Neither Here Nor There: An Investigation Into The Role Of The Photographer’s
Subjective View in Landscape Photography.

By
Adam Stenhouse

Emily Carr University of Art and Design

A THESIS ESSAY SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE
REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF
MASTERS OF APPLIED ART
In

Visual Arts

EMILY CARR UNIVERSITY OF ART + DESIGN
2012

©Adam Stenhouse 2012

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Abstract
This thesis will examine the role of a landscape photographer’s subjective view in the
construction of a photographic image by considering the significance of their
photographic intent, visual relationship to the physical world and personal relationship to
place. I will deconstruct my series Neither Here Nor There, examining the significance
of investing my own history of experience and memory into the photograph in order to
explore my relationship to the landscapes I have lived in. The paper will examine the
roles of the photographer and the viewer when reading a photograph, using Susan
Sontag’s ideas of authority within the photograph from On Photography, Roland Barthes’
concept of the ‘punctum’ from Camera Lucida, and Robert Adams’ essay Truth and
Landscape, to investigate how a photographer forms intent within his photographs.
Drawing on Kaja Silverman’s World Spectators, the paper will go on to explore an
individual’s visual relationship with the physical world whilst maintaining the core idea
of exploring the photographer’s intentionality within a photograph by using the practice
of Thomas Joshua Cooper as an example of a photographer who claims authority over his
images. The thesis then analyses how concepts of place influence this conversation by
using Yi Fu Tuan’s Space and Place to investigate an individual’s relationship with the
physical world. Taking Italo Calvino’s Mr Palomar and Rinko Kawauchi’s photographic
series The Eyes, The Ears as examples, the paper looks at the representation of an
individual’s relationship to the physical world through their internal solipsistic view. The
essay concludes with an explanation of how my photographic series Neither Here Nor
There, tackles the issue of the representation of the photographer’s intent and subjective
vision, by offering an autobiographical reaction to my own sense of place.

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Table Of Contents

Abstract……………………………………………………………………….…...ii
Table Of Contents…………………………………………………………….…...iii
List of Images………………………………………………………………..……iv
Acknowledgements…………………………………………………………..……v
Introduction…………………………………………………………………..……1
Chapter 1 – Examining A Photographer’s Intent Within The Photograph…….….4
Chapter 2 – Investigating Visual Intent.…………………………....………….…10
Chapter 3 – Understanding The Effects of Place On Subjectivity....…...………..15
Chapter 4 – An Explanation Of Neither Here Nor There…………………..…....26
Works Cited……………………………………………………………………...34
Images……………………………………………………………………………36

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List of Images

Fig. 1 - Adam Stenhouse, Lake Kennedy, 24”X16”, 2010
Fig. 2 - Thomas Joshua Cooper, “uncharted dangers” – blanketing dense fog The
Bransfield Strait The Mouth of The Antarctic Sound Looking towards Prime Head
“Catherine Island” Antarctica, 2008. © Thomas Joshua Cooper
Fig. 3 - Rinko Kawauchi, Untitled From The Eyes, The Ears. 2005
Fig. 4 - Rinko Kawauchi, Untitled From The Eyes, The Ears. 2005
Fig. 5 - Rinko Kawauchi, Untitled From The Eyes, The Ears. 2005
Fig. 6 - Rinko Kawauchi, Untitled From The Eyes, The Ears. 2005
Fig. 7 - Adam Stenhouse, The Garden II, 36”X24”, 2011
Fig. 8 - Adam Stenhouse, The Garden I, 36”X24”, 2011
Fig. 9 - Adam Stenhouse, Untitled, 24”X16”, 2011
Fig. 10 - Adam Stenhouse, Untitled, 24”X16”, 2011
Fig. 11 - Adam Stenhouse, Untitled, 24”X16”, 2011
Fig. 12 - Adam Stenhouse, Neither Here, 72”X24”, 2012
Fig. 13 - Adam Stenhouse, Nor There, 72”X24”, 2012

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Acknowledgements

I would like to thank my Supervisor Kyla Mallett, my Mum and Dad – Krys and Austin
Stenhouse, as well as Arni Haraldsson, Howard Ursuliak, Ewa Hawrylowicz and
Schuyler Lindberg for their assistance in the production of this paper and for their support
and guidance.

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Introduction

This thesis will examine the importance of a landscape photographer’s subjective view in
the construction of a photographic image. In relation to my own practice, particularly my
series Neither Here Nor There, I will investigate the significance of investing my own
history of experience and memory into the photograph to explore my relationship to the
landscapes I have lived in.

I grew up in the North East of England. The landscape of this region has always affected
me emotionally and physically. I would go so far as to say the landscape influenced who
I am and how I see the world. Industry has scarred this land into its current appearance;
traces of settlements and industry litter even the remotest areas. These extinct industries
have shifted populations, created towns and forced others to be abandoned. All these
events were caused by the discovery and resultant exploitation or abandonment of natural
resources.

On walks up on the Fells and Moors I would often discover small mementos,
insignificant signifiers of past industry in the emptiest of places; abandoned buildings
used by sheep to shelter from the winter weather, small remnants of machinery slowly
rusting away, former pipe lines and chimneys left to crumble into the ground, paths
originally laid for now vanished rail lines, forgotten rusted nails and screws just lying
amongst the grasses and heather. All of these found objects show the traces of past lives
lived out within the confines of this place.

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Through family excursions into the countryside I became acutely aware of this
ambiguous presence called “the landscape” from a young age. As I have travelled further
a field, and experienced new and alien landscapes, there has always been a sense of
nostalgia for this place that I had left behind. It affects how I have viewed new places,
and informs my subsequent experiences. I have returned repeatedly to the North East to
photograph specific places, basing several photographic projects within this landscape in
order to consider and evaluate my relationship to the region.

Robert Adams, in his essay Truth and Landscape writes, “There is always a subjective
aspect in landscape art, something in the picture that tells us as much about who is behind
the camera as about what is in front of it.” (15). He concludes the essay by stating that
landscape art, “…is a rediscovery and revaluation of where we find ourselves.” (20).
His statement directly addresses important concerns within my own practice. Set within
the confines of my own subjective experiences and memories, my photographic practice
is a method by which I examine my relationship to the places I inhabit.

