Bella Spadafora-Style Analysis

Harry Callahan:

Harry Callahan, born in 1912 in Detroit, Michigan, was an American experimentalist photographer. As a young adult, he worked at Chrysler and decided to leave the company to study engineering at Michigan State University until he dropped out and returned to Chrysler to join their camera club. In 1941, Ansel Adams encouraged Callahan to take the craft more seriously, and so he did. His work is modern, leaning into post-modern.

Callahan used  (film) a huge view camera loaded with 8x10 negatives that he could print by laying them directly on photosensitive paper and exposing them to light.  He always photographed outside, never in the studio. Laszlo Moholy Nagy, photographer and painter, and Ansel Adams both heavily influenced Callahans work. Callahan merged Adam’s purism and Moholy’s experimentalism to create his innovative and inventive work.  

Callahan photographed an array of subjects. He was particularly drawn to photographing his wife, Eleanor, and his daughter Barbara. He captured nudity from Eleanor in an intimate yet non-sexual way, often layering the nude pictures with nature. He also photographed nature in ways that resembled patterns, captured movement in people and in nature, and sometimes photographed buildings. All photos are done in black and white with experimental exposure and contrast.

It isn’t fully obvious why Callahan photographed what he did. He did not what to confine the viewers experience with a narrative, so he allowed the viewers to decide what to feel. Another way to describe his drive to photograph can be found in this quote said by him: “My value lies in the fact that I am a man for whom the visible world exists.”

To describe his photos, it is best to say they are black and white with a clear subject, heavy contrast, sometimes distinguishable, sometimes abstract. Sometimes with many people, sometimes with a single woman-in all relative settings.

I rather enjoy Callahan’s work. It is distant, yet intimate and I enjoy his experimental techniques with movement, contrast, etc. He seems like a mysterious yet simple man and I think that transcends into his photos.

Hannah Starkey:

Hannah Starkey was one of the photographers I chose to analyze based on her style. Starkey, British photographer, was born in 1971 in Belfast and her work is considered postmodern (the photographs analyzed were taken from 1997 to 2007). She studied photography at Napier University in Edinburgh and continued her education at the Royal College of Art in London.

Starkey uses a digital camera with tripod and C-Type prints.

She has a very distinguishable concept to what she photographs. Every time, her subjects are women predominantly in public setting or staged-like settings. The best way to describe her work is women in every day life caught in the middle of a scene. The scenery is very important to the image for it influences the mood and character of the photo. The photos have a high contrast and deep depth of field, often with a singular, predominant light source such as a lamp post or neon signage. Many times the women are dressed in street style or fashionable, and other times just casual or busy. A quote by Iwona Bazwick easily describes Starkey’s work: “Starkey presents a repertoire of public and private spaces that we occupy but which are conceived as invisible.”  

Starkey photographs to capture the internal state of mind externally. She claims she is trying to make a collection of documents that communicate something that doesn’t necessarily have a verbal language. She enjoys capturing photos that may show that mental state is slightly on the edge and enjoys portraying how women communicate with each other-it is interesting for her to see it and to learn about it.

I find Starkey’s work to be exceptional. Her photographs convey a feeling I find hard to explain, yet I want to keep looking to figure out how I feel. I feel like I can relate to the day-to-day activites, moods, and characters Starkey conveys, yet there is a slight “unfinished” feeling to the photos-not that the picture is unfinished, but the people within them aren’t.

Walter Pfeiffer:

Walter Pfieffer, a Swiss artist born in Zurich, Switzerland in 1946 is one of the most renowned photographers teetering between the the realms of reality in sexuality and beauty. He is a post-modern photographer, but the photos I am analyzing range from the 70s to the early 2000s.

Pfieiffer used polaroid’s predominantly for his drawings but they also bled into his work. He uses a 35mm film camera in both color and black and white and he does not use digital.

He photographs people, portraits, intimacy and nudes, and sometimes even objects in a staged setting. He captures the human experience in a very intimate, sexual yet tasteful/fashionable sense-often in a series or standalone.

Pfeiffer photographs to capture positivity, color, sensuality and sometimes humor. His juxtaposition between masculinity and femininity and where those lines cross is a big influence into his work. He is exploratory in how he photographs yet deliberate in the image he wants to capture. He wants not to capture reality but to capture somewhere in between reality and semblance.

The photos range, with an underlying sensuality, even if it just a pair of trousers on the floor. The black and white photos are grainy and blurred and very intimately close. The colored photos are very colorful. Even the skin is vibrant and the photos are often overexposed. The photos often show a lot of skin and nudity in a way that seems interrupted, yet still beautiful and somehow fashionable.

I am obsessed with Walter Pfieffers work. I think he is exceptional and raw and I love the way he conveys beauty. It is ambiguous and uncomfortable yet seemingly untouchable and unattainable. There’s a high fashion feeling to his work yet it feels relatable. I love his overexposed portraits the most.