Malcolm Venville

L3

MALCOLM VENVILLE – PHOTOGRAPHER

I came across Malcolm Venville’s book ‘Layers’ in the college library whilst browsing the shelves. I had seen it on the shelf before but it was too big to take home that day. And how big it is when you start to read it, despite it’s size. And the quality of the images is great. Coming from a very different background where both his parents were profoundly deaf, he develop the ability to listen with his eyes. He was a quite and contemplative man, but sort out great interest with technique and innovation. Nothing new today then, even with our development in technology.

Some of his photos appear to me to bland and uninteresting, except for the fact that when studies they carry an unseen message at first glance. He was greatly influenced by Cartier-Bresson, and wandered the streets looking for something to photograph. Bearing in mind that he was using film, and did not want to crop his photographs, the effort to create his images was great. And it was by the use of one image that he managed to get into the Polytechnic of Central London to study photography.

Despite a controversial start to his portfolio, he produced some excellent portraits, some of which I have included for study. The study of his first commissioned portrait shows his vision as he went out to buy the suit in the model is wearing in the portrait, which is quite dynamic. His brief, for Adidas, lead to him producing an image of just a foot, but carefully taken, as he states “a long shutter speed can turn something ugly into an image”. I like the image of Minor White, with the expression that he has caught; I would like to replicate something similar, as the image is quite striking, as is the model of course. His range of portraits in quite extraordinary, but they are very similar in a lot of cases, as is some of Rankins work, with the style of lighting etc. The expressions that have been captured are the key to the interest of theses images, they make the image.

What I find remarkable about his images is his choice of camera for taking many of his images. And the choice of film and developing techniques that he used to get the image that he wanted. A good example of this is the image of his assistant. He states that you will never get the photographic depth on 35mm, only on a 10” x 8” camera, fully open. Can this image be produced to day with the modern Digital Camera? Or do we have to revert to medium foarmat, or borrow a 10” x 8” camera.