Marcus Bunyan, artist and curator of Art Blart, examines one of his favourite photographs – Alexander Gardner’s photograph of one of the plotters to assassinate Abraham Lincoln, Lewis Paine, who was captured by the camera months before his execution in April 1865 – and asks what makes this a great photograph.
The video is a little underwhelming but it was done for free for the CCP.
It doesn’t show the 12 images that I used to illustrate the talk and you can see me pressing the buttons on the computer to present them. Unfortunately, this ruins the structure of the speech.
However, you can see the photographs that I used by Alexander Gardner below.
Click on the picture to view the video or go to the Vimeo website.
Many thankx to the Director of the CCP, Naomi Cass, for asking me to speak at the event. Other presenters: Serena Bentley, Helen Frajman, Natalie King, Tin & Ed, Tom Mosby and John Warwicker.
Alexander Gardner (American born Scotland, 1821-1882) Lewis Paine
26th April 1865
Albumen silver print from a Collodion glass plate negative
Alexander Gardner (American, 1821-1882) Three photographs of Lewis Paine
26th April, 1865
Albumen silver prints from a Collodion glass plate negative
Alexander Gardner (American born Scotland, 1821-1882) Lewis Paine (detail)
26th April 1865
Albumen silver print from a Collodion glass plate negative
Alexander Gardner (American born Scotland, 1821-1882) Lewis Paine (detail)
26th April 1865
Albumen silver print from a Collodion glass plate negative
Alexander Gardner (American born Scotland, 1821-1882) Lewis Paine (detail)
26th April 1865
Albumen silver print from a Collodion glass plate negative
Noel Cordle Hot Dead Guys: Lewis Powell
Posted on September 5th, 2010 Mere Musings blog [Online] Cited 01/12/2012. No longer available online
Descriptions of Lewis from “The Life, Crime and Capture”
Alexander Gardner (American born Scotland, 1821-1882) Lewis Paine (detail)
26th April 1865
Albumen silver print from a Collodion glass plate negative
Roland Barthes (French, 1915-1980) Camera Lucida (La Chambre claire)
1980
Alexander Gardner (American born Scotland, 1821-1882) Lewis Paine (detail)
26th April 1865
Albumen silver print from a Collodion glass plate negative
Alexander Gardner (American born Scotland, 1821-1882) Lewis Paine (detail)
26th April 1865
Albumen silver print from a Collodion glass plate negative
When the wall text introduction to an exhibition boldly states in the very first sentence, “Juergen Teller is one of the most important photographers of our time,” you know you’re in trouble. I think the word that springs to mind when I look at these photographs is vapid.
Blanched, empty photographs that have an inane void at their centre. I really don’t want to look at them any longer.
Dr Marcus Bunyan
Many thankx to the ICA for allowing me to publish the photographs in the posting. Please click on the photographs for a larger version of the image.
Installation photograph of the exhibition Juergen Teller: Woo! at the Institute of Contemporary Arts, London
Installation photograph of the exhibition Juergen Teller: Woo! at the Institute of Contemporary Arts, London showing at left, Teller’s Kate Moss, No.12, Gloucestershire, 2010 (2010, below); and at centre rear, Lars Eidinger, Berlin 2010 (2010, below)
The ICA is delighted to present a major solo exhibition of photography by Juergen Teller from 23 January to 17 March 2013. The exhibition marks the first survey presentation of Teller’s work in the UK in a decade and will include new and recent work.
Considered one of the most important photographers of his generation, Teller is one of a few artists who has been able to operate successfully both in the art world and at the centre of the commercial sphere. This exhibition will provide a seamless journey through his landmark fashion and commercial photography from the 90s, presenting classic images of celebrities such as Lily Cole, Kate Moss and Vivienne Westwood, as well as more recent landscapes and family portraits.
Teller entered the London photography scene through the music industry taking photographs for record covers. Photographing amongst others Björk, Cocteau Twins, PJ Harvey and Courtney Love, it was Teller’s photograph of Sinéaad O’Connor for her single Nothing Compares 2 You that marked an important moment in his career. In 1991 he photographed Nirvana back stage when they toured Germany. Teller’s photographs first appeared in fashion magazines in the late 80s, and included portraits of Kate Moss when she was just fifteen years old. It was also in the early 1990s that Teller shot behind the scenes at Helmut Lang’s fashion shows capturing the models, clothes and atmosphere with a deceptively casual aesthetic. Teller’s images could be described as the antithesis of conventional fashion photography seen perhaps most markedly in his campaigns for Marc Jacobs.
Picture and Words introduces a series from a weekly column in the magazine of Die Zeit. For over a year the photographer presented a new image each week with an accompanying text. Like his images the texts are often controversial and provoked outcry amongst readers. The exhibition will feature many of the letters that the magazine received and some of which Teller included in his book. Irene im Wald and Keys to the House are Teller’s most recent bodies of work. These series reveal the photographer’s more personal world in his hometown in Germany and family home in Suffolk.
Teller’s provocative interventions in conventional celebrity portraiture are apparent in works such as a photograph of Victoria Beckham for a Marc Jacobs ad in which we only see her bare, high-heeled legs flopping over the side of a shopping bag. Vivienne Westwood reclines nude on a floral settee in a startling triptych whilst Björk and her son swim in the Blue Lagoon in an intimate portrait. Subverting the conventional relationship of the artist and model, Teller himself often figures as the naked muse in his photographs, seen for example in the Louis XV series with Charlotte Rampling. Whatever the setting, all his subjects collaborate in a way that allows for the most surprising poses and emotional intensity. Driven by a desire to tell a story in every picture he takes, Teller has shaped his own distinct and instantly recognisable style which combines humour, self-mockery and an emotional honesty.
“Whether Juergen Teller’s photography is art, or whether he is an artist or photographer, or both, or none of the above, or anything cconected with such thoughts, can only lead us astray. Teller’s work is about great images.” Gregor Muir, Executive Director ICA.
Press release from the ICA
Installation photograph of the exhibition Juergen Teller: Woo! at the Institute of Contemporary Arts, London
Installation photograph of the exhibition Juergen Teller: Woo! at the Institute of Contemporary Arts, London showing at top right, Teller’s No.12 of the series ‘Irene im Wald’, 2012 (2012, below)
Art Blart _ art and cultural memory archive 
You must be logged in to post a comment.