[Photographer Profile] #2 Sineadw

sineadw

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Hi. My name is Sinead McDonald. I don’t take photographs.
Or at least not at the moment, or very much. But in a roundabout way, I do so every day. Let me explain:

I started taking photos relatively recently - about 2005 or so. I was given an ancient film slr and instantly fell in love. I’d always wanted to create images, but I *cannot* draw or paint to save my life. The control a camera gave me was like someone switching a light on in my head. I started off shooting anything and everything, got myself a digital SLR so I could shoot MOAR anything and everything. I did gig photography for a bit, but soon got bored of going to venues where there were more photographers than punters. It was about this time I went back to college.

I can’t understate what that experience has done for me. It’s opened up a whole new world. I’ve been able to explore all the various forms, with portraiture and fine art documentary rising to the top of the pile. My life now revolves around them, portraiture especially at the moment.

I’m currently in the final year of a fine art Masters at NCAD, having graduated from a media degree specialising in photography and multimedia, and I’m starting to look at Doctoral options. Not that there are many. We’ll see..

Enough background - work!

I guess Vet was the first proper body of work I made. Or the first one I’m really proud of anyway. I followed Dakar around for 18 months, shadowing him at work in the surgery and sometimes at home. Even though I’d had cameras for years at this point and would have considered myself both technically and artistically on firm ground, it was still a revelation just how much I learned from total immersion in one subject, with one lens, one focus, one processing technique, one focal length.. And editing thousands upon thousands of photographs down to a cohesive group of 30 or so for the book and 13 for the exhibition with Darren was of incalculable value. I would recommend it to *anyone* trying to get serious about their work.







In fourth year of my degree I started to look seriously at portraiture for the first time - from an academic as well as an artistic viewpoint. I was messing about with historical processes



And large format film photography



And it started to hit home just how these different processes altered the viewer’s reading of the image, especially those of people. I developed the idea into a masters research proposal and have been working on it ever since. In a nutshell, I’m examining where exactly the authorship and narrative come from in portraits and images of people - the photographer, the sitter, the viewer, or the technology. The ones above - the large format ones - were very much controlled by me - what the sitter wore, how they sat, I even tortured them with 2 hr sittings for 3 or 4 negatives, and the huge camera stuck right in their face to assert my dominance over the image (I didn’t tell them that at the time ).

For the First Fortnight festival last year I produced a series of 108 portraits over six weeks, with 108 accompanying text panels, displayed in a grid in mirror image form. As well as being about mental health and stigma, from an academic point of view it was about the sitter as author - each person had as much control as I could give them without losing unity, and each became author with their text panel.







(more about the project at http://sineadmcdonald.com/facing.html )

Recently I’ve been exploring photographs from around the back of photography somewhere. I’ve started to explore video more as a way to look at authorship and photographs, odd as that may sound. I built an installation piece for a show in The Lab that looked at the viewer as author, by giving improv actors texts from dating websites and asking them to improvise a character:



http://vimeo.com/41286096 (sorry - no Vimeo embed code )



(more about that one at http://sineadmcdonald.com/disconnect.html )

And I even built a victorian penny arcade machine for Maker Faire in the Science Gallery over the summer - meet Dr Dupas’ Phrenologiscope and Psycheograph, which looked at the idea of technology as author of a portrait - something I’m becoming increasingly interested in (my Masters is based around art and technology). This was brilliant fun - poked holes at the victorian concept that the skull of a person could reveal their personality by reading your lumps and bumps and then printing a readout for you:



(more at http://sineadmcdonald.com/phrenologiscope.html )

I’ve gone back to messing with historical processes to look at that further - at the moment I’m working with wet plate collodion.



I love that one minute I’m trying not to kill myself doing that, the next i’m trying not to kill myself with arduino and electronics projects

I’m currently working on two things (well, about 5 actually, but two main ones..) which are outside photography but looking directly at it. One is a series of light installations based on last year’s First Fortnight work, again for the festival, and another a maybe-not-successful-but-that-was-kind-of-the-point attempt to make portraits directly from landscape video pieces. I think at this stage i’m starting to confuse even *myself* with that one.

As much as I’m absolutely loving the more fine art installation work I’ve been doing recently, I’m really looking forward to getting back to straight stills documentary. I can’t really devote time at the moment, but I have two projects I’ve done some preliminary work on that I hope to pick up after I graduate next year.