My photographic project Neither Here Nor There1 demonstrates the inseparability of the
photographer’s subjective experience of a landscape from his photographs of that same
landscape. The project is an examination of my relationship with both the landscape that
I grew up in, as well as the landscape of my present - Vancouver and its immediate
surroundings. The project examines each place through the specific lens of my own

1

A full description of Neither Here Nor There is given in the final chapter.
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personal, and deeply subjective, experience and represents an extension of the analysis of
the role subjectivity plays within the photographer’s construction of the photograph. This
work insists that a photographer’s subjective experience of a landscape is inseparable
from the images he makes, allowing the photographs to communicate more than a mere
representation, and to show directly how the photographer experienced the landscape.

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Chapter 1 - Examining A Photographer’s Intent Within The Photograph

This chapter will explore and outline ideas that discuss how a landscape photographer
constructs a photograph through their subjective intent, as well as examining the role the
viewer plays in the interpretation of the image. Susan Sontag succinctly describes the
subjective nature of photography and the photographer’s significant presence within the
photograph in On Photography. She writes:
The earliest photographers talked as if the camera were a copying machine; as if,
while people operate cameras, it is the camera that sees. […] The photographer
was thought to be an acute but non-interfering observer – a scribe, not a poet. But
as people quickly discovered that nobody takes the same picture of the same
thing, the supposition that cameras furnish an impersonal, objective image yielded
to the fact that photographs are evidence not only of what’s there but of what an
individual sees, not just a record but an evaluation of the world. (87-88)
Sontag is suggesting that the photograph becomes the product of the photographer’s
presence and vision, and that the photographer is engaged with every aspect of the image,
including the initial impetus to make the photograph. By stressing that the image is, “not
just a record but an evaluation”, she questions the scope of what a photograph can
communicate. The photograph is then elevated from an objective viewpoint to a
description of the photographer’s subjective experience of the world.

Solipsism - the idea that we live through our own histories and approach each new
experience through the filter of our previous experiences - insists that we can only ever

4

know ourselves.. The photograph can be seen as evidence that the photographer was
present at a specific moment in time, one in which the viewer most likely was not
present. Yet through the photograph, the photographer is attempting to convey a sense of
personal experience to other individuals, so challenging solipsism’s claims. Within
contemporary society there is a compulsion, through the widespread availability of image
making technology, to record every facet of our contemporary lives, no matter how
mundane or extraordinary. This compulsion has meant that the subjective reactions of
multiple individuals to an occurrence are made available, in particular via digital media,
to a large and immediate audience. Examples of this in practice lie in the prevalence of
social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter; where an individual can display a
photograph to others across the globe at almost the moment it is taken, as well as
websites such as Flickr or Blipfoto; whose sole purpose is to offer a platform to share
photographs.

This perspective raises a number of provocative questions that apply beyond the realm of
photography and into other artistic mediums but that remain pertinent: If we are all
unique individuals, arriving at the present moment in time through our own particular
path of experience, and so inevitably subjective in our being, how can we, as viewers, be
affected by seeing a photograph made by someone else? Is it coincidence when we are
able to empathise with the subject matter? Or specifically with regard to photography, is
something else happening within the photograph? This last question relates closely to
Roland Barthes’ concept of the punctum as described in his seminal text Camera Lucida.
Michael Fried examines Barthes’ idea of the punctum in great detail in Why Photography

5

Matters As Art As Never Before (95 – 114), regarding how it relates to his own ideas of
theatricality within constructed art forms. Citing Barthes he states, “A photograph’s
punctum is that accident which pricks me (but also bruises me, is poignant to me).”
Adding his own interpretation Fried continues, “The punctum, one might say, is seen by
Barthes but not because it has been shown to him by the photographer, for whom literally
it does not exist; as Barthes recognizes, ‘it occurs [only] in the field of the photographed
thing,’ which is to say that it is a pure artefact of the photographic event.” (100) 2. As a
physical object one could state that the photograph is a deliberate, edited view of the
world, that the photograph can only show definitively what is in its physical frame, and
cannot show what is excluded from it. The frame is the cut-off point, beyond which
something else existed but which the photographer chose not to include, instead
concentrating only on what he permits to be visible. However, Barthes insists that the
punctum transcends these parameters as the viewer will always bring their own histories
of experience to the photograph, projecting their remembrances of experience onto the
image regardless of the photographer’s own intent. Barthes goes on to state:
Nothing surprising, then, if sometimes, despite its clarity, the punctum should be
revealed only after the fact, when the photograph is no longer in front of me and I
think back on it. I may know better a photograph I remember than a photograph I

2

Barthes describes the punctum in Camera Lucida in relation to the studium. Michael
Fried describes the studium as “endow[ing] the photograph ‘with functions, which are,
for the Photographer, so many alibis. These functions are: to inform, to represent, to
surprise, to cause, to signify, to provoke desire. And I, the Spectator, I recognize them
with more or less pleasure: I invest them with my studium (which is never my delight or
my pain).’” (97). The studium becomes an expression for the topography of the
photograph, a description of what the photograph describes.
6

am looking at, as if direct vision oriented its language wrongly, engaging it in an
effort of description which will always miss its point of effect, the punctum. (53)
This expansion of the punctum conveys its intangibility. The photographer is unaware of
the punctum, only the viewer may conceive of its presence, and even further, that it may
not be conceived until away from the photograph’s presence and immediacy, appearing
within the memory of experiencing the photograph and as such transcending vision. This
issues significance to the viewer and their interpretation of the image. The punctum in
this capacity carries a resemblance to Barthes’ ideas in text Death of the Author, in which
he claims the author intends their writing to be read. Barthes insists the author’s history
should be irrelevant as to how one reads or interprets his works as importance lies with
the viewer and their interpretation, which should not be influenced by the life of the
author. The significance in Barthes’ idea is that he claims the reader, or, if we consider
this idea in a photographic context, the viewer, is the intended recipient and so it is
ultimately their interpretation rather than the creators intent that is important.

Robert Adams offers an opposing opinion in his essay Truth and Landscape, in which he
sets out what he calls the three verities of landscape photography; geography,
autobiography and metaphor (14)3. This concept can be applied to many forms of
photography, not just landscape, as the three verities imbue a photograph with
consideration and meaning. The importance in Adams’ essay is that he is claiming that

3

Adams insists a balance between the three must be achieved to create a landscape image
that is both valuable and engaging, stating “Geography is, if taken alone, sometimes
boring, autobiography is frequently trivial, and metaphor can be dubious. But taken
together […] the three kinds of information strengthen each other.” (14)
7

the photographer is intending to describe to the viewer what they should see within the
photograph, how they should see it and why.

