considering...
What is a landscape? Typically I think of an image of nature, vast and inspirational, a sweeping dramatic view. Something like a painting from the Hudson River School comes to mind; the painting is realistic, romantic, and there is only a minute presence of human life. The format of landscape would seems to be by default horizontal. But consider the landscapes of Chinese scrolls, in which the distance increases as you travel up the painting following all the way to the tips of mountains. Tiny figures travel through the landscape, but are on the same category as the people of Hudson River paintings: not the focus. In addition, I would say that a typical landscape has a foreground, midground and background, creating a sense of dimension and unlimited space. But these qualities do not appear in all landscapes.
Consider Ray Metzer whose photography does not adhere to these descriptors. There are no wide-open spaces or dramatic geographical features. I am struck immediately by the square format so atypical of landscapes. This adds to the feeling of confinement brought on by the obscuring branches and lack of distinctions. Branches move in and out of focus, meshing with the shapes behind them. There is such an overwhelming amount of gray that the photographs seem like ink wash or charcoal drawings. There is abstractness about the image, brought on by the shapes and tonalities that leave me a bit mystified. And yet I am not bewildered, a sense of calm floats over me and I forget trying to make distinctions.
Arno Minkinnen takes a completely different approach to landscape although his work too is imbued with serenity and abstraction. However, he focuses on the placement of the human figure, and solely that without clothing, in relation to spaces, often outdoors. The photographs could be read as either a study of shape or as portraits exploring their subjects in unconventional ways. In any case, the landscape does not exist without the human in Minkinnen’s work. This is in contrast to many artists’ approaches where they eliminate the human figure from tainting the natural beauty and even godliness of the scene. I find Minkinnen’s photography engaging, disturbing, sensual and personal. Despite the absence of faces in many of his images, the weight, tangibility, and intimacy shines through.
Finally John Pfahl’s work could be considered a much more “traditional” approach to landscape in that he is focusing on nature in open spaces, but often he explores the manipulation of landscapes. It could be changes inserted by himself or created by other human hands, such as in “extreme horticulture” or “power places.” Color is also an important element and in some of his series seems essential, like “bali suite” or “smoke.” I am not drawn to all of his work. In fact, a great deal of it seems ordinary in the category of grand landscapes. But I do find a few of his inquiries interesting. “Picture windows” is intriguing because it examines the way people have framed their views out on the world - the “picture” they see every day, but may not consider a landscape or even beautiful.
The paintings of Frederic Church, such as “Heart of the Andes” (1859), were so exacting in detail and realism that viewers chose to look at it through binoculars from a distance and imaged themselves actually in the landscape. Can you imagine something so funny today? It just goes to show that the genre of landscape has change vastly over time, but for me it is often the more offbeat approach that attracts me most.
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