This exhibition looked at how different international photographers have captured Britain from the 1930's to present day. This exhibition included very famous photographers including Henri Cartier-Bresson, to previously unseen images from Japanese artist Shinro Ohtake, who captured his images in the 70's without being able to speak a single work of English.
Instead of looking into the ways that the different photographers captured Britain, I wanted to focus on the different ways they had displayed their images because I needed to know this to help influence my own exhibition techniques.
Two photographers techniques worked the best for me which were portraits by Bruce Gilden and a display of photos of 1970s Britain by Shinro Ohtake.
Above you can see the exhibition piece's by Bruce Gilden. What I think about the format of displaying is how large he has printed his images, this creates a huge impact for the viewer. The scale of the images invites the viewer into studying each little detail of the portraits in length. If he had just printed the images in a smaller size, the viewer wouldn't be able to see the smaller details in the subjects face which makes it less intimate. Gilden is forcing the viewer to study each little mark and indent on his subjects face which makes you come away feeling like you know everything about the subject.
Above are the images by Shinro Ohtake. What I like about how he has displayed his images is the fact that they are fixed closely too the wall, meaning that they almost look like they are fixed directly onto the wall. I think for his images this technique works well, because it represents how he had a very fixed view on Britain because he couldn't speak the language which meant he found it difficult to interact with people. I also think thats why are less intimate with his subjects, and he doesn't photograph anyone closely because he felt it difficult to connect with them on the same level that Gilden did.
Looking at the two sets of images, Gilden's huge exhibition pieces invite the viewer into the image to view each little detail in the subjects face. He has mounted his images in frames but without glass, to make sure that he doesn't put any distance between the viewer, I think this technique works very well for his images. Ohtake has multiple small images, which are fixed almost directly onto the wall. I feel he has done this because he had a very fixed and distant view to England, so he wanted his viewers to look at his images like they are viewing the scenes from afar.