Did anyone make it this far? You can all blame Daire. If you’d like to read/see more about the stuff I’ve done, there’s a bit up at http://sineadmcdonald.com and if you want to get an idea of what I’m getting up to at the moment and into the future, I keep a research/projects tumblr at http://sineadw.tumblr.com/

magicbastarder

i think you've answered more questions than people would have thought of asking!

sineadw

magicbastarder wrote: »

i think you've answered more questions than people would have thought of asking!

I was thinking maybe i'd just bored you all to death

EyeBlinks

All looks mighty impressive.

1) Where do you find the time

2) Where do you see yourself ending up in the photographic world ?

3) Do you see yourself primarily as a photographer (making photographs) or more acedemic as you say "outside photography but looking directly at it"

4) Do you feel there is some kinda normal living to be made out of photography as an artist still ?

5) I know you have strong views on this, so talk to us about your opinions on the importance of process

magicbastarder

6) what is photography for?

dakar

sineadw wrote: »

I would recommend it to *anyone* trying to get serious about their work.

But ye can find someone else to follow around, I'm all documented out

sineadw

EyeBlinks wrote: »

All looks mighty impressive.

1) Where do you find the time

2) Where do you see yourself ending up in the photographic world ?

3) Do you see yourself primarily as a photographer (making photographs) or more acedemic as you say "outside photography but looking directly at it"

4) Do you feel there is some kinda normal living to be made out of photography as an artist still ?

5) I know you have strong views on this, so talk to us about your opinions on the importance of process

1. I'm *extremely* lucky in that this is kind of my full time job atm. It's a practice based masters - we're there to make work and not necessarily to write about it or attend classes. Although we do both. A bit I do have to stop myself from trying to respond to *everything* that interests me though. Which I fully realise is a fantastic complaint to have.

2. Oh god.. I dunno as yet. Hopefully practising and teaching. From a work point of view you mean? The arduino/more leftfield stuff doesn't really fit into contemporary art practice (you tell me how many pieces there were in the RHA show this year that had plugs..), and photography still struggles to be taken seriously. Although that's changing. I seem to be going into a niche thing based around science and art. I still want to work in documentary though. Again, I dunno.. I tend to fall into things. Definitely documentary though.

3. When I read this earlier, my first instinct was to say 'photographer!'. TBH though I think I'm probably somewhere in the middle. Or both, actually. You can be both Practice is the most important thing. Research informs that. And I love writing. You'd never have guessed that, would you? I feel at home in academia more than I've ever felt in my life though. If I can I'll do the doctorate. And given a choice, I'm guessing I'd want to do post doctoral as well. But always practice based.

4. Hah! No. Unless you're EXTREMELY lucky. And can talk the talk. And you're EXTREMELY lucky. I know people who move from residency to residency and eek out a living that way, but it's hardly something you'd secure a mortgage on or bring up kids in. I'll teach if I can. I'm trying not to think too much about it at the moment. Hence the doctorate

5.

The image is the most important thing, but I *do* think that process has a HUGE impact on how we view images. Or it can have. And I'm not talking 'film is better than digital' or 'medium format has more pixels'. I mean how the technology we use puts its own mark on the image that's separate to that of the photographer, or the subject. Take the wet plate of Kyle above for instance. You lose a LOT in a digital scan, but the object has a texture and a very specific look and feel and even a smell (lavender - from the varnish) that invokes ideas of age and travel. It should never be the main draw of a picture, but I don't think you can discount its part in what you read from it. That's an obvious example, but there are more subtle ones in pretty much every form of photography, to a greater or lesser extent.

magicbastarder wrote: »

6) what is photography for?

Jaysis.. that's kind of a how long is a piece of string question. You mean for me? Hmm.. It's a way for me to present and re-present ideas and concepts I have in my head about things. Again, I can't draw for sh!t, so it's the only way I have of getting things in my head into the physical world. And to a lesser extent, of framing things that are already in the world in a way I can control. I think all photography is an exercise in controlling your environment. I think What is photography for for you?

dakar wrote: »

But ye can find someone else to follow around, I'm all documented out

You should set up a little sideline. 'Will look menacing for food'.

magicbastarder

i'm going to do a masters in photography, and my thesis will be documenting someone doing a masters in photography.

sineadw

magicbastarder wrote: »

i'm going to do a masters in photography, and my thesis will be documenting someone doing a masters in photography.

I'd be laying bets it's been done

humberklog

Tommy's and MB's questions were brilliant as we're your answers.



If the option to study photography/art directly after finishing school was an option do you think you'd have benefitted or were your life experiences gathered more important to bringing you to where you are now?

EyeBlinks

Did you really go to finishing school ? :cool:

sineadw

humberklog wrote: »

If the option to study photography/art directly after finishing school was an option do you think you'd have benefitted or were your life experiences gathered more important to bringing you to where you are now?