While photography’s ability to represent the world is often questioned, even undermined
with particular regard to digital technologies, (though manipulation of the image has
occurred since photography’s earliest days), through it’s indexical nature, photography
still has the ability to factually show a physical location; to show a field as a field, and a
tree as a tree. However, photography is more than just a recording tool to simply state
“this existed”. This attaches to each photograph an implicit sense of autobiography, as
the photograph is changed from being just a recording device, to depicting a subjective
viewpoint, reflecting photography’s hybrid nature, and causing the image to now become
the product of an individual’s subjective position. Autobiography within the image is the
appearance of the subjective vision of the photographer. Adams states that “Without the
photographer in the photograph the view is no more compelling than the product of some
anonymous record camera, a machine perhaps capable of happy accident but not of
response to form.” (15). He sums up the importance of autobiography within the image
by reaffirming that the photograph can only be produced by the photographer. Thus the
resultant image can only ever be the photographer’s individual construction.

Adams goes on to state, “We rely, I think, on landscape photography to make intelligible
to us what we already know. It is the fitness of landscape to one’s experience of life’s
condition and possibilities that finally makes a scene important.” (16). In effect Adams is
saying that the pinch one feels comes not from an attraction to form or to an intangible

8

presence, but from our own personal histories of experience. What the viewer feels, or
doesn’t feel, is a reaction to the photographer’s intent through the filter of the viewer’s
own experiences. The photograph can now be said to occupy a dual role: to project the
photographer’s representation to the viewer whilst allowing the viewer to project their
interpretation onto the photograph. The issue now is where importance lies: in the making
of the image, or in its interpretation? In this paper I will continue by investigating the
significance of the photographer’s role as the creator of the image.

9

Chapter 2 - Investigating Visual Intent

As stated in the previous chapter, Barthes’ punctum questions the concept of the
photographer’s intention by challenging how the photograph is perceived. Claiming the
punctum as a force of attraction, Barthes’ ideas tie in with phenomenological ideas on the
relationship between seeing and being seen. Film theorist and art historian Kaja
Silverman, in her book World Spectators (2000), explores this relationship. She asserts
that everything intends to be seen as much as the eye intends to see. She writes,
Something must give itself to be seen, and a spectator must see within it the
miraculous reincarnation of the what-has-been. It is, moreover, not the perceiving
subject, but rather the perceptual object which plays the initiating role in this
scopic transaction. The world “intends” toward being seen; it aspires or moves
toward appearance. (129)
Silverman claims that we see because the subject intends to be seen. She follows in a line
of theorists who have made similar claims including Merleau-Ponty, Jacques Lacan and
Hannah Arendt (Silverman 129). By stating that the source of this attraction is the
intention to be seen, there is a similarity with Barthes’ idea of the punctum. Silverman
believes the world is intending to be seen, it attracts the eye and draws attention to a
detail. Barthes is insisting that potentially, within a fragment of a photograph, exists an
attraction to the viewer. However this is not solely a visual attraction as Silverman’s
claims are, but more complex, the punctum can exist in the present, whilst viewing the
photograph, or within memory, appearing through recollection. Yet despite this

10

difference in the manifestation of their ideas, both Silverman and Barthes state that an
object’s desire to be seen exercises a dominant influence over visual attraction.

Photographic practice4 engages with chance, and no two images can ever be exactly the
same. Various factors including weather, light conditions, and, in particular, time all
conspire to make each photograph unique. What is present before the camera at the
instance that the shutter is opened can never be exactly repeated or recreated. Silverman
writes, “The language of things is the language of presence.” (144). She is insisting that
by being present within the world, objects have a language with which to communicate
and make themselves apparent. In my series Lake Kennedy (2010)i I photographed the
landscape whilst an unexpected weather front caused intense fog to blanket the landscape
from view resulting in a short series of photographs that are unique. In Silverman’s
terms, chance could be the play of the world attempting to be seen and creating a
stimulus for myself, the photographer, that is visually attractive and prompts me to make
a photograph at that particular moment.

Within his practice, photographer Thomas Joshua Cooper absolutely refutes Silverman’s
position. In his most recent project, True, Cooper records the world at its most extreme
edges. His photographs are beautiful, often abstract in appearance, yet situated within
Cooper’s personal experience with the world. Cooper describes his practice as being
concerned with the act of gazing. He gazes at the world and records this gaze through his
photographs. In his essay “Gazing at the Void”, which accompanies True, Ben Tufnell
4

In this instance I am referring to practices based outside of the photographic studio, that
are not able to enforce a constant environment onto the subject.
11

states, “He stands with his back to the land and looks out at the sea. His characteristic
position here is one of looking out – at the void – and thereby looking inwards. For the
gaze that lights upon a blank plane is inevitably turned back upon itself.” (28).
Suggestive of Zen thought (Tufnell 28)5, but also referring to a subjective visual
relationship with the world, Tufnell is describing both the basic methodology of Cooper’s
practice and the contents of his images.

True, is a smaller section from Cooper’s much grander project - An Atlas of Emptiness
and Extremity – The World’s Edge – The Atlantic Basin Project – a project that aims to
photograph the rim of the Atlantic Ocean. Tufnell declares that the project is “Destined
to fail” (29), whilst insisting this is also the strength of the project as it, “tells us about the
world and how big and unknowable it is.” (29). In this sense Cooper’s project, though
destined to fail, becomes successful as it portrays the scale of the world. This epic
undertaking becomes about Cooper recording his own subjective experience of the world.
What I find particularly valuable about Cooper’s work, beyond his scope to engage with
the world, is that he is actively looking at, or into, the world. His gaze searches out the
content he will record in his photographs. Cooper is actively searching the world before
him, a conscious act that contradicts Silverman’s claims that the eye is attracted to seeing
an object. Is it possible to actively look or is the seen object intending to be seen
anyway? It could be that Cooper gazes, looking into the void at the edge of the world for
a particular vision he already knows of, or it could be until his vision is pricked by
5

