Photography itself is the focal point in this new chapter of the project. Digital technologies developed in recent years have transformed the art form. But they have also changed the ways we understand it. Today more than ever, photography is free from the clichés of formality and our reliance on the medium. Here, we are not analyzing the different ways we can photograph one subject or another. Instead, the idea is to capture the nature of the medium and to understand the technological and cultural changes that are happening within it.
Their will to go beyond photography was clear. Some did so by answering a technological call. They made use of the optic components employed in digital cameras and then reimagined the images on different platforms. Others used traditional devices as they interpreted the changes in photography as something more subtle. For them, it became an environment in which they could reverse the attitudes we have all acquired by using our smartphones and other software — even when those technologies are not being employed in the way they were intended.
The colors of the photographs are frequently altered with respect to reality. They are often extremely saturated and they don’t attempt to depict the truth. Instead, they knowingly distance themselves from reality as they attempt to mimic the colors that we have become accustomed to seeing on the back-lit screens of our devices.
The same could be said of the objects that were photographed. The artists show them to us in images where their look and usage have been transformed. It is as if they have changed their function. In some ways, they appear like a designer’s draft of a work in progress.
The works produced by the students from SVA show this change through the different media on which the images have been printed. This is especially true when it comes to the way they were mounted for the show. Some of the images are framed and hard mounted to the walls. Others are printed on light fabric that moves as the viewer walks by. Others yet are printed on flooring, on paper of different weight and texture, transparent sheets, or textiles.
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