Photographic series and poetic instigations on the quality, possibility, and identification of phenomena subjected to the constraints of portraiture using medium format film.
—Alan Dunyo Avorgbedor
SUBJECT.
The subject and its negative. Portraiture. A musing in three negations. I use the square format native to 6x6 Medium Format photography to (1) activate the hyper-centrality of the framing device and (2) produce conventional compositional moments with subjects (3) that are usually visually obstructed to acknowledge the influence of terministic screens. Here, the image passes procedurally from granular smear of the focal range (abusing or rewarding Delta 3200 grain structure), to the abrupt preemption of a subject’s visage (foreclosed) using the fine film emulsion of Fuji Across 100 , to the relative geometrical clarity of a typical Montreal staircase using Ilford FP4 Plus 125 in three gestures. More than moments in expanded contrast. More like chiaroscuro pimping. Tools: Kowa Super Six 85mm, Hasselblad 500 c/m 80mm, Minolta Autocord. Olivine.
BIOME.
Magenta dripping in a biome brimming. Objects and intensities and there — you. Here, expired Fuji Astia 100 slide film produces distinct magenta overtones that are methodically instigated through cross-processing techniques. Further activation occurs in the subtle fringing of chromatic aberration and its blue hues, suggesting the pure or vulgar material phase of an old lens, an expired emulsion, an odd chemistry and their performance. Environs may ooze effortlessly, returning replete with data and their sources. Objects may shift from synthetic to organic from frame to frame. Reflections of a musing, or melisma, in three dreams. Tools: Hasselblad 500 c/m 80mm. Wonder.
VOID.
Therein or thereby, a procedural suture or struggle. An opening, a gulf, an impasse. Sometimes an absence is all that is required — or expressive of — speciation. Here, the inquiry presents the figure as a dative condition (to which something is given), supported by the weight of empty determinations, objects, indices that condescended to be but could very well have not been. Tools: Hasselblad 500 c/m 80mm, Kowa Super Six 85mm, Minolta Autocord. The ineluctable. An abyss.