Tufnell states “In Zen thought and iconography the void is something to be sought and
embraced. It represents clarity in opposition to the dense static of the world. It is an
emptiness that allows us to find a true sense of relativity. It induces a welcome loss of
ego.” (28)
12

something wishing to be seen, the eye and object both achieving their goals, to see and be
seen? Cooper is adamant of his role within his photographs, unwilling to abdicate his
authority over his work. In his image: “uncharted dangers” – blanketing dense fog, The
Bransfield Strait, The Mouth of The Antarctic Sound, Looking towards Prime Head,
“Catherine Island”, Antarctica, 2008ii, Cooper stood in a location so remote that more
people have stood on the moon (Tufnell 27). From this remote and dangerous point of
land, Cooper looks into the fog, towards the northernmost tip of Antarctica. The image is
a swirl of dark greys, which represent the movement of water around the static black of
rocks. At the top edge of the photograph is a large white mass, floating sea ice. Cooper
has placed his camera at this absolute point of extremity and gazes still further out into
the world. What appears on his negative is his subjective vision of the world. Within
these images there is a vague description of the physical world but also, significantly, a
depiction of Cooper’s own view of this world. His images are filled with narrative and
metaphor, suggestive of intangible moments, the witnessing of the sublime, the heroic
and romantic ideals of great explorers travelling in search of unknown lands. Cooper
follows in their footsteps, taking his camera to these extremes, and at these outer edges of
human knowledge and experience he makes his photographs through his subjective view
of these places. Cooper makes a further point regarding his authority over his images by
insisting he ‘makes’ rather than ‘takes’ a photograph. To ‘take a photograph’ would
imply that an image pre-existed and the result is not the product of his controlled
creation. Yet through Silverman’s ideas, one could argue that even within his controlled
practice, he can only ever see the world as it appears to him, and this is what is present
within his images. But that Cooper claims he is ‘making’ rather than ‘taking’ is

13

significant in challenging Silverman’s claims of the world’s intention to be seen.
Cooper’s intent also acts as a challenge to Barthes’ ideas because he absolutely intends
what the viewer will see and how. Through his photographs the viewer is shown the
world as experienced by Cooper. Here lies a contradiction of opinions, one stating the
photographer creates, another saying the viewer interprets, and a third saying the world
intends.

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Chapter 3 - Understanding The Effects of Place On Subjectivity

If we take Robert Adam’s insistence that, “Landscape art, the main business of which is a
rediscovery and revaluation of where we find ourselves.” (20) literally, then we must
examine the importance of rediscovering and revaluing where we find ourselves. The
human geographer Yi Fu Tuan, who specifically explores human subjectivity in relation
to place in his book Space And Place, describes the intimate and emotional relationships
we create with places. These relationships are intense and deeply set within our being.
Poetically evoking the essence of Barthes’ punctum and Silverman’s discourse on the
relationship behind seeing Tuan states,
Intimate experiences lie buried in our innermost being so that not only do we lack
the words to give them form but often we are not even aware of them. When for
some reason, they flash to the surface of our consciousness they evince a
poignancy that the more deliberative acts – the actively sought experiences –
cannot match. (136)
In Tuan’s writing the significance of mundane places, such as the home, is outlined and
examined. Tuan explains that, “The home place is full of ordinary objects. We know
them through use; we do not attend to them as we do to works of art. They are almost a
part of ourselves, too close to be seen” (144).

To understand the relevance of Tuan’s ideas within the context of a photographic
practice, I want to consider the work of Japanese photographer Rinko Kawauchi. Her
practice is based in the documentation of the everyday, yet documentation suggests there

15

is a form of fact within her images. Rather they are representations of her visual
relationship with the immediate physical world around her. In her work the insignificant
is made significant through her gentle observations and acute awareness of her immediate
surroundings. In her series The Eyes, The Ears, Kawauchi is located absolutely within
her local surroundings, at times barely seeming to leave her apartment. Such is the
richness of what she discovers, she has no need to travel further a field to engage in a
relationship with the world. The images chart the most banal moments and instances.
Kawauchi expresses her fascination with the things that most people ignore, finding in
them an importance and significance: the way concrete has rippled around a pole as it has
driediii, she compares soap bubbles on one page with the lumpy skin of a toadiv, she
photographs a few strands of hair out of place on a head whose face we can not seev. In
one photograph a young girl is standing at a deskvi, pencil in hand, seemingly in deep
concentration, behind her a blackboard hangs with no information on it. The girl is
bathed in brilliant light, burning out her pink sweatshirt and highlighting her hair. The
simplicity of this moment, a school child possibly doing homework, is familiar to many,
yet Kawauchi elevates it to a moment of intense beauty and poignancy. There is a
delicacy and understanding shown by the colours and light she captures within the
photograph that many people would not notice in passing, but Kawauchi lingers on them,
looking to them for significance. This act is significant in Kawauchi’s practice. This
lingering is reminiscent of Silverman’s ideas of visual intent. Kawauchi though, offers a
middle ground between the polarising arguments discussed so far. Empathy with the
familiarity of her subject matter allows the viewer an entry point into her work, and a
bond is created between photographer and viewer through this. Kawauchi herself, whilst

16

looking for the moments she will photograph through her subjective vision is also open to
the world making itself visible to be seen. She seems especially sensitive to the prick of
attraction to see the world. Tuan explains the intangibility of what Kawauchi is
attempting to portray within her pictures,
A mere smile or touch may signal our consciousness of an important occasion.
Insofar as these gestures can be observed they are public. They are also fleeting,
however, and their meaning so eludes confident interpretation that they cannot
provide the basis for group planning and action. They lack the firmness of words
and pictures. (137).
These fleetest of moments and feelings that feel so immensely overpowering are
important to defining and understanding where we find ourselves. Kawauchi’s ability to
make visibly tangible these moments is important so that one is not left with only
inadequate descriptions, but an actual sense of what these moments are and where they
lie.

