Abelardo Morell

There was a point in time when I was very much into black and white, analog photography. That time has long since past, but it definitely influences how I see certain types of photography. I find that when looking at his photographs, it is difficult for me to view and analyze them as works of art. My mind is clouded by a strange nostalgia, if you can call it that, and I mainly find myself paying attention to the processes by which he would have come up with those photographs. This is a little odd for me, since I normally do not have that feeling when looking at photography. I think that what is different about him is his interest in alternative photography. When looking at his images made by means of a camera obscura, I find myself thinking about how much time it would have taken to set up and what variables he would have had to play with to come up with that image. I devoted a lot of time to pinhole photography, so I view those particular works of art as simply very large pinhole photographs (which essentially they are, except for the size of the "camera" and the fact that the art is in the image itself, not a piece of paper that is processed from the image.) I think that those images actually make me a bit uneasy, as I remember the frustration of not having a view finder and guessing expsure times (which don't even deal with the camera obscura, but I somehow still have that association.) When I really take time to look at them, I find them incredibly beatiful, it just takes me a while to get my mind past the technical aspect of the photography. I have to say though, I was dissappointed that I did not find any pinhole photographs on his website.

This artist definitely has a very noticable style. He takes pictures of things you wouldn't normally think to take pictures of, like the photograph of his box of tissues. I think that for him, the art is in the contrast that he gives those objects. By manipulating his box of tissues in a certain way, he actually changes it into a very interesting photograph, which I don't think it would have been had it been taken in color without any color adjustment; it would have just been a box of tissues. Pretty much all of his photographs have a very similar level of contrast to them (which gets me thinking about the development process and moving my focus away from the photographs themselves.)

Overall, I think that he is a very good photographer. He has a very unique style and uses processes that many have forgotten about. When looking at his website, there is definitely a lot more to take in than those of most photographers out there.