Discuss a Jeff Wall Photograph

[catem]

I do find Jeff Wall's work fascinating - and enjoy the links to past works (Hokusai's 'Sudden Gust of Wind') and to literature. Agree they must really need to be seen 'in the flesh' to be appreciated fully (which I haven't seen unfortunately). I do like the story-telling/filmic qualities of his work, anyway.

btw Suzanne - 'Where's Waldo' must be what we know as (or similar to ) 'Where's Wally'

[Scott Peters]

Sitting alone, thinking thoughts, some good, some bad. Some evil perhaps, some good intentions. Or, is it wasted thoughts, wasted abilities....poor use of talents? Or is it the evironment that squelches our creative thought process, or is it that no one really listens anymore....

Staged well, nice lighting, interesting composition.

I think its one of his better images, stronger images. I think overall as a body of work, overall, I am a bit dissapointed.

To me, it's more difficult to take a non-staged photograph and tell a similar story, imho. I appreciate those more, personally.

[jstraw]

Sitting alone, thinking thoughts, some good, some bad. Some evil perhaps, some good intentions. Or, is it wasted thoughts, wasted abilities....poor use of talents? Or is it the evironment that squelches our creative thought process, or is it that no one really listens anymore....

Staged well, nice lighting, interesting composition.

I think its one of his better images, stronger images. I think overall as a body of work, overall, I am a bit dissapointed.

To me, it's more difficult to take a non-staged photograph and tell a similar story, imho. I appreciate those more, personally.

There's nothing new with using the vocabulary of documentary photography or fine art photography in commercial work. I think this turnabout confounds some. I know that it challenges my thinking. I think using the vocabulary of the studio/set piece/art-directed photograph for the production of art is a worthy thing to undertake.

Some people prefer non-fiction to novels. I like Joseph Mitchel and Tracy Kidder but I don't think what they've done is more difficult than what Hemingway or Steinbeck did. Some people prefer documentary films to "cinema." I don't think the Maysles brothers worked harder than the Coen brothers. Milage may vary.

[Sparky]

Hey - that's a pretty good analogy there. (fiction/non-fiction writing)

[Jim Chinn]

Think of a favorite scene from a favorite movie. Somewhere in the hundreds of individual frames on the film stock from that scene will be a single "still" frame that captures the essence of the scene. That is, a frame that when printed as single image distills the essence of what has just happened and is about to happen in the scene.

With Wall's work the lighting, staging, actors, directing and final presentation all are used as with a motion picture. But Wall doesn't need a few thousand feet of film stock. His movie is contained in a single frame.

I think the subject of a particular image seems to provide a single "still" frame from which the viewer can work both backwards chronologically from the image or project into the future about what comes next.

I don't recall if I have seen any of his work in person. From what I can find on the web, I would say that some of his images work much better then others .