Apparitions: A Meditation on the Portrait in Photography
by James McArdle
We do not exist in isolation, yet so many photographs, supposed to be portraits, show us alone. We flow through time and are not frozen as a photograph is frozen. An archetypal analogy for life is the river. If Narcissus were to look at his image in a photograph instead of in a river he would not find a true representation of this process of dynamic change that is himself. The mirrored image changes with us, the photograph does not. We inhabit a space, our place, not the flat two-dimensional surface we see on photographs. Our identity arises from a sense of self and other, of place and placement. To reveal in my photographs that the people in them live in relationships with others and in the world is an ambition that is nevertheless difficult to achieve because of the limitations of my medium. The effort necessitates invention and I am not really concerned about whether such invention constitutes a form of Art. It is photography. The research necessary has occupied my current activity but of course relies on discoveries made in previous years of practise and in the work of others that inspires me. This writing has included some of these, but is not complete without my outlining my own discoveries and innovations, though my photographs should do this best on their own.
It
has
been
said
that
it
is
the
task
of
the
portraitist
to
represent
a
whole
life-story
at
one
moment
of
that
life
by
means
of
condensation.
Edgar
Degas
"The
Bellelli
Family"
(1858-67.
Oil
on
canvas,
200
x
250
cm.
Paris:
Musee
d'Orsay)
Degas'
painting
of
the
Bellelli
Family
intrigues
me
in
this
way
because
it
reveals
a
terrible
truth
about
the
family,
learned
by
Degas
through
his
great
fondness
for
his
aunt
Laura.
No
doubt,
each
member
of
the
unhappy
family
was
posed
separately
to
complete
a
scene
imagined
or
remembered.
Though
it
looks
real,
with
its
attention
to
the
incidentals
of
a
family
in
a
domestic
interior,
it
is
a
fabrication.
A
'straight'
photographer
like
myself
(and
I
am
a
essentially
a
'purist')
could
create
such
an
image
only
by
posing
them
in
this
way
together.
Would
they
pose
their
vulnerabilities
for
such
a
photographer?
Could
the
photograph
look
the
same
and
portray
as
much?
James
Agee's
Now
Let
Us
Praise
Famous
Men
contains
similar
human
drama,
but
do
Walker
Evans'
photographs
of
the
protagonists?
Walker
Evans,
Bud
Fields
and
his
Family,
Hale
County,
Alabama,
1936
I am not proposing that group portraits are superior to solitary faces, but that there is a relationship established in certain images between persons and between persons and places that conveys spiritual/emotional/psychological qualities just as colour expresses itself better in relation to other colours than in isolation.
A photographer's subjects might also not know how they are being portrayed, unless the image is made in a ritualistic way, as snapshots are, where the result is predictable, pre-ordained by established concepts of the family and its roles and the well established conventions of family snaps. But they always show more and when we look at them from the future we can see they are prophecies.
What you might see about to happen in my photographs too, has happened. They often look like family photographs. Marriages have failed, children been born. I can know this because I know the people. But the photograph comes before, it is 'Before' and because the subjects are anonymous the viewer cannot know what comes after any more than I can tell you what they will do tomorrow. In this way, what starts as a document ends looking as much a like fiction as a predictive biography might, if there is such a thing.
The
people
in
front
of
the
camera
and
those
inside
the
camera
are
not
replicas
of
each
other.
Those
outside
are
people,
those
inside
are
ghosts.
Obvious,
but
so
often
confused.
To
make
images
that
are
as
telling
as
portraits
are
supposed
to
be,
is
only
possible
if
the
photographer
is
aware
of
this
distinction
and
aware
that
the
ghost
in
the
camera
poses
as
the
person.
This
becomes
obvious
when
you
look
at
the
ground
glass
at
an
image
inverted
and
reversed.
I
am
using
a
large
format
camera,
a
Sinar,
that
is
actually
intended
for
studio
work.
Instead
of
the
traditional
dark
cloth
I
strap
onto
my
head
a
close-fitting
mask
attached
to
the
groundglass
screen
via
bellows.
Physically
I
am
in
the
camera.
One
looks
at
the
subject
as
an
image,
not
framing
it
as
through
a
viewfinder.
After
some
moments
of
concentration
the
inverted
image
seems
to
right
itself
but
it
is
always
laterally
reversed,
as
in
a
mirror.
These
physical
differences
between
inside
the
camera
and
outside,
along
with
the
slowness
of
the
process,
means
that
the
people
I
photograph
are
with
each
other,
not
with
me.
The
subject
who
is
supposed
to
be
in
an
inferior,
less
powerful,
position
in
front
of
the
photographer
and
those
who
will
see
them
in
the
photograph
is
in
fact
not
in
this
situa
tion.