Kawauchi has stated; “People often say that I have a child’s eye. For example, I stare at
ants gathering around sugar, or when I seek shelter from the rain, I gaze upon snails.
These are things which you often do when you are a child aren’t they? I have a very
similar sensibility to that.” This acknowledgement of ‘staring’ bears a resemblance to
Thomas Joshua Cooper’s act of gazing in that their eye is consciously lingering on the
physical world around them, actively searching the world. However Cooper gazes with
intent whilst Kawauchi suggests she looks to be affected by the world. The innocence
she speaks of within her practice, of the subject matter, of her attention to the

17

insignificant, comes through her openness to see the world, to be conscious of her
relationship with the world and to enact upon her observations. Tuan succinctly reasons
the importance of this relationship further, explaining,
Home is an intimate place. We think of the house as home and place, but
enchanted images of the past are evoked not so much by the entire building,
which can only be seen, as by its components and furnishings, which can be
touched and smelled as well: the attic and the cellar, the fireplace and the bay
window, the hidden corners, a stool, a gilded mirror, a chipped shell. (144)
Kawauchi, entranced by these tiniest of details, seems content to let the world come to
her as it wishes to be seen, much as Silverman describes our visual relationship with the
world we encounter.

The Italian writer and journalist Italo Calvino, through his Novel Mr Palomar, examines
the act of observing the world, so inherent to the practices of Kawauchi and Cooper,
through his character-cum-alter ego Mr Palomar. Taking the solipsist position, that we
can only know ourselves, Mr Palomar attempts to open up one man’s interior world and
make it public. Mr Palomar is an awkward character, who views himself as a social
misfit, and the novel explores his inner thoughts as he undertakes his series of
observational exercises in an attempt to better understand the world he lives in and his
relationship to it. Through Mr Palomar, Calvino offers a description of the subjective
viewpoint of the individual looking out from his interior world to the exterior world
around him. Calvino sets up a series of situations that allow for a study of the world’s
natural phenomena and an individual’s subjective reactions to these phenomena. This

18

subjective viewpoint is inescapable and affects our understanding of, and relationship
with, the world around us.

Taking Mr Palomar, as a starting point, I have explored through my own photographs
how a place can be represented inclusive of my own subjective point of viewvii. I
observed the garden at my parents’ house; a small garden, that in summer is bursting with
bushy plants and flowers. It is also the garden of my childhood, and I have many
personal memories rooted within that place. The photographs I made were taken during
August when everything seemed to be at its fullest and brightest. Mr Palomar’s attempts
to understand his place within the world and his inability to escape it led me to consider
how I can view the world around through the lens of my experiences and memories.
Within my series of images I endeavour to mimic Mr Palomar’s attempts to see a wave
and record its whole. The images are not intended as a true visual representation of my
parents’ garden. Instead they are photographs of the sensation of being present within the
garden. I am alluding to my own relationship with the garden and the history of stories
and emotions involved in that relationship. The images show no detail, just a mix of
colours and shapes that one could suppose to be leaves or flowers. Shapes and colours
can be assigned descriptions in an attempt to describe the garden, but this will be an
invented series of names. These images are a deliberate obfuscation of the visible world.
By refusing the viewer a literal image that would describe the garden, I am denying the
details of my vision. Through this I am controlling the image and its content, so
controlling what the viewer can see. By controlling what the viewer sees I am expressing

19

solely my own subjective view, I am taking command of what appears within the image
and also how it is viewed.

As Mr Palomar reacts to the visual stimuli around him, inciting various observational
exercises, so my immediate surroundings act as my own stimuli within my practice.
Calvino describes the difficulty in considering the world through Mr Palomar’s first
observational task: to see a wave. Calvino describes this task as,
To perceive all its simultaneous components without overlooking any of them, his
gaze will dwell on the movement of the wave that strikes the shore, until it can
record aspects not previously perceived; as soon as he notices that the images are
being repeated, he will know he has seen everything he wanted to see and he will
be able to stop. (4).
Mr Palomar must be obsessive in the extreme to complete this task. He must pay
absolute attention to every detail of the wave, and surely to reach the point where he has
seen the whole of the wave, even in segments, he must spend an immense amount of time
watching an infinite number of waves. Mr Palomar starts to consider all that is involved
in his task and attempts to control the parameters of his observations, reducing the area he
will observe to a small square of sea. He repeats his act of observation, every time
thinking he has seen it all, but each new watch reveals more stages in the wave’s
existence. He keeps piecing the various parts together to create the perfect viewing of a
wave. But “Concentrating the attention on one aspect makes it leap into the foreground
and occupy the square, just as, with certain drawings, you only have to close your eyes
and when you open them the perspective has changed.” (6). This description of vision

20

also relates to the photograph and how the photographer controls, or manipulates, how
the image is viewed. Directing the viewer’s focus to one part of an image, or taking
focus away from another allows the photographer to convey intent by dictating what
appears as important. In my work I reduced the area of the garden I was looking at,
attempting not to photograph the whole, but just a small part. However, through
photographing this small part I am attempting to allude to much more; to a whole
personal history to form continuity with ones self as memory.

In the final set of stories, Calvino has Mr Palomar examine his role within his
observations. He starts by claiming that Mr Palomar, “will be looking at things from the
outside.” (101). Attempting to explain Mr Palomar’s attitude in understanding this shift
of his observations, Calvino writes, “Yet it has always happened that certain things – a
stone wall, a seashell, a leaf a teapot – present themselves to him as if asking him for
minute and prolonged attention.” (101). This seems to speak to the practice of Kawauchi
and her attention to the smallest details, creating a sense of empathy with which the
viewer can relate to the content of the image, or in this instance, the reader can relate to.
Mr Palomar and his subjective relationship with the world is a relationship we can all
relate to as we all experience through our own histories and memories, we all have a
subjective relationship with the world before us and around us. In effect Mr Palomar is
also complying with Silverman’s insistence that vision is attracted rather than cast, that
something wants to be seen, rather than the eye intending to see it. Calvino reasserts this
suggestion by stating, “Mr Palomar has decided that from now on he will redouble his

21

attention: first, by not allowing these summons to escape him as they arrive from things;
second to attribute to the observer’s operation the importance it deserves.” (101).

In relation to the concept of a subjective viewpoint already discussed, Tuan states,
“Intimate occasions are often those on which we become passive and allow ourselves to
be vulnerable, exposed to the caress and sting of new experience” (137). He succinctly
describes how we must open ourselves up to those moments described by Calvino and
shown by Kawauchi. Tuan is stating that we must give up the act of searching for them
and allow those moments to appear before us. Seemingly agreeing with Silverman’s
suggestions that we are called to see, Tuan sets about describing a method for engaging
with the world through our vision, a method that is passive. Defining the relationship we
all have to place as, “Each intimate exchange has a locale which partakes in the quality of
the human encounter” Tuan is stating that reacting to the stimulus that calls our attention
has a direct relationship to the place we are present in (141). Place allots further
significance to these moments as place allocates these moments within specific
memories.