Definitely life experiences. I went to college when I was 17. The whole thing is a blur - a completely wasted opportunity. But that's me - there are a lot of young undergrads in the college with amazing heads on their shoulders who are doing unbelievable work, so I wouldn't say it's a general rule! There are things in my head that weren't there 20 (jesus..) years ago though. And things that have happened to me that changed the way I see. So, yes. For me.

sineadw

EyeBlinks wrote: »

Did you really go to finishing school ? :cool:

Of course. In Switzerland. Doesn't it show?

magicbastarder

these threads, in order to live up to the title, should include profile photos of the photographers.

sineadw

magicbastarder wrote: »

these threads, in order to live up to the title, should include profile photos of the photographers.

pullandbang

Not a question per se, but having done your print workshop I have to say your presentation and knowledge generated a "passion" in me for print. Up to that I'd bung my stuff off to photobox and wait for it to arrive in the post.
Now I spend much more time preparing the files for print and derive a huge amount of pleasure from sitting in front of the Epson in Rua Red watching my A3+ emerge.

The preparation for print is actually quite technical as borne out by your explanations for each step, however your ability to explain it all in simple terms makes you a great teacher. If you can make a muppet like me understand it you are a natural instructor.

sineadw

FoxT

Hi Sinead,
I have a few questions!

Photographs have become ubiquitous. Mobile phones today can take photos that are technically better than the leicas or nikons of the 70's ...at a time when Susan Sontag wrote of the ubiquity of photographs! Do you think this is a good or bad thing?

- I was wowed by your vet exhibition - as an on-off amateur, I have a vague idea of how much work went into it - ie I know it was enormous, but have no idea, really - yet all the photos look 'normal', I could see how non-photographers might think 'sure I could have done that, all you need to do is to be there'...what impact do you think this has on photography as an artistic medium?

- You took thousands of photos & distilled them down to 30-40. I am sure you have hundreds more of fine photographs, that have not been seen. How do you feel about that? How would you compare the work process of photography (where so much is discarded) vs, say, words (where so much is kept) ?

I hope this isnt too heavy! but having read this thread a few days ago these Q's sorta bubbled up.

Thanks!

-FoxT

sineadw

FoxT wrote: »

Hi Sinead,
I have a few questions!

Photographs have become ubiquitous. Mobile phones today can take photos that are technically better than the leicas or nikons of the 70's ...at a time when Susan Sontag wrote of the ubiquity of photographs! Do you think this is a good or bad thing?

- I was wowed by your vet exhibition - as an on-off amateur, I have a vague idea of how much work went into it - ie I know it was enormous, but have no idea, really - yet all the photos look 'normal', I could see how non-photographers might think 'sure I could have done that, all you need to do is to be there'...what impact do you think this has on photography as an artistic medium?

- You took thousands of photos & distilled them down to 30-40. I am sure you have hundreds more of fine photographs, that have not been seen. How do you feel about that? How would you compare the work process of photography (where so much is discarded) vs, say, words (where so much is kept) ?

I hope this isnt too heavy! but having read this thread a few days ago these Q's sorta bubbled up.

Thanks!

-FoxT

Hmmmm! Interesting questions.. I think maybe the first two are linked? I think it's brilliant how digital cameras have democratised photography. I'm a full-blown instagram addict, and I happily snap my life. I love running through my stream there, watching other people's moments of ordinariness. I think it's its biggest appeal. And yep - it's taken a lot of the mystique from the craft of photography as people realise they can take just as good a photograph as Ansel Adams. It *is* just being there in a sense.

A few thoughts on that though- as I've said before, I could make a decent stab at a Picasso, but it wouldn't have any value (not for a SECOND comparing Vet to Picasso, but you know what I mean hopefully!). I wonder what the general population thought when he first moved away from his representative paintings and started to do abstract work. I'm sure people thought 'I could do that!'. But the point is, they didn't.