I
get
out
of
my
camera
and
stand
beside
it
to
expose
the
film
-
you
cannot
view
the
ground
glass
at
this
point
because
the
film
is
put
in
its
place
-
and
I
try
to
see
as
the
camera
sees.
Waiting
tensely,
I
am
embarrassed,
nervous
and
trying
to
vanish
so
as
not
to
affect
what
goes
on
between
my
'sitters'.
Its
the
almost
unbearable
tension
one
feels
watching
a
good
mystery
film.
What
is
going
to
happen,
can
I
predict,
am
I
wrong,
have
I
seen
the
clues?
The
only
way
to
cut
the
tension
is
to
leave
the
cinema
or
endure
till
the
end.
I am moved to make portraits of the people I know. I cannot make these people up - they must exist in order to for me to photograph them. Nor can I really control them them in front of the camera - I have enough to do dealing with their image. The faces they present to me, to others, to the camera, conceal and reveal themselves, their selves. In order to portray them I must know them, otherwise all I can show you is a 'likeness' which may conceal them or reveal them. There is something in here, in between the known face and what it reveals, and it reveals so much to those that know it, and the possibility of knowing someone only from their face in a photograph. It makes me distrust faces, and photographs that contain only faces.
A life story is a like a mystery film, portrayal a form of detection. Photography has been linked often to death, which means the portrait photograph is like a corpse. How can this be when it is so easy to believe in the life in the photo? But the act of portrayal through photography is close to death in that it is like a eulogy that is at the same time a conversation. People in portraits are speaking to us, but at the same time they are being represented. The representation can be honest or dishonest, portrayal or betrayal - in portraiture there is a definite moral dimension - it is an exchange or a promise or a contract. In a photograph the 'moral dimension' becomes a visual exchange using as currency all the metaphor that can be assembled in the image.
Metaphor in photography is a process of using the descriptive nature of the medium to find appearances that name the subject. In photography the image can contain a great deal more than just the face - the 'likeness' - there is an embarrassing wealth of space in a photograph with which to do this and the medium will almost automatically create a likeness of everything in that space. A solution is to cover that 'everything' with background paper as in Richard Avedon's fashion shots and portraits, or hide it in darkness, leaving only the 'subject', as in so many of Julia Margaret Cameron's photographs, or move in so close that the 'everything' is cropped away. Another, contemporary, solution is to import metaphors (objects, costumes, colours, historical or political references etc.) into the orbit of the photograph as Clegg and Gutmann or Cindy Sherman do.
I
photograph
in
an
environment
full
of
accidental
topographical
detail.
In
planning
and
arranging
one
of
these
photographs,
my
main
concern
is
searching
out
the
right
place,
of
visualising
the
couples
or
friends
or
families
together
there.
Views
from
different
positions
from
within
the
place,
as
from
among
the
human
relationships
to
be
portrayed,
are
unique
sights.
Through
their
relationships
the
people
will
focus
each
other
and
the
place.
Just
as
the
couple,
about
to
separate,
and
their
son
do
in
'Arrangement'
.
The
camera
is
placed
in
relation
to
the
focal
point
they
create.
Clues,
names
for
emotions,
interactions,
rapports,
intimacies,
histories,
alliances
or
betrayals
are
somewhere
in
this
space.
They
may
take
the
form
of
a
balancing
rock,
a
dead
dog,
the
open
roof
of
the
walled
quarry,
the
webbed
reflection
of
branches,
a
kind
of
light,
a
shadow
that
looks
like
a
wing.
Their
discovery
is
an
intuitive
one
for
myself
in
producing
the
image,
and
an
enigmatic
process
for
the
viewer.
In
this
way,
in
a
still
photograph
which
in
itself
has
no
beginning
or
end,
mystery
and
discovery
co-exist
,
overlap
and
fold
out.
Focus is a visual meta-language, a voice-over, an image of and about the image, to indicate the signs of detection. The view camera is capable of rendering things more sharply than my myopic eyes can see them. I choose what is sharp to indicate where I am looking, what was seen. In the groundglass, with the aperture wide open, focus seems to be a tangible substance that can be physically moulded by movements of the camera. A plane of focus is a fourth dimension, an overlay that makes space tangible or creates voids, that concentrates meaning out of the chaos of time and space - the environment - coalescing in detail and forming interconnections.
What is known and what is unknown are here together.
You see these apparitions before you. These are relationships that I know, that I love and try to comprehend. Here in these photographs they are anonymous but not without naming. If they are not themselves, then who else are they?
James McArdle