Tuan suggests that, “There is far more to experience than those elements we choose to
attend to. In large measure, culture dictates the focus and range of our awareness” (148).
Tuan is stating that culture influences and affects each person, meaning the specific
cultures in which we have grown up also affect our relationship with the larger world, as
well as influencing our relationship with others. Landscape too, falls into this category. It
affects our relationship with the world. The idea that there is “far more to experience

22

than those elements we choose to attend to” almost seems a poetic description of the
photographic frame. So when Tuan suggests that as individuals we can only ever do the
same, we can never see the whole, like Mr Palomar attempting to step back from the
world to see it but failing, we can never truly leave the world to observe it, for we are
always a part of it. Tuan goes on to describe the paradox that Mr Palomar finds himself
trapped within when he writes, “Thought creates distance and destroys the immediacy of
direct experience, yet it is by thoughtful reflection that the elusive moments of the past
draw near to us in present reality and gain a measure of permanence” (148). We see the
world like a photograph, limited by a frame of vision. This paradox allows the audience
to empathise with a photographer’s subjective experience, as we can never see the whole,
larger picture outside of our immediate vision and surroundings.

In considering my own relationship to place, I have explored my own relationship to the
specific landscapes of my homeland, England. I have spent time photographing the
coastline of the North East of Englandviii. The coastline from the North East is diverse;
covering sandy beaches, to high rocky cliffs, to industrialised towns, to empty, almost
uninhabited areas. This landscape has been an influence on the history of the region: in
terms of industry, it was a former mining and ship building hub; in terms of cultural
changes, it was a point from which religion and invaders such as the Vikings, entered the
British Isles. The Sea is a very definite entity that has affected many artists throughout
history. Thomas Joshua Cooper’s images from True described in the previous chapter

23

exemplify this, as does Hiroshi Sugimoto’s series Seascapes6, by acting upon an
acknowledgement of the influence of the sea upon people.

My own images were taken during winter, a particularly bleak time in the region where
the colours seem to be de-saturated into a mix of browns and greys. The photographs
were made during a time of introspection as I considered my own changing relationship
with this landscape I was in the process of leaving behind. Charting the coastline, the
images turn inland and also out to sea as considerations of this region are shown. The
land shows the history of the place, scars from industry, specific features, the topography
of the land. The images that look out become more introspective as they consider the
influence the sea has had upon the region and also personally upon myself. Through the
series of images I engage with Adams’ three verities by showing the geography, my
personal relationship with the landscape, and, through the alternating view of looking
inland and out to sea, offers a sense of metaphor as to the effects of the landscape on the
region and myself by offering a visualisation of my own act of looking out to the
6

In this evolving series of images, Sugimoto places his camera on top of a cliff
overlooking a sea and frames the photograph so that half the frame is filled with sea, the
other half sky. He then records this potentially identical image numerous times at many
points upon many seas. Whilst each image appears different due to light and weather
conditions, the underlying composition is identical. The lack of any defining landmarks
or gestures within the images makes identifying where the images geographically are
almost impossible. Michael Fried eloquently describes the repetitive composition of
Seascapes as; “all have the same extremely simple internal structure though they also
differ considerably from one another depending on lighting and weather conditions and
the precise state of the water.” (294). The only information we are given is contained
within the title Sugimoto gives each image, which offers a geographic location, for
example each image carries a country name and the name of a specific sea or ocean.
Sugimoto has spoken coherently of his ideas behind his project, addressing his
relationship to The Sea within some of his writings and talks. The Sea becomes almost a
character of childhood memory and imagining for Sugimoto, visiting him in half dreams
and obscure moments (Kellein 91).
24

landscape and looking internally to my subjective view. Further, I am controlling vision
and intent, and building up a story examining my internal and external relationship with
the landscape. Through this simple act of looking in and out I am directing the viewers
attention to my own relationship with landscape.

As Mr Palomar considers his troubles with his attempts to bear witness to the world, he
ponders on his place within it. He comes to the conclusion that to really see the world he
must step back to be outside its parameters. However, he realises his problem with this
conclusion; he is contained within the world, so he can never step outside of its
parameters to reconsider it. Mr Palomar then realises he will only see the world as and
when it calls to him to be seen. He may see objects before him but cannot force
significance upon what he sees, concluding that he will only feel an emotional connection
when something calls to be seen. The significance in Mr Palomar’s struggles is that
through his observations he offers a photographic like representation of the world he is
contained within. He describes the topography of his surroundings, and describes his
internalised personal relationship to what is around him. Finally he expands upon that
immediate relationship by attempting to understand the links between his solipsistic inner
world and the exterior world he physically inhabits. In many ways he describes the
geography, autobiography and metaphor that make up Robert Adams’ three verities.
Importantly, Mr Palomar describes his world through the specific framing of his
subjective view, and much like the photograph’s frame, it shows a specifically chosen
view.

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Chapter 4 - An Explanation Of Neither Here Nor There

My Thesis Project, Neither Here Nor Thereix, represents my relationship with two
specific landscapes. To indicate a sense of displacement, that I am emotionally between
places, it has been entitled Neither Here Nor There. This is suggestive of my personal
position of having left one place to arrive in another, and finding that I am being
influenced in this new place by memories of the previous place. One place is the
landscape of my childhood, in the North East of England. The other is of Vancouver and
its immediate surroundings, this is the landscape of my adulthood.

The images seek to dissect and examine my subjective relationship to each individual
place shown. The photographs are separated into two categories for each locale. The
first is a series of landscapes while the second is a series of photographs concentrating on
interior spaces. Both these types of places, interior and exterior, are shown side by side
in contrast to each other. The contemplation of place as described by Yi Fu Tuan is
deeply imbedded within my work. Tuan surveys the differing associations we make
regarding home, and its importance within many facets of our lives. As I have explored
my own position within the world and my specific relationship to the two locations, I
have imbued these places with personal significance and importance as they represent the
place of my childhood and the place of my adulthood. The aim in this is to consider the
concept of home by examining different definitions of what home represents. Home can
be the house, the building one shelters in, but it can also be expanded out to be a land or
landscape (Tuan 144-145).

