Having given this quite a lot of thought, and having done some reading already, the subject that holds the most interest for me at the moment is the idea that landscape photography does not necessarily have to focus on the physical landscape or environment, natural or built, in order to convey something about it.  Rather this can be done by concentrating on the people who inhabit the particular landscape.  This comes from the idea that “a place and its people are inextricably linked”, as the course material puts it, and from thinking about the work of Lixenberg and Sobol. However, rather than looking again at their work, what I am thinking of is looking at the genre of street photography, and in particular a few artists who concentrated on photographing people in New York City, specifically.  

Looking at some of this work again I am struck by how much some of it speaks of the nature of the city, built by, lived in, and used by people, and how the city in turn affects and shapes the lives of those people.  I am not interested here in the street photography that simply seeks out “characters”, chance events or juxtapositions, nor indeed what has been described as the “social landscape” (though that would in itself be an interesting subject, albeit not one I am sure would fit entirely comfortable within this part of the course), but that which says something about the city as a place.

Exactly what the argument will be is still developing but it is beginning to take shape as the jottings accumulate in my notebook.

As indicated in a recent post, part of the reason for choosing such a subject is to step out of my comfort zone, literally out of my natural environment in so far as I do not live in a city, and have not lived in a big one for many years (not since a brief sojourn in London 36 years ago).  Another reason is a desire to question and challenge the idea of distinct genres within photography. I also want to indulge in a bit of original thought, and it is interesting that in my research so far I have found nothing that is directly on the point, though enough that is more germane when given a wider view. I nevertheless hope that I can draw from this something that will be relevant to some of the work that I would like to attempt over time in my current more rural environment.

It is not often that I find the mere introduction to a section of the course material as significant or useful but on this occasion the opening paragraphs do just that. They chime with my thinking about Assignment 4 and coincidentally validate the approach I am planning. One sentence in particular strikes a chord: “A place and its people are inextricably linked.” This is exactly the point that I want to explore in the assignment and address the apparent paradox that photographs of people, rather than a physical location, can actually represent the landscape.

Although it does not fit with my current intentions, Dana Lixenberg’s book (2008), referred to in the same paragraph, and on which I have written previously (https://markrobinsonocalandscape.photo.blog/2020/02/19/landscape-as-a-call-to-action-2-dana-lixenberg-the-last-days-of-shishmaref-book/) is one that I have been looking at again and has informed some of my thinking in this regard. The further reference to Jacob Are Sobol’s book is similarly interesting in so far as it deals with similar subject matter. What I find particularly striking about his work though is the way it is much more personal, not least in the sense that he became a protagonist in his own story, an insider’s view. Lixenberg on the other hand, although clearly closely engaged with the community she was documenting, was nevertheless an outsider.

One thing that is particularly important to me, and my ideas about landscape, is that both these bodies of work illustrate that the relationship between people and landscape is two-way. This is particularly evident here in the case of these two groups of Inuit people (although they are thousands of miles apart, and speak different languages, their cultures are quite similar) although I guess the same might also be said of virtually everyone. Their landscapes are influenced and affected by the people themselves: they have built upon and changed the physical landscape in many ways, both in microcosm, in their immediate vicinity, but also in macrocosm in so fas as, even if only in a small way, their use of the trappings of modern life makes some contribution to global warming, which is in turn degrading their environment. But also their way of life and culture, the way they live on, in and on the land and its resources, is affected and shaped by the environment, as it has been for millennia.

Incidentally, the link to Sobol’s work cited in the course material appears no longer to exist and I found samples of his photographs on a newer site, to which there is a link below.

I would dearly love to have a physical copy of his book “Sabine”. It is set in a country that fascinates me, and which I have visited, albeit only briefly. It also has a visual aesthetic that I particularly like (though have so far not tried seriously to emulate) that I am more used to seeing in the work of Japanese photographers (such as, to name a few who appear in my library, the Provoke group, Daido Moriyama, Hajime Kimura, Masahisa Fukase – think Ravens in particular, Yasuhiro Ogawa, and Valentino Barachini – not Japanese I know, Italian, but has spent time and worked in Japan and has applied a similar aesthetic). I am not sure though that I can justify the cost: something in excess of €500!

Lixenberg, D, (2008).  The Last Days of Shishmaref.  Edam/Rotterdam:  Paradox/episode

https://www.jacobauesobol.com