The Un-manipulated
Image
For the most part, photographers
have applied their craft to the imitation of the real
world. The camera has been used to capture a frozen slice
of time, arresting a single instant from its place along
the flow of the time line.
Rather than suspending a single moment, my photography
examines the passage of time. With the aid of a digital
slitscan camera of my own invention, the horizontal axis
of the image is rendered as a time exposure. A single
sliver of space is imaged over an extended period of time,
with moving objects inserting themselves into the data
stream at different speeds and directions. The result
is a mind-bending swap of the dimensions of X and Time.
Counter to classic photography, still objects are blurred
and moving bodies are rendered clearly. Some figures are
elongated and have stick legs, others are stretched out
and their feet resemble skis. Shadows curve and landscapes
are devoid of perspective.
Instead of mirroring reality as we know
it, this camera records a hidden reality. The apparent
"distortions" in the images all happen in-camera
as the image is being recorded. There is no Photoshop
manipulation. These "distortions" could really
be described as a more accurate way of seeing the passage
of time, although unfamiliar to our traditional concept
of the depiction of time and space in art. In other words,
this camera is recording a reality that exists, but one
we cannot see without it.
I draw a link between the ephemeral nature of these fleeting
images and the elusive nature of the quantum mechanical
universe. Some scientists argue that the orbits of electrons
do not exist in nature unless and until we observe them.
So then, to observe is to create. Figures appear and disappear
in my work like quantum particles and uncertainty rules
the day.
My work reveals my admiration and
awe about the real world: the camera doesn’t lie
and that truth is stranger
than fiction.
--Ansen Seale
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