Photograms

Man Ray and Moholy Nagy are both photographers that have inspired me to create photograms as a part of my final outcome.

I will create my photograms by placing objects onto the paper and exposing it to light on the enlarger. Once this is done I will place the paper into three different chemicals; developer; stop; fix. I intend on using jewellery to make photograms as I have now decided to focus on 'hands and jewellery' for my final outcome. Once I have made basic photograms I will experiment with different techniques and materials; placing a hand made negative into the enlarger, moving the objects, or moving my hand over the paper and objects during the exposure time.

Man Ray is a photographer who created this type of photography; photograms. When he first developed them he named them 'Rayographs'. He discovered this in 1921 in Paris whilst experimenting in the darkroom whilst developing images, and accidently left an object on a piece of paper whilst being exposed to the light.

A photogram made by Man Ray:

I believe that this picture was created using a role of film, aswell as a rubber band on the top left. The way that the film is coiled creates an amazing effect as it shows a contrast with the colours grey, black and white. 


Moholy Nagy is an artist who also experimented on photograms. He took on a large amount of design jobs and in 1927-1929 he became an editor of the art and photography department of a magazine made in Europe named International Revue. He was commonly known as one of the 'fathers' of light art as he worked on doing light sculptures and moving sculptures. As he was such a great artist, when he died of leukaemia in 1946, Budapest named a university after him in his honour; Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design.

A photogram made by Moholy Nagy:

This image by Moholy Nagy is very interesting in comparison to the picture above by Man Ray. This is due to the fact that Moholy has also used a role of film, but has captured the image differently. He has stretched out the role of film more which allows there to be more white and black rather than grey aswell. I also believe that he used a lower appeture to allow more light onto the object and paper, which helps the white colour show.

Sigmar Polke

Sigmar Polke was a German painter and photographer (13 February 1941 - 10 June 2010). He was an artist who experimented with a variety of styles, subjects and materials. In the 1970s he focused on photography and then concentrated on painting 10 years later. The New York Observer once said: 'Polke used his camera like a sketchbook; and he treated his photos like paintings, experimenting with, altering or deliberately bungling the development process to create unusual visual effects. Most of his prints are creased and stained. Everything seems unfinished - not in the sense of lacking anything, but in the sense of still being in play'.

I don't think that this experimentation has any meaning as it seems that Sigmar Polke has intentionally made it look abstract, which is the purpose of placing different materials onto the photo paper during exposure. Although the picture has no meaning, it clearly has been planned as there are different materials of different textures that has been placed certain places of the paper. 

This experiment has been done by using an SLR camera to take the photographs as well as a darkroom to experiment different techniques; materials and exposures.