26

The act of taking the images has been based around observing the places depicted, and
considering my personal relationship to them. Each image is considered via the filter of
my personal perspective. I have my own memories of each place. These memories are
the starting point for my re-examinations of place, which, ostensibly, is what these
photographs are. The reasoning behind each image is essentially private, something I, the
photographer, will not openly share with the viewer, but which I use in a metaphorical
way to frame the image. I am enticing the viewer in with an unexplained, unobtainable,
and intangible reasoning – my own.

The images shown are part of a growing series. The intent is to have between ten and
fifteen images for each geographical region. The images from England explore my
memories and experiences associated with the region, and the images from Vancouver
show my explorations of this place through experiencing it first hand. The use of a series
allows each pairing of images to delve into it’s own story of memory and experience
whilst offering a description of the locale, whilst the overall effect of the series describes
my overarching sense of each place. It allows me to be suggestive without being direct in
each image, as they are only a segment of a larger representation of my relationship to the
two defining places depicted in the series.

The interior photographs are concerned with small details within the spaces depicted,
objects that can allude to a specific memory without ever informing the viewer what that
memory may actually be. There is a deliberate ambiguity within these images so as to be

27

suggestive, they act as signifiers and clues to the viewer, but without ever stating why I
am specifically looking at this. At times they seem like they could carry a weight of
significance, but do not suggest what this significance is or where it stems from. The
worn armrest of an old chair could be representative of many moments in the past that are
personal to the photographer, but can also carry a weight with the viewer’s memories of
home too. The viewer is left with a freedom, through a lack of specificity, to impose
their own interpretations and experiences onto the photographs. A shower curtain
photographed with an almost deadpan banality carries a lot less narrative and is much
harder to read. What associations can one make with a shower curtain? Again this
ambiguity as to why the camera has been trained on this specific object and framed in
such a way is intended as an invitation for the viewer to participate in the reading of the
image. Often there is a deliberate use of depth of field or focus to obscure aspects of the
image. This pushes other elements or details within each image sharply into or out of
focus, directing the eye of the viewer to specific details within the image. The question
the viewer must consider is “What exactly is the photographer intending me to see?”
Though I offer up an image, I deliberately make the point obtuse, not wanting to state
why I am showing this particular image. Yet within the image I am deliberately directing
the viewer’s eye.

By contrast the landscape photographs act as descriptions of two geographic places. But
within this concept of description there is a banality of content and a generic sensibility
within the composition. Through this a lack of specificity is offered to the viewer. The
importance this has upon the images is that rather than stating where the image is, it

28

states where it is not. This is the entry point for the viewer. To the viewer the images
show non-places rather than specific locations, however to myself, the photographer they
show locales in which memory is based. Again, information is deliberately withheld
from the viewer, preventing the images from being documents, or documentary in intent,
and enhancing their subjective nature, much like Kawauchi’s images cannot be described
as documents. There is no polemic about either place, but instead a subtler attempt to
confer a personal relationship onto this non-place. To further emphasise this, within the
images taken around Vancouver, where the city is heavily present throughout, the
banality of the quotidian world takes the place of the emptiness of the landscapes from
England. Within both sets of images there is a lack of direct human presence. This
emphasises my intent as the images are rooted in memory. A memory cannot be
reproduced for another person. So although my photographs use personal memory as a
starting point, and this cannot be re-conveyed to the viewer, I am asking the viewer to
accept the importance of the content without describing the significance of the memory
that lies at its base. Importantly it further imposes my subjectivity onto the images and
further removes the ability of the images to be descriptive documents.

The exterior photographs from both places have been taken whilst on walks7, and are a
product of my response to this experience. As stated my personal memory becomes the
fundamental reason for taking these photographs. I am constructing these images as a
7

Walking is a significant act, loaded with meaning and historical importance and is a
prevalent tool in many forms of art and writing. Notable influences on my own thoughts
around the act of walking include Robert Walser, W G Sebald and Rebecca Solnit. My
use of the walk enables me to slow down the process of my vision. By this I mean it
allows me to be present within the physical world and let it influence and affect me.
Walking offers time to stop and reflect on the relationship I have with the physical world.
29

result of my responses. My view of these landscapes is grounded in my personal and
subjective experience, as I stated earlier, and they are not intended as factual
representations of any historic and geographic location. Exemplifying this subjective and
deeply personal relationship with the landscape is an important part of the project. It
represents the invisible connections we all have through memory and experience to Place.
The Place of our childhood is deeply significant as it is the starting point of our
explorations into the larger world. As Tuan states, we start with the comfort of the cradle
of parents arm and branch outwards (138). Through these images I have re-explored
memories, considered why I still feel drawn to these places through childhood
remembrances. The image becomes a representation of the present landscape though my
relationship with it based on an older memory invisible to the viewer. My former
experiences and memories of this place can be re-valued by actually being present there
once again. Importantly, I am also able to re-examine these places through the filter of
the photographic process. Taking Sontag’s concerns with regard to the camera mediating
experience - that the camera acts as a barrier from experiencing the world - in this use the
camera acts as a focusing tool. The camera allows me to use the process of photography
to permit myself to consider more than the world directly in front of me, making the
resultant photograph more than a mere reaction to the world, but a considered response to
my being present in a place where my personal memory already exists.

By contrast the landscapes from Vancouver and the surrounding area are explorations of
a place in which I am currently resident. They record the construction of memory rather
than the reliving of it. Whilst based within my immediate scope of experience and

30

memory, these images have more in common with Barthes’ idea of the punctum and
Silverman’s concepts on the authority of vision, as I am exploring the landscape,
experiencing it first hand, making photographs that are influenced by this immediacy of
experience. They are recorded reactions to the physical world as witnessed by my
presence within it. They are images based on an interaction with and a reaction to the
world. Through this the world is offered an opportunity to express itself by affecting my
vision and attraction, much in the way Silverman has described. These are images based
on a physical interaction with the world, but based in a subjective reaction of what that
exterior world is doing to my self. Moreover, through this interaction the world is
offered an opportunity to express itself, via the visible landscape, through the photograph,
in this instance my photograph. The relationship between what I see and why I see at a
particular moment is allowed to flourish, unlike the interior images, or indeed the
landscapes from England, where I enforced my own intent onto the resulting image.

As I explore Vancouver, creating new experiences, I build up a body of memories of this
place through the act of photographing. These images become a documentation of
exploration, but unlike traditional documentations of place, they are heavily affected by
my own subjective vision and attractions. I focus on what I am drawn to, rather than any
specific topographic or factual representation. While I may be in a visual relationship
with the world, each photograph I make is carefully constructed. Each image is deeply
autobiographical as it shows my presence within these places.

