Photograms
Who is Man Ray?
Born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States on August 27th 1890. Died in Paris, France on November 18th 1976. Original surname was Radnitzky Became an artist, was a huge contributor to the Dada and Surrealist movements. |
Who is Moholy Nagy ?
Born in Bacsborsod on 1895 Died in Chicago on 1946 Abstract painter, designer, typographer, photographer, film maker and theorist. Studied law in Budapest University. Served in the Austro-Hungarian was wounded several times. Moved to Berlin and began to paint abstract pictures on 1920. Had his first one man exhibition two years later. Got involved in experimental photography such as photograms. |
What are Photograms?
A photogram is photograph made without using a camera. You simply place objects onto a light sensitive paper, photographic paper and then expose it to light, the light comes from an enlarger which can be found in the darkroom. The images remind me of x-ray images as they asre negative images produced by exposing light on the top of various objects. For example we used various objects such as metal safety pins, a rubber watch and wooden chopsticks. The images which were left on the paper were various shades of whites and greys. |
How to make photograms
We made photograms in the darkroom using enlargers, photographic paper, and our various objects.
First we carefully chose a selection of objects which were different in weight and opacity-this means how transparent the objects are and we started by placing the objects onto the photographic paper making sure that we arranged them in a good composition. We then exposed the objects to light from the enlarger and experimented with different times to do a test, my first test was to open the enlarger so that the most amount of light went onto the paper and then developed the image using various chemicals, these were developer, stop, and fix.
First we carefully chose a selection of objects which were different in weight and opacity-this means how transparent the objects are and we started by placing the objects onto the photographic paper making sure that we arranged them in a good composition. We then exposed the objects to light from the enlarger and experimented with different times to do a test, my first test was to open the enlarger so that the most amount of light went onto the paper and then developed the image using various chemicals, these were developer, stop, and fix.