this one to show her beauty and resiliency and to enhance the pathos of her grim situation—recently divorced, vulnerable and living in a predatory environment with her daughter.” – Jeffrey Wolin

Jeffrey Wolin at PROOF opening reception

Ultraviolet Beauty (Untitled) #80, 2008

Two of Cara Phillip‘s pieces from her series Ultraviolet Beauties can be seen alongside their contact sheets in PROOF. Cara shared with us a statement about the work and a few process shots from Union Square.

“My first body of work was a personal exploration of the psychological experience of the cosmetic surgeon’s office. While researching that project, I came across ultraviolet photography, used by many medi-spas and dermatologists to show patients their ‘future’ skin. Despite the fact that there is no guarantee that this unseen damage will ever appear, beauty professionals and doctors still use these images to sell cosmetic treatments to their clients and patients.

Utilizing the same UV technology, but with B&W large format film, I set up my studio on the streets of New York City. The idea was to offer any pedestrian willing to sit for me in public, an expensive, rarified, beauty treatment. The results were surprising—however not so much for what they revealed about the subject’s skin damage—but for the questions they raised about the revelatory expectation of the contemporary photographic portrait, and  about the aesthetic beauty of imagery. By closing their eyes the subjects were able to restrict what how much they revealed to my camera, while at the same time allowing themselves to stop posing and control their expressions.  And even though the images capture every visible and invisible imperfection, the final photographic prints are extremely beautiful.”  -  Cara Phillips

All images © Cara Phillips, 2010

We asked each photographer in our current show PROOF to explain what the contact sheet reveals about their process and way of thinking. Here is what Hiroshi Watanabe had to say:

“For me, as a film photographer, contact sheets are a very important step and big part of my creative process. There are two types of photographic artists – ones who create based on his/her visionary ideas and ones who document reality and develops his/her ideas from that reality. I am the latter one. When I photograph, I keep my mind open and photograph what intrigues me. In essence, I merely document them. And mostly, I forget about them. I discover what I photographed in my contacts sheets and I study them. I ponder them. I select what surprises me, teaches me, and stirs my emotions and then make prints. Unlike digital, I cannot see what is exactly on my film until I print the contact sheets. That uncertainty is what drives me to create.” – Hiroshi Watanabe

El Arbolito Park, Quito, Equador Contact Sheet © Hiroshi Watanabe

El Arbolito Park, Quito, Equador, 2002 © Hiroshi Watanabe