Redefining Photography: The Art of the Photogram
British photographer Adam Fuss’ works are not conventional photographs, yet they are photographic. Using the earliest camera-less techniques such as photograms in which objects are placed directly on light sensitive material then exposed to light, Fuss encourages the viewer to think more broadly about the medium and its possibilities. Photograms, invented by William Henry Fox Talbot in the 1830s and later popularized by artists such as Man Ray and Moholy-Nagy, have significant historical precedents, but Fuss’ unusual subject matter imbues his contemporary renditions with a deep psychological intensity. Some of his most well-known body of work includes images of christening gowns, rabbits, snakes and babies. His contemporary, evocative and ethereal interpretations of the technique explore the complexity, mystery and transience of life.
Rooted in Nature, Drawn to Process
Adam Fuss was born in 1961 in England and mostly grew up between England and Australia, often spending time alone and outdoors. Nature was where he found solace and it provided him with what he describes as a ‘world of revelation’. Unbeknownst to him at the time, Fuss’ fascination with nature would later become one of his greatest influences and the touchstone to his practice. In 1980, he began working as a photographic apprentice at the Ogilvy & Mather Agency. Two years later, he moved to New York and began experimenting with a pinhole camera, which later led to its abandonment altogether.
Originally trained as a commercial photographer, Fuss’ decision turn away from modern technology and photographic processes was a reaction to the banality of mass produced generic images;
“I was consciously trying to make photographs I hadn’t seen before. I’d probably seen billions of photographs and they were all produced by the same mechanism.”
It was when he began experimenting with the photogram technique that Fuss came to the realization that he did not want to take, but rather make images; ‘Photograms let you see what has never been in a camera.’, he says, ‘Life itself is the image.’
A Familiar Subject, Reimagined
Flowers have been one of the many subjects Adam Fuss has favorited throughout his career. Alluding to the early photograms of Talbot, which served to record the fleeting, Fuss’s contemporary study of this familiar subject presents a deepening internalization of photography. He says,
“The goal is to create something that is unfamiliar, through a photographic language that is unfamiliar—to create something that has qualities to draw you in. It may be a play of light, an idea of beauty, an incredible subtlety of tonality.”
In his quest for the essence of things and conscious effort to search for the essence of photography, Fuss’ presentation of flowers emphasize their overwhelming fragility. Although the subject is familiar, its associations to the metaphysical, the spiritual, and even the emotional are heightened through the camera-less technique. And through this process of simplification and distillation, the object becomes a greater metaphor, a symbol.
Light as Memory, Image as Presence
As the flash of light leaves a direct imprint on the paper, the pressed and dried flowers are immortalized within the image, enacting the romantic myth of the beauty of death, functioning as memento mori. There is nothing intervening between the image and the object; we see whatever the photogram presents us about the color of the petal or the shape of the stem. Thus, the photogram becomes a visual echo of the real object. Fuss’ preference to print the works on gesso coated aluminum also brings out the painterly elements of the image. The coating gives a luminous quality to the pictures and elevate the brilliance of their colors. The crushed petals, for example, seemingly gain volume and depth within the frame. Fuss says that he would,
“much rather have people look at (his) photographs as if they were paintings. Because when we look at paintings we look only at the image; we experience it.”
The artist presents his beautifully haunting flowers within the photographic image, as if to preserve them beyond death, while encouraging the viewer to reflect upon the ephemeral state of something that once was but no longer is.
A Lasting Legacy in Contemporary Photography
Throughout his career, Adam Fuss has gained critical acclaim for his unconventional approach to the photographic medium. By focusing on the most essential elements of photography, he has not only refined but has breathed new life into the medium’s earliest practices. In 2000, Fuss was awarded the 16th Annual Award for Art from the International Center of Photography. His work is included in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Whitney Museum of American Art, and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, among many others, and has been exhibited in major international museums such as the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the FotoMuseum in Winterthur, and the National Gallery of Victoria in Melbourne. The work of Adam Fuss He resides and works in New York, NY.
