Week 2 Week

Week 1

9/1 INTRODUCTION, DISCUSSION OF PROJ 1, STAGED REALITY

Lecture

Introduction, Syllabus, How the class will work. Attendance and grading. Textbook. Readings, writing, why we do both. How crit works.

The nature of photography. The formal elements that photography uses to make meaning. Using photography to investigate ideas (our own, others')

Genre and its ability to frame discussion (Hank Willis Thomas Basket Ball and Chain, 2003) How we have defined photography. How we define photography now.

Lab

Lightning assignment: White Lies: Get your brain moving. Take one photo that tells a lie and one photo that tells the truth. Make an 11x17 b/w laser print. Bring them to class next week.

Homework

• Start shooting Project #1, Staged Reality/Narrative
• Read Cotton, The Photograph as Contemporary Art, Chapters 1 and 2.
• Write a reading response to Charlotte Cotton (Reading Assignment 1)
• Bring in your truth and lie

Week 2

9/8 STAGED REALITY

Lecture

Discussion of Cotton, Chapter 1 and 2

Narrative: conveying the story within the frame

Ideas of scale and scrutiny; handscrolls, In-depth discussion of jeff wall

Multiple instances in the frame - Nate Smythe, Jason Salavon, Ben Guest,

Sideline: Barbara Probst, multiple viewpoints within a body of work that are not a single frame. Idea of Performance for the camera, difference between self-directed and photographer-directed. Lars Tunbjork, Matthew Monteith Discussion of how all photography is somewhat constructed. The Cinematic: Gregory Crewdson, PL di Corcia, Carrie Mae Weems Constructing History History painting, Artemisia Gentileschi, Paul Shambroom, Yinka Shonibare Diary of a Victorian Dandy

Kelli Connell

Lab

Critique Truth and Lie

Homework

• Finish Project #1. 1-2 pages write-up about it.
• Read Chapter 3 in Cotton (this will help with the work but you don't have to write a response)

Week 3

9/15 CRIT PROJECT 1 (STAGED REALITY), DISCUSS PROJ 2, INTIMATE LIFE

Lecture

Introduction to Intimate Life Project #2. Discussion of emotion and color/lighting.

Nan Goldin, Pierre Bonnard, Edouard Vuillard, Jen Davis, Jessica Todd Harper, Elinor Carucci, Tara Wray, Richard Billingham, Kenneth Josephson (Matthew), Tracey Moffatt (scarred for life), Gene Meatyard (Lucybelle Crater), Tina Barney

Role of text, Role of viewer context. Too Black for BET (http://www.jaysonmusson.com/TooBlack.html)

Positioning of viewer inside/outside of the moment of intimacy, the role of the physical space in generating or breaking those bounds. Carrie Mae Weems? Zoe Strauss, Sophia Wallace (Truer), Catherine Opie

Lab

Critique Project 1

Homework

• Start Project #2, Intimate Life
• Cotton, The Photograph as Contemporary Art, Chapter 5
• Reading Response for Chapter 5 (Reading Assignment 2)

No Class 9/22 - School Closed

Week 4

9/29

Lecture

The progression of the vernacular image and aesthetic into the fine art arena.

Latoya Ruby Frazier

Implications of 'authenticity' or 'honesty,' idea of humility and why it is considered positive. Approachability of the medium as an inherent characteristic, also as a constructed pose. Role of the curator as creator, problems with that. Idea of 'voice.' Idea of the mundate as subject matter, banality as a pose which actually elevates the maker of the image (it is not that which I see, but how I see it which is important. You fail to see them, therefore I am awesomer than you.)

Larry Sultan, Sally Mann, Mitch Epstein, Ben Cowan, Sally Mann, The Art of the American Snapshot. Bill Wood's Business. Sadie Barnette, http://www.sadiebarnette.com/

Lab

Finish Critique of Project 1

Homework

• Finish Project #2, 1-2 page write up on what you did.

Week 5

10/6 CRIT PROJ 2 (INTIMATE LIFE), DISCUSS PROJ 3, SOMETHING FROM NOTHING

Lecture

Discussion of chapter four reading and other reading.