And ignoring even that, getting to a more fundamental level - I look at Adams and I think meh. I've seen his prints in person, on a huge scale. They were technically wonderful, beautifully printed, wow, but they did absolutely nothing for me. I talked about this with my head of dept the other day (he's an accomplished photographer) when we were going over my landscape-as-portrait project. He's seen the original negatives the Adams prints came from, and he said there was a LOT of darkroom manipulation to make them more dramatic. We talked about how landscape photographers of the time seemed to be in a competition to out-wow each other. Dramatic skies, dramatic mountains, the more drama the better (my project is based partly in a midland's bog - not exactly sweeping, majestic vistas ). I think maybe that's the down side of the camera's ubiquity for me? To an extent, there seems to be a race to get the biggest wow, and quieter everyday moments are discarded as boring. Again, that's why instagram is so great IMHO. In a lot of ways I'd rather look at it than flickr or pixie. There was a Paul Graham exhibition in the Douglas Hyde that finished a week or two ago that tried (and I think didn't completely manage) to elevate the ordinary. I like work like that - where it's not about the instant gratification of the image's beauty, but makes you look a bit deeper, and think. Maybe ubiquity is drowning that. On the other hand, maybe it's making it more important. I dunno. Bet you're sorry you asked now

On the last point, which I guess is related to the others, editing down work is something that's perhaps most difficult to get a handle on if you're teaching yourself photography or watching YouTube videos or whatever. It's a skill that is for some work anyway, more important than the photographs you take. My first day shooting on Vet, as I know you know, I took 1200 photos :eek: It was a defence thing as I wasn't expecting the blood and gore. Not one of them made it to the end I don't think. I have methods to do it where the good stuff eventually floats to the top. If you're not careful you dilute all your good photos by leaving one bad one in. I'm not so good at editing words (as you can see), but my partner's a writer, and he's very careful. I asked him about this this morning though and he said 'a picture paints a thousand words'. Apart from being silly, he's right. You need a lot less to get a narrative across when you're using images. There are none that were left out of Vet that I now wish had been left in, even though I might have struggled with a few at the time. I had help with that from my photography lecturer, and I think we did a good job.

Made me think - thanks

EyeBlinks

Any thoughts on what you'd like to do a doctorate on?

magicbastarder

sineadw wrote: »

He's seen the original negatives the Adams prints came from, and he said there was a LOT of darkroom manipulation to make them more dramatic. We talked about how landscape photographers of the time seemed to be in a competition to out-wow each other. Dramatic skies, dramatic mountains, the more drama the better (my project is based partly in a midland's bog - not exactly sweeping, majestic vistas ). I think maybe that's the down side of the camera's ubiquity for me?

i've actually lost interest to a large extent in landscape photography as a result of this; you see a lot of photos on the forum here which are visibly manipulated, and if it's visibly manipulated, i lose interest immediately. it undermines the photograph, because it's advertising itself as not reflecting reality.

sineadw

EyeBlinks wrote: »

Any thoughts on what you'd like to do a doctorate on?

None yet. Gonna take a year out, do some work and think about a proposal. Submissions are in January, and I'd be nowhere near ready this year..

EyeBlinks

sineadw wrote: »

I have methods to do it where the good stuff eventually floats to the top.

Care to share ?

sineadw

EyeBlinks wrote: »

Care to share ?

Ah you know - I do a first pass in Lightroom or Bridge or whatever, then leave it a day or two, then do a second pass. I grade everything each time, and then I print the best ones as 6x4s from a crappy cheapo machine. Then I put those prints up on a wall will bluetack, and I live with them. I move them around, take some off.. Then I start to see what absolutely needs to be there and what I can lose. I *always* lose the ones that aren't strong - one weak shot can kill a whole series as I've said before. The I start editing the good ones.

Through all this though, or from the printed stage at least, I get as much feedback as possible from people whose eye I trust. Having a test audience stops you from getting tunnel vision on a project and can lead you to things you'd never have seen yourself.

stcstc

sineadw wrote: »

Through all this though, or from the printed stage at least, I get as much feedback as possible from people whose eye I trust. Having a test audience stops you from getting tunnel vision on a project and can lead you to things you'd never have seen yourself.

you also need to learn to edit peoples opinions when you do this

else what you do is end up with a body of work to please the masses. although i guess depending on the purpose of the work, this might be what is required!!

sineadw

Which is absolutely why i have the phrase 'from people whose eye i trust' in there. I'm talking about a small core of three or four, alongside critique sessions with the other masters students. Then yep - decide what you take from that and what you don't. It's your work, but it's good to bounce it off some people at times.

stcstc wrote: »

sineadw wrote: »

Through all this though, or from the printed stage at least, I get as much feedback as possible from people whose eye I trust. Having a test audience stops you from getting tunnel vision on a project and can lead you to things you'd never have seen yourself.

you also need to learn to edit peoples opinions when you do this

else what you do is end up with a body of work to please the masses. although i guess depending on the purpose of the work, this might be what is required!!

stcstc

yea i agree

what i was trying to convey is its easy to get caught up in opinions during those kinda discussions. even with people you trust and rate their opinions, because its not human nature to be able to not be biased sometimes as you say its learning to take from the discussion what helps