The Aesthetics of Photographic Production
(2024)
Andrea Jaeger
I am a photographic artist, and my research focuses on exploring the multi-sensorial and immaterial aspects of photographic practice through a practice-based approach.
With this research project, I am contributing to an understanding of photographic practice that attends to aural and tactile senses as well as more-than-human agency in the making of practices to expand the discourse on photographic practice beyond traditional approaches that primarily focus on the reading of photographs.
Supported by an AHRC-funded PhD grant, I studied the making of practices in various photographic production sites, including laboratories such as Bayeux London, and manufacturing plants like FujiFilm, Polaroid, and Hahnemühle. The fieldwork identified three specific photographic practices—tensioning, fogging, and tearing photosensitive paper— which were explored through artistic research methodologies. By combining fieldwork and artistic research in a bricolage approach, the study demonstrates how these practices make aesthetic sense beyond the photograph as centre. The research outcomes, including a written thesis, artworks, and artifacts presented on the 'Research Catalogue' platform, highlight the role of non-visual senses and non-human agency in the making of photographic practices.
In this research, I challenge the commonly held belief that understanding what photography is, is synonymous with understanding what a photograph is (Squiers, 2014). This prevailing notion assumes that the photograph is always already produced and readily available for theoretical discussions focused on reading their meaning rather than attending to their making (Wells, 2015, p. 29). This research shifts attention to processes of making in real-world-settings of the photographic production sites, aiming to contribute to a broader understanding of photographic practice beyond the traditional confines of the photograph and the photographer as reference points. Instead of solely relying on individual approaches and the analysis of photographic works, this study shows the importance of aesthetic otherness, such as the sounds of tearing, which arise once the focus extends beyond the photograph. By activating aural and tactile senses and attending to the agency of the non-human, this research unveils the significance of more-than-visual senses and more-than-human agency in the making of photographic practice. The impact this research makes on the photographic discourse is to demonstrate how more-than-visual senses and more-than-human agency matter in the making of practices.
It argues that to understand photography, one must engage with aesthetic otherness made in photographic practices, transcending the photograph as the central element.
Expositionality in Action
(2024)
Michael Schwab
Although it is virtually impossible to formalize what ‘best practice’ on the Research Catalogue might be, it harbours by now numerous examples of expositions that ‘work.’ In this session, I want to introduce a small set of diverse expositions from JAR as a way to highlight successful choices people have taken. With a short explanation of expositionality and virtual witnessing, I aim to support an understanding of the effect that those examples have as a way of describing how media-rich articulations can productively engage with both academic and artistic expectations.
JENNY SUNESSON
(2024)
Jenny Sunesson
Jenny Sunesson (b. 1973) is a Swedish artist predominantly
working with sound. Her practice ranges from field recording and live collages to conceptual sound art and video. Sunesson uses her own life as a stage for her dark, tragic and sometimes comical re-contextualised work where real and invented characters and
derogated stereotypes, collaborate in the alternate story of hierarchies and normative power structures in society.