Introduction to Project 3, Something from Nothing/Creative intervention

Negative space, tension, the relationship between two things creates a third thing.

Discussion of the sculptural intervention in Photography. Importance of point of view, constructions for the camera. Photographs as objects, studios or galleries as objects, the photograph comes off the wall. Acknowledging the fictional nature of the boundaries between the gallery, studio, and the outside world.

Laura Letinsky, Wolfgang Tillmans, Peter Fraser, Anthoney Hernandez, Delaney Allen, Ben Cowan, Horatio Baltz

Lab

Critique Project 2

Homework

• Start Project #3, Something from Nothing
• Cotton, The Photograph as Contemporary Art, Chapter 4
• Reading Response Chapter 4 (Reading Assignment 3)

Week 6

10/13 SOMETHING FROM NOTHING

Lecture

Making and subverting the viewer's assumptions about what they are seeing, monocular vs binocular vision. Being inside and outside an artwork, installation (even when only 2D - Wolfgang Tillmans)

Cultural reference and its difficulty; issues of shared assumptions between audience and photographer: The problem of a visual language in conceptual art.

Performance and its relationship to making photographs.

Why we fear the gimmick (does it matter, is the joke funny the second time), clever versus wise versus true.

Documentation versus the end in and of itself. The influence and interrelation of photo and sculpture. Walker Evans masks, Fischli and Weiss (Lauf der Dinge), OK Go

John Pfahl, William Lamson, George Rousse, John Divola (As far as I could get, Artificial Nature, Vandalism)

Adam Ekberg's disco balls and Heinecken Bottles (And possibly an appearance by the man himself)

Alejandra Laviada

Lab

Finish Critique of Project 2

Homework

• Finish Project 3, Something from Nothing, writeup on Project 3.

Week 7

10/20 CRIT PROJ 3 (SOMETHING FROM NOTHING), DISCUSS PROJ 4, DEADPAN

Lecture

Formal elements of portraiture, traditional relationship between portrayed/artist/viewer. Dutch portraiture and classical paintings (the Arnolfini Portrait)

Funny: Nina Katchadourian and the Flemish airplane pictures (Seat Assignment) Political/Identity: Layla Essaydi, Lorna Simpson

Zanele Muholi, Catherine Opie again, Avedon. August Sander, Cezanne, Meatyard, Thomas Ruff, Diane Arbus, Rineke Dijkstra, Cara Phillips, Frederick Sommer, Harry Callahan

Modern composition in the portrait in painting and photography

Alice Neal, Alex Katz, Francis Bacon, Chuck Close.

The implications of deadpan. What we are asking our audience to do. What we are asking photography to convey. The weight of symbolic expression and the assumptions about shared cultural knowledge again. Subverting that or emphasizing that.

Size and its relationship to meaning. Scrutiny, the stare, the implication of seeing=knowing Kehinde Wiley, discussion of image and surface.

Laura Pannack Chris Killip

Lab

Critique Project 3, Discussion of show prints

Homework

• Shooting Project 4, Deadpan.
• Bring in any progress prints from assignment 4 for possible inclusion in show.
• Bring in sample prints for all your shots so far, small images that you've put on a table and moved around.
• Cotton, The Photograph as Contemporary Art, Chapter 3
• Reading Response Chapter 3 (Reading Assignment 4)

Week 8

10/27 EDITING AND MEETING ON YOUR PRINTS

Lab

Individual meetings to figure out your show prints and what you're going to put in there.

Homework

• Final Files Ready For the Show
• Project Four, writeup about project 4

Week 9

11/3 DEADPAN CRITIQUE

Lab

Critique Project 4

Homework

Week 10

11/10

Lecture

Critique Project 4

Introduction of Final Project, Field Trip

Homework

Note: You'll need be installing in class next week

Week 11

11/17

Lecture

Any Install that needs to be finished

Homework

Look Cute for your opening

BREAK

11/24 No Class Thanksgiving

Week 12

12/1

Lecture

Final Critique

Lab

Final Critique

Week 13

12/8 NO CLASS SEAN IN MIAMI

Week 14

12/15 FINAL

Lecture

Final Critique

Lab

Final Critique

Week 15

NO CLASS