Can the modern city be photographed in B&W?

When asked during a presentation why he didnt shoot color, Lee Freidlander answered that (I can't quote his exact words) that he had nothing against color, but black and white was his medium.

This is a very interesting post, and I have noticed that people

have turned this into a "black and white" vs "color" arguement.

 

I feel that this is not what Tim intended, and nor did his question

even reflect that.

 

I have been shooting NYC for a few years now, in both color and

black and white and they both have their own respective

problems.

 

I have noticed that sometimes the b&w shots do look "nostalgic"

(not always to me, but to the viewer) but also the color shots

sometimes tend to look to much like Conde Nast Traveler.

 

I feel the "modern" city/suburb can be photographed in black and

white as well as color. It really does come down to your feeling

on the subject. The "nostalgia" arguement makes sense

sometimes, but not always- looking at work by Eugene Richards,

Ken Light, Selgado and other Documentary photographers

shows that.

 

I think it also depends on the phtographer- look at AA's color

work and it (pardon my expression) blows. Just like I would hate

to see b&w work by Steve McCurry- color is his thing.

 

After hearing Tim talking alot about Eggelston, I checked out a lot

of his work, and his B&W work can't hold a candle to his color

work. This may be due to the fact that it was "early" (just as the

Struth observations) but maybe its not.

 

I cannot say much about your feeling (tim) on photographing the

modern city in black and white. I have not seen any of your work,

so one cannot judge for your particular project. But in general

terms- I feel yes it can be.

Much also depends on the subject. Since you raise the issue of suburban landscapes, here's one, not North American, and not the greatest photograph in the world, that I took in B&W, that I don't think I could have done in color, and that I don't think is nostalgic:<p>

 

<a href="http://www.echonyc.com/~goldfarb/photo/kahala.jpg">http://www.echonyc.com/~goldfarb/photo/kahala.jpg</a><p>

 

In B&W it's about a suburban development on a slope outside Honolulu, where social status is conferred by altitude, and building has proceded steadily upward over the past 20 years, now having reached the edge of a nature preserve. I may play with the tonality a bit more on this, but it's intentionally kind of flat. In color, and maybe on a sunnier part of the day, it would become a kind of real estate ad--"Move to our lovely gated community in sunny Hawai'i!"<p>

 

In the modern city, can one photograph a contemporary building in a nostagic way? Could one feel nostagic about an image of the new Westin Hotel in Times Square, whether in color or B&W?<p>

Tim,

 

Good question, and I have no straightforward, uncomplicated response. Previous posters mention NYC, but the cities I lived in until coming to Pittsburgh, namely Los Angeles, near San Francisco, and Athens (plus a summer in NYC itself), present not only a less upright but more sun-drenched, shining, even glaring face to which b&w is entirely appropriate.

 

I shoot only b&w in LF, and one of my self-imposed rules is never to shoot a subject that the average viewer of 2003 would expect to be in color. So, what was acceptable b&w subject-matter ca. 1900 (e.g time of Stieglitz or Strand) is for me no longer necessarily acceptable.

 

We're talking about photography here, but I personally do not separate photography from painting---together they present a seamless continuum. With your question in mind, I looked over some urban subects by O'Keefe and Hopper, and I find that they both added entirely too much color, if credibility is what we're looking for (and it may well be that it isn't). Maybe Georgia especially was already hankering to get out to the New Mexico desert. My personal recollections of LA concrete and asphalt translate so naturally into b&w. As for suburbia, two of my very best pictures are of residential plans, one taken from the street, the other from a balcony. Color would have worked too, but monochrome fits the modernist lines of these stucco units despite the inadequate rendering of mission tile roofs and manicured landscaping.

 

Mood is what it comes down to me for me. Walker Evans I think was cultivating the quaint, which I would avoid like the plague as well as anything that looks like it was shot in b&w (as I said) simply because color was not in use or not available. But it can be done. The collection Photography in California 1945-1980 by Louise Katzman (SF MoMA 1984) has IMO some successful b&w examples alongside the many in color, esp. those of Roger Minick, "Flying Wing Station" (1975), "Mother and Daughter at K-Mart" (1977), for example (pp. 130-131). OTOH, I'm undecided about the craftsman cottage in Arthur Ollman's untitled color study of 1980 (p. 128); I grew up in a house just like it in LA, and I can't decide whether to go with his lurid palatte or stick with the b&w's of my own family album ca. 1950. Luridness would certainly be at home in So. Calif. , but somehow the colors keep taking me back to O'Keefe and Hopper ... a kind of overcompensating antidote to counter the drabness of urban/suburban life.

Nicholas - interesting image. But I look at it and I'm trying to figure out how to do it in colour and NOT let it look like a realtors brocure... so maybe that's my answer :-)

 

BTW have you seen the section of work on Hawaii in Laura McPhee and Virginia Beahan's No Ordinary Land (I love the idea of two people working together under the same darkcloth - ans I think their colour work overall is very interesting)

I think that's directed to me, not Nicholas. Yes, I've glanced at that book in a friend's collection, but not recently, and not since photographing in Hawai'i. Thanks for mentioning it, because I've been meaning to get a copy for myself at some point, and I've let it slip.

sorry David, scrolling down too fast...

Charles Sheeler might be relevant here, since he treated some of the same subjects, including cityscapes and factories, in both b&w photographs and color paintings. I don't know enough about Sheeler to suggest a relationship between the two in these cases, esp. whether the photographs were ever merely preliminary studies for paintings, but many of his b&w's obviously were meant to be free-standing works of art.

This thread took a bit of a wrong term. I've deleted some responses.

 

Let's continue the thread, remembering that this forum is a dialogue where each of us can learn from others. That can occur only if we treat each other in a respectful and considerate way.

