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Paul Outerbridge

An American born in 1896 is best known for introducing an artists sensibility to the black and white photographs. He and his work has been featured in respectable magazines such as Vanity Fair and Harper's Bazaar. In the 1920's Outerbridge flew onto the scene with visually fresh and technically adept photographs. In 1