Adam Fuss

Source: http://www.cheimread.com/artists/adam-fuss

"I see the photogram as being much more truthful and more honest because it's just recording light. There is no manipulation of that light, in the way that a lens manipulates light." - Adam Fuss

Adam Fuss was born in 1961 in London but he grew up mainly in Australia. In 1980 Fuss started working as a photographic apprentice at Ogilvy & Mather Agency. He later made a move to New York, this is where he first started to record and document the natural environment around him through photography using a pinhole camera. This later guided Adam to experiment with alternative photographic processes, which later on led to him abandoning using the camera completely. Fuss's photographic works are unique for their contemporary reinterpretation of the earliest techniques of photography, specifically the photograms and camera-less techniques. Fuss believes that to make photographic techniques work, they should be personal and have deeper meanings behind them, which capture processes and that occur in the natural world.

Fuss is most renowned for his ethereal photograms of water. Fuss intentionally distills the main fundamentals of photography with just the simplest exposure of light on a surface, Fuss purposely avoids the sharpness of traditional photography. Fuss's works have a sense of ghostly like appearances of both shadow and light. Fuss and his work were reviewed in The New Yorker: "A restlessly inventive photographer, Fuss has made some of the most exciting, mysterious and provocative images of the past twenty years."

Fuss's work is shown and can be found in numerous American and international collections which include New York; Museum of Modern Art, Metropolitan Museum of Art and Victoria and Albert Museum, London.

Adam Fuss, Blue Snake
1998
Source:http://www.xavierhufkens.com/artists/adam-fuss

Sources: http://www.artnet.com/artists/adam-fuss/
http://www.cheimread.com/artists/adam-fuss

Adam Fuss, (Series) My Ghost
1999
Source: https://www.artsy.net/artist/adam-fuss

 

Adam Fuss, Self Portrait
2015
Source: https://www.artsy.net/artist/adam-fuss

The photograph on the left "Self Portrait" has been arranged and purposely shot in this manner so that the main subject matter is at the centre of the photograph with the focal point being in the top third of the photograph which could mean that Adam used the rule of thirds to make the passage of my eyes, as a viewer of the photograph, focus on multiple areas of the photo such as the subjects upper body in the foreground and then the ripples of the water in the background. The subject of the photograph is a man, presumably, a model laying on water or Adam has asked the model to lay on top of a large glass panel with water beneath the glass which is making the main subject's figure distort with the movement of the water. I think that the main source of lighting is coming from left side of the photograph, making the dark figure stand out in contrast from the lighter areas of the photograph. This lighting is also creating interesting tones of colours specifically within the subject where there are darker tones and lighter tones and also in the background with there being different tones of orange and yellow and slight shadows being cast where the light has shone through the water and is casting some peculiar lines.

This photograph is a Cibachrome photogram where Adam would have had to use a hand color print process. The Photographic papers emulsion contains delicate raw silver metals which means that the image will last for a long time without the print losing any color or quality.

I think that this photograph creates a mellow atmosphere because of the colour scheme showing warm colours such as oranges and yellows and also the photo has a sense of simplicity. To me, this photograph has sentimental value because it reminds me of summer because when I see this photograph it looks like someone I swimming in a pool with the sun beaming down.
  

My responses to Adam Fuss

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