My second photo assignment had just as loose of guidelines as the last: take images that represent the themes in chapters 2-4 in The Photograph as Contemporary Art. These chapters are as follows:
Chapter Two: Once Upon a Time
This chapter explores "tableau" photography, or photography in which an entire narrative has been condensed into one single image. This style of photography often includes images constructed by the photographer and requires a preconceived idea of what will be photographed.
Chapter Three: Deadpan
Deadpan photography cares more about aesthetic than meaning in an image. Deadpan photos are crisp, clear, large images of scenes that lack narrative, detail, or drama. They tend to be detached and cool, with no deeper meaning.
Chapter Four: Something Or Nothing
This chapter focuses on turning everyday objects into art. The seemingly banal, boring subject matter of the images is what makes them so striking: who'd think to photograph a pile of dirty laundry, a banana peel, or a half burned out light up sign? This style of photography takes ordinarily ignored subject matter and brings it into the light.
For my project, I took photos of Preister's Service Center on Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard. It seems that the gas station has been abandoned for at least thirty years. I've driven past the lot on which the crumbling structure sits almost every day since I started school here in September. Hundreds of other people- locals, students, and tourists pass this decaying sight every day and don't even take the time to bat an eye or turn a head. However, the service center caught my eye the first time I drove past it and I had been looking for an excuse to get off the bus in that part of town to photograph it for months. Here's how it turned out when I finally did.
click right on photos below to scroll.
The photos are taken at different times of the day, from early morning just before sunrise, to high noon, to dinner time, to after sunset. As seen in the photos, nothing about the landscape changes in the 14 hours that pass between photographs. No matter what the time of day- early commute, lunch break, rush hour, or bedtime- the gas station remains lifeless and ignored. That is, until a SCAD kid decided to go back not once, but four times to shoot photos.