It is said that a picture is worth a thousand words. When you look at a picture you only see some of the words. Others viewing the same picture might see the other words. And some words are yet still hidden. When our class visited the Cultural Center’s exhibit on Barbara Crane titled Challenging Vision, our vision was definitely challenged. Crane has an ability to create different styles of images, and she can force viewers to compare the different in the same light.
Crane is “someone who is very curious about photography,” remarked Bill, our instructor. After viewing the exhibit, I believe that Bill’s statement is true. She used Polaroid, film, and digital cameras; and experimented with fish-eye lens, sandwiched negatives, and double exposures. Here is an example of her ability to experiment:
There was a picture of a dead bird. It didn’t make the bird pretty or anything; it was more about the study of the physical characteristics. This picture was in a series that Crane did, in which she captures the “beauty” of death. Here is an example from that series:
This was a fun field trip. We learned a lot about the different processes of developing/making pictures.
