Chapters 2 +3

I really enjoyed Cotton's chapter on storytelling, titled "Once Upon a Time".  She talks about the use of narrative in contemporary photography that makes references that society understands.  The first section of the chapter looks at how a single image can show a whole series of events without necessarily using multiple images.  Wall's 'Insomnia' was a great example because he used the placement of objects around the kitchen, in combination with the figure's disheveled look to explain the man's final placing curled up on the floor.  Cotton went on to talk about photographers who use certain 'set ups' to inspire "storytelling in the viewer's mind" (pg51).  I was drawn to Hunter's "The Way Home' which discusses the use of historical symbolism in modern art, and affirms that art is a place for fables and stories to chronicled.  Cotton closes the chapter looking at the use of architectural spaces as the story.  I was really interested in how these spaces disorient the viewer, especially when explained.  The Casebere piece really seemed to be a schoolhouse but with such a cutesy element that made it look like a dollhouse, reading that it was a model made of an boarding school added to the surrealism and total creepy sense the image gave.

Cotton's third chapter discusses the intricacies of deadpan photography.  In reading this chapter I was focused on the idea of emotional detachment that is present in these photos.  The discussion on Gursky was important in understanding how deadpan works, and I was interested in the idea that he places the viewers far enough from the subjects so one cannot become immersed but rather has to be a critic.  This idea really helped my understanding of the many artists who work with landscape, architecture, and interior deadpan photography.  Burtynsky's work on the oilfields seemed to break the emotional flatness by hitting viewers in the gut with 'fact-stating' photos that viewers may not want to believe.  The photographs seemed to put the viewer in two distinct positions, one as the critic, the other as a viewer who may have to give into realities they are not comfortable with.  Deadpan is almost a statement of fact, but behind it is a lot of intrigue.  Photographers use their colour range, subject matter and focused details to create discussions on meanings behind the flat image.  Ruff's portraiture really captures this; he voids the pictures of visual triggers only to trigger questions on his sitters character.