Copy Photo: Uta Barth

Copy Shot: Uta Barth (Contact Sheet)

Uta Barth (Images)

Uta Barth (Artist Report/Research)

Uta Barth uses photography to examine the differences between photographic and visual perception - what the human eye sees and what the camera lens captures. Barth's photographs are rarely grounded in the figurative and often lack a foreground subject. Rather, her images are out of focus, blurry, and cropped. In the absence of a clear object or landscape, atmosphere and light become her subjects.


Barth's acclaimed series of photographs include Ground and Field, the first in which she focused her camera on unoccupied space to create colorful photographic blurs. Her 2007 series, Sundial recorded the effects of light at different times of day and times of year in her home. Though devoid of concrete subjects, these works demonstrate her mastery of composition and balance.


I was initially drawn to Barth from her light refraction photos which I found very interesting because of the simplicity within the photograph which was shot very professionally in a way that looked clean and detailed. I then looked at other projects Barth has done and instantly liked the manual focus project where the photo is blurry, but the subject is still visible, similar to another photographer that I have researched and shoots in the same style, Bill Armstrong.


http://www.artspace.com/uta_barth

Unit 4 Outline

In Unit 4, my choice of theme is 'challenging traditional representation' which consists of altering images in certain ways as well as keeping the focus on the subject in the image. In this project I intend to firstly look into light reflection and refraction, using Uta Barth as inspiration. Then I intend to go into manual, out of focused images, then glitch art within photos, keeping the photo the same, yet altering it in a different way. In unit 4, I want to present images which are different from the norm, changing the way someone will look at the image, and their perception of the photo.

One question I can ask myself and try and answer throughout my project is: What other perceptions of the image can be given off to an audience viewing it?