Where to place desaturated or muted colour? This is a favourite

of documentary art photographers, and for me at least induces

the same contemplative mood as good black and white. The

Becher school is most famous, but there are numerous good

Nordic photographers who use the technique. One of my

favourites is here:

 

www.simonladefoged.com

 

I don't find black and white necessarily nostalgic. If anything,

hyper Velvia tones are what most get my goat - they make

everything pretty, empty and easily liked.

 

Perhaps the real difference is between contrast and lack of it, not

colour and monochrome. For me, high contrast and dramatic

lighting says old, flat rendition and a concern with the intrinsic

shapes of things says new.

 

Of course, there are exceptions.

Interesting point Struan - I've only seen it on the website but I find the work of simon ladefoged quite enthraling.

 

"If anything,

hyper Velvia tones are what most

get my goat - they make

everything pretty, empty and easily liked."

 

It's probably heresy, but personally I wouldn't be overly upset if Fuji dropped Velvia...

 

One thing I've found with my own work is that you can pretty much shoot B&W at an time of day. Harsh overhead midday sun has it's own look that can be used, and a slightly dull overcast day can often be perfect, with many variations in between. Shooting in colour there can be a bit of a mental block to wait until the light is "nice". The average slightly sunny day, say between 10am and 4pm isn't necessarily the time of day you would chose to go and photograph landscapes. Traditionally you would get up early for the "magic hour" or wait for that evening glow, or the the strong light after a rainstorm etc. (a bit of an Outdoor Photogrpaher charicature, but I think you get what I mean). Yet the world we inhabit is more often than not struck by very ordinary light - the 9-5 world. Which is why IO find Struth's low key landscapes and gardens so rewarding. It is photogrpahing in this way which I find much more challenging, and ultimatley rewarding.

 

As someone elses said " Most people (both photographers and viewers), IMO, are clueless about color. One sees it often used incidentally, as if it were a casual byproduct of film & scene. Most well-known color photographers rarely go beyond the pleasant/decorative/pretty, and only a handful have an understanding of its symbolic value." For me, this is part of the challenge.

I had the joy on saturday of viewing Tim's work, and for those of

you who think he is a pain in the a$$ (sorry tim!!!) he has the

talent to back up his posts.

 

for his particular project and vision, IMHO color is the only way to

go. I feel that if he approched them the same way with B&W they

would end up looking like the boring FSA photos that we rarely

see.

 

As I have quite a few photos that I have taken, that fall into the

aformentioned catagory.

 

Tim, actually has such a subtle way with color, that it is quite

powerful and his subject matter is as far away from "view

camera magazine" as joel peter witkin is from anne geddes

(with the possible exception of the pregnant photos!!!).

 

Tim's work, has a much better feel (to me) than those two

german photographers everyone talks about all the time. There

is a very subtle presence that pulls you in, and even though his

influences are hinted at in the photos-his own quality is what

grabs you.

 

plus its refreshing to see something other than canyons with

black skies and velvia landscapes that look like the forbidden

planet.

I'm not anti-Velvia per se, it's just that there are not too many

people doing anything particularly interesting with it - unlike, say,

those using the equally vivid Agfa negative film(s) for social and

documentary photography. Like singers with permanent vibrato,

what was exciting when used sparingly becomes the affected,

unthinking norm.

 

Hiroshi Sugimoto is a canonical big name who has done

interesting pictures of architecture in B+W, but with a new twist. I

don't suppose anyone would mistake his work for anything from

the archives, at least, not if met with the imprimeur of a gallery or

museum hanging.

 

I personally tend to 'see' in colour, but also try hard to

concentrate on shape, texture and formal geometry. A lot of

photographer friends tell me my pictures would be better in black

and white, but for now I am trying to re-educate them to look

again. Part of me feels that if another photographer sees a

potentially good B+W image in my photo, then I have in a sense

already taken it. The colour is there for those whose visual

memory is less boxed in.

tim, interesting topic! Is B+W "quaint?"---could be, but is gritty 35mm photo-journalistic B+W "quaint?" I think alot depends on how its printed and toned, a B+W can be anything from quaint(warm tone) to raw(grainy) to brooding(cold tone)and everything in between. And the "modern city"---how modern? What is the architecture? Is it Flash Gordon ultra clean modern or is it a poster city for bad urban planning? Or somewhere in between? Clean or dirty? Northern or Southern? Coastal or plains? Sterile or fertile? All have various kinds of light that make a difference, I think, in selecting between color and B+W. Do you see a City as a physical plant or do you see it as the sum of it's people? What are you comfortable with? Do you find that you communicate better in color? Or B+W? I know these aren't modern american cities, but they stand out in my mind as examples: Old Jerusalem is vibrant with color reflected off the native stone from the judean hills. The whole place changes from gold to orange to brilliant white to purple with the time of day. The old ortho photographs of history don't, IMHO, do it justice--but the ortho(or panchro, for that matter) does give it a quaint feeling when toned. Zurich is(my opinion only!) from what I've seen a very drab city suited to B+W, but also a very saturated color film would make the rare geranium in the window box "pop" Hong Kong, when I was there 20 years ago was similar in drabness. In this case color would have my vote for providing the "quaint" element. Sorry, no answers, just thoughts---Good Luck!

John, funny you should say Hong Kong. One of the

photographers I was thinking of when I mentioned low-key flatly

lit work was Vegar Moen, who has made some interesting

photographs in China, first in Shenzhen and more recently at the

site for the Three Gorges Dam. From the prints I've seen I would

guess he has to use on-topic LF. Sadly, he has nothing online

that I could turn up, but if you are ever in Oslo the Museum of

Contemporary Art has some of his prints on display.

Hey Tim, if James saw your work on Saturday, does that mean it's hanging somewhere in New York waiting to be seen? Inquiring minds want to know.