We Can’t Paint

The cluster-fuck aesthetic best represents much of the new photography being produced today. This is not to say that all of the photographic innovation is placed within this style, but it is an emergence of a new way of seeing photographically. It is a combination of staged and documentary photography that is both subjective in its formal presentation as well as its conceptual ideals, but how did this develop? What were some of the key factors that led to its inception?

As the 20th century came to a close contemporary art had seen a shift in its boundaries, lines that had been traditionally drawn between art and popular culture. For example, the title of photographer now covered a vast proliferation of styles, working methods, and pursuits. These artists not only worked within an art world context, but other areas of media that have traditionally been categorized as separate.

Artists like Juergen Teller and Wolfgang Tillmans, who for the most part excelled in the fashion and magazine realm of media production, were now beginning to gain the same level of attention and respect within the art world as artists who produced work for gallery walls. In fact, by the year 2000 this new acceptance was solidified with the announcement that Tillmans had won the controversial Turner Prize, the first photographer to do so. It seemed only fitting that in a new century where images and information are ingested so rapidly, and even with such ease, that this new type of photographer could be marked as an example of excellence within arts.

(from “Louis XV”), 2005© Juergen Teller

Shaker rainbow, 1998© Wolfgang Tillmans

Tillmans’ practice was unlike much of what was considered fine art photography at the time. It placed a myriad of commonly uninteresting subjects as a symbolic representation of what could be considered central to an exploration of life. This could include keys left in an apartment door lock, black socks illuminated with soft overcast light, and even the branch of a houseplant against the sky. Prints were sometimes produced from Bubble-jet and Ink-jet printers, materials which are prone to fading and lacked much of the high-end quality that traditional photographic practice was accustomed to. The sheer prolific range of Tillmans’ output and subject matter was not only revolutionary, but it questioned what constitutes value within photography itself.

Chaos Cup, 1997© Wolfgang Tillmans

Deer Hirsch, 1995© Wolfgang Tillmans

grey jeans over stair post, 1991© Wolfgang Tillmans

winter rail, 1996© Wolfgang Tillmans

Freischwimmer 15, 2003© Wolfgang Tillmans

Smokin’ Jo, 1995© Wolfgang Tillmans

Tillmans’ work was also exhibited in an unusual manner. While only a portion of the photographs that encompassed these exhibitions were mounted traditionally in frames, the rest of the work was usually tacked to the wall as a bare print. Small photographs could often be arranged in a grid like pattern, while medium to large work could be installed near the galleries ceiling or floor. This is a photographer who is challenging the importance of photography as a medium. A Tillmans exhibition was less a combination of work and more of an artwork in its own right.

Turner Prize Installation Wolfgang Tillmans

Installation Wolfgang Tillmans

Thus, it is here where much of our contemporary photography was reconfigured, a merging of popular imagery (fashion, design, etc), and in particular, this is where the cluster-fuck aesthetic is grounded. The acceptance of fashion photographers as artists was only a small part of a larger change in photographic output and ideals; other non-traditional forms of media have played a large role as well.

To be continued on Friday.