31

Mr Palomar’s observational exercises have affected how I have approached this project.
Having considered my relationship to specific places, in a manner described by Tuan of
many individuals’ relationships with the concept of home, my next act was to consider
how I would observe these places in order to photograph them. By considering how one
looks at the physical world, and the attention given to specific objects or scenes, allows
me to further investigate my own relationship to specific places. Calvino uses Mr
Palomar to explore an individual’s relationship with the world they are contained within,
both physically via the external tangible world and internally through their subjective
experience of the same world. By considering how I am drawn to a place and then
discovering what in that place draws me further into taking a photograph, be it memory
or attraction, allows me greater control over my photographs. The framing of the content
becomes more considered, influencing how the image will look, and how it will relate
within the series.

The pairing of the images is an important aspect of the project. These pairings are based
on formal qualities, choosing images that complement each other and offer an intriguing
composition, rather than a direct relationship between interior and exterior, which would
be difficult to construct. I state this because all the images are linked yet still separate
entities in their own right. By linking these images the viewer again must consider why
they are being shown these different places and what within them seems to be thrown
into focus and why. And likewise, what is obscured and why.

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To summarise, the photographs in this project are deliberately constructed through my
subjectivity. They are paired, interior and exterior, to form a dialogue between two quite
different places, both of which I refer to as home. Charting cityscapes, agricultural
landscapes, mountains, forests and seascapes and contrasting this exterior world with the
interior space of the abode, also referred to as home, the images chart my personal sense
of Place within the larger physical world. The importance of this is to state “This is
England! And this is Canada!” further, to state, “I regard this place as home and this
place as home.” In effect I am attempting to realise Robert Adams’ statement from the
beginning of this essay; “a rediscovery and revaluation of where we find ourselves” (20).
Adams’ statement describes the methodology behind my practice and an entry point for
the viewer to access the work. By offering this access point I allow for the viewer to
empathise with the image and its contents. This project is a rediscovery and revaluation
of where I find myself through my own subjective viewpoint. As discussed earlier in this
paper, the viewer will bring their own histories of experience to bear on the photographs,
and this is beyond the control of the photographer, it affects how the image is received.
However, I have asserted my own intent by representing my subjective vision and
experience of these places, and I am claiming this authorship as still significant in the
understanding of the photographic image.

33

Works Cited
Adams, Robert. Beauty In Photography. Singapore. Aperture Foundation. 1996.
Barthes, Roland. Camera Lucida. London. Random House. 2000.
---. The Death Of The Author. Hill And Wang. 1978
Calvino, Italo. Mr Palomar. London. Vintage Classics. 1999.
Cooper, Thomas Joshua. True. London. Haunch of Venison. 2009.
---. Exposicion: True de Thomas Joshua Cooper.
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ifzatCLgTZs>. 2010.
---. The World’s Edge: The Atlantic Basin Project. Lecture at The Glasgow School of
Art. <http://www.gsa.ac.uk/life/gsa-events/events/thomas-joshua-cooper/#tjc>. 2008.
Fried, Michael. Why Photography Matters as Art as Never Before. New Haven. Yale
University Press. 2008.
Kawauchi, Rinko. The Eyes, The Ears. Foil. Tokyo. 2005.
---, Mayalina. 10 Questions to Rinko Kawauchi About Photography.
<http://pingmag.jp/2006/08/11/10-questions-to-rinko-kawauchi-about-photography>.
2006
Matsumoto, Taka and Hiroshi Sugimoto, Hiroshi Sugimoto: Catalogue. Ostfildern. Hatje
Cantz Verlag, 2010.
Merleau-Ponty, Maurice. What is Phenomenology? The Merleau-Ponty Reader. Ed. Ted
Toadvine and Leonard Lawlor. Northwestern University Press. 2007.
Sebald, W.G. The Emmigrants. New York. New Directions Paperbook. 1997.
---. The Rings of Saturn. New York. New Directions Paperbook. 1999.

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Silverman, Kaja. ‘The Language of Things’ World Spectators. Stanford. Stanford
University Press, 2000.
Solnit, Rebecca. The Field Guide To Getting Lost. New York. Viking Penguin. 2005.
Sontag, Susan. On Photography. Toronto. McGraw-Hill Ryerson. 1977.
Sugimoto, Hiroshi. Hiroshi Sugimoto: Seascapes Nightscapes: Hall of Thirty-Three Bays,
Gallery of Contemporay Art, Lewis & Clark College, September 7 to October 22, 2000.
Portland. Or: The Gallery. 2000.
--- Hiroshi Sugimoto: Time Exposed London. Thames and Hudson. 1995.
Tuan, Yi Fu. Space and Place. Minnesota. University of Minnesota Press. 2011.
Walser, Robert. The Walk, Selected Stories. New York. The New York Review Of
Books. 1982.

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i

Fig. 1 - Adam Stenhouse. From The Series; Lake Kennedy. 2010

36

ii

Fig. 2 - Thomas Joshua Cooper. “uncharted dangers” – blanketing dense fog, The
Bransfield Strait, The Mouth of The Antarctic Sound, Looking towards Prime Head,
“Catherine Island”, Antarctica. 2008.
© Thomas Joshua Cooper

37

iii

Fig. 4 - Rinko Kawauchi. Untitled From The Eyes, The Ears. 2005.

38

iv

Fig. 5 - Rinko Kawauchi. Untitled From The Eyes, The Ears. 2005

39

v

Fig. 5 - Rinko Kawauchi. Untitled From The Eyes, The Ears. 2005

40

vi

Fig. 6 - Rinko Kawauchi. Untitled From The Eyes, The Ears. 2005.

41

vii

Fig. 7 - Adam Stenhouse. The Garden III. 2011.

42

Fig. 8 - Adam Stenhouse. The Garden I. 2011.

43

viii

Fig. 9 - Adam Stenhouse. Untitled 2011.

Fig. 10 - Adam Stenhouse. Untitled 2011.
44

Fig. 11 - Adam Stenhouse. Untitled 2011.

45

ix

Fig. 12 - Adam Stenhouse. Neither Here. 2012.

Fig. 13 - Adam Stenhouse. Nor There. 2012.

46