In apparent homage, Chris Fortescue constructs photographic mise-en-scene
or tableaux which conform to some of the more exemplary optical illusions
within psychology: Schroder's reversible staircase and Thiery's contrary
perspective figure; the Ponzo illusion; the impossible figures of Penrose
and Penrose; and many more [1]. As with most optical illusions, the
viewer is encouraged to respond to contradictory visual cues which manifest
a visual paradox, in this case achieved by the peculiar, distorted form
of the subject matter in its photographic representation.
The
illusion in Fortescue's work, shown recently at the Victorian Centre
for Photography, is in the association of photography with a rationalised
system of representation (a system which approximates the laws of perception
through perspective and composition and which in fact may function with
as much veracity in painting as in photography). In Fortescue's Cibachromes,
this association leads to an error in our perception of contradictory
forms and spaces and is perhaps a subtle critique of the originary role
accorded photography within the visual arts. As Pierre Francastel observes:
"Photography
. . . has made visible not the real character of traditional vision
but, on the contrary, its systematic character" [2].
It
becomes possible, then, to dissociate the system from the practice of
photography by identifying conventions derived from its social use or
function, and to subvert the expectations which accompany those conventions.
But
perhaps Fortescue's photographs have more in common with M. C. Escher
than Rodchenko. The radical import of Escher's art lies in forcing the
viewer to acknowledge the limits of a system of representation by observing
its dysfunction within the image. The illusion first involves the viewer's
affirmation of certain laws and principles by which things appear, and
secondly the realisation that such laws are arbitrary and falsifiable
within a system of representation. In Rethinking Art History, Donald
Preziosi compares the development of the discipline of art history to
a Necker Cube, an optical illusion much touted by the psychologists
of perception in which a skeletal cube presents itself in alternating
aspects according to the vagaries of perception. This is just one of
various 'machines' which Preziosi cites as embodying (in their specific
function) changes in attitudes towards representation and perception
(among them Bentham's panopticon and Camillo's Memory Theatre).
"The discursive space of art history is . . . a contradictory,
illusory, or imaginative space, precisely like a Necker Cube illusion
in which alternate perspectival logics co exist within the same object.
And each of the objects in the disciplinary analytic theatre invariably
becomes, itself, a temple of entelechy." [3]
According
to Preziosi, the illusion encapsulates the two contradictory assumptions
upon which the discipline of art history is predicated: that art retains
some connection with the real world via its descriptive function (as
a language of representation); and that it is, at the same time, an
autonomous code in its own right. The function of the optical illusion
within art depends on the curious orientation of the discipline towards
this paradoxical foundation.
Since
an optical illusion presupposes the conscious manipulation of means
to bring about the occasion of error, what is represented becomes a
part of those means. Everything appears as if the means were laid bare
for all to see. Fortescue, as the illusionist, stands outside the conventional
or accepted use of photography to represent the world. Like a conjurer
he must disappear, or appear incidental to the deception. This is the
case within psychology, as in magic, where the illusion is presented
objectively, totally resigned from artifice, only to reappear after
the deception as indeed belonging to the perpetrator: Necker, for example.
If
we consider Fortescue's photographs in terms of his project description,
his absence becomes more apparent, more telling. In this series of prints,
the recognition of certain objects, surfaces and spaces is rendered
erroneous, that is, in relation to their cognition.
The
prefix 're' here signifies the occasion of error. 'Re', used as a living
prefix can be attached to almost any simple verb to derive a transitive
verb, noun, adjective, past participle, etc. The use of the hyphen is
instructive. It indicates that the author is not employing a compound
verb straightforwardly but insinuating a slightly different meaning,
however, commensurate with either of the two formal senses of the prefix:
once more, again; or back to, a return to [4].
Fortescue
states:
"These images result from a project which seeks to occupy a position
where perception and the language of representation intersect." [5]
Fortescue proposes photography as a means of recognition (and as a language
of representation) while perception is a means of cognition. The point
or plane of their intersection is meant to 'vibrate' and 'resonate',
'poise(d) between possibilities'. I would suggest that the said intersection
would be occupied by a hyphen in the word 're-cognition'. The hyphen
achieves this effect as the sign of intention and purpose. However its
absence in Fortescue's account refers instead to a precondition for
the practice of a deception; the neutrality of means and the artist's
temporary concealment.
The
difference between cognition and recognition (precisely the space either
filled by the hyphen or evacuated when when this difference appears
to be a 'natural' one) or between perception and photography, can thus
be enumerated ad infinitum in the terms of an error or illusion associated
with a 'repetition' or 'a return' which the prefix draws into circulation
around the primary term 'cognition'. But the illusion remains uncorrected
and the artist's stagecraft remains undisclosed. [6]
The
work seems to require some other sign of intention commensurate with
the degree of manipulation involved. We might find this in the particular
method of presentation (unique to Fortescue, developed in association
with the patent holder) which encases the print in a thick layer of
acrylic, akin to laminating although the final result is a solid plastic
volume. If there is little acknowledgement of the artist's intervention
either at the level of rhetoric or image, then certainly the encasing
of the images in this way corresponds in form to the conjuror's art;
the trick-in-a-box. This might seem incidental but our physical relation
to the less inert photographic image works to reinforce its transience.
Instead, Fortescue's photography is talismanic. It attempts to arrest
a moment in time between intrigue and realisation regarding what we
see and how we see it and make of it an object (not an image) forever
working its illusory wonders within a real, palpable space. This is
far different from Cartier Bresson's infamous 'moment' since in Fortescue's
photographs our gaze never returns to us a resolved reflection upon
the world but is endlessly relayed along axes and between nodal points
comprising the illusion; caught up in a 'repetition' or 'return' which
is perpetual. Thus the work is not pictorial but mechanical and its
object status reflects the artist's position outside the photographic
process and out of our immediate view.
But
there is no skullduggery in need of being exposed, nor any hegemony
at work in these conventions. Rather the illusion curiously reaffirms
the potential of a 'language of representation' to transform reality
as if by magic, exploiting its imprecise form and grammar in seemingly
profound ways.
[1]
For a detailed account of these illusions and their development see
J. O. Robinson, The Psychology of Visual Illusion, Hutchinson University
Library, London, 1972.
[2]
Francastel, P., Peintre et Societe, Audin Lyon, 1951, p47. Quoted in
Pierre Bourdieu et al, Photography: A Middle-brow Art, Polity Press,
London, 1990, p74 (translated by Shaun Whiteside).
[3]
Preziosi, D., Rethinking Art History, Yale University Press, New Haven,
1989, p86.
[4]
This ambivalent relation to any given verb (or term) might explain the
number of 're-' words in currency. For if we extrapolate from the use
of certain terms qualified in this way to a theoretical context which,
perhaps, overdetermines the use of the words, we observe the prefix
conforming to the outline of a number of theories and, in fact, performing
an abbreviation of considerable literature. This does not recommend
the prefix but indicates the dependence of the author on the simplification
it brings about (multiplying meanings exponentially) and the complicity
of the reader who is required to make some sense, a sense, of the term.
[5]
Fortescue's comments are taken from an artist's statement accompanying
the exhibition.
[6]
An interesting counterpoint to Fortescue's work, which might differentiate
the disciplines of psychology and art, are two photographs of a wooden
construction of Penrose and Penrose's 'impossible triangle' (1958),
in which the apex appears to be formed by one receding side and another
extending forward. In one photograph it appears an impossible object
while in the other, taken from a different aspect, the particular construction
of the form which makes the illusion possible is exposed; it is not
a complete triangle at all, simply the manipulation of depth of field
which makes it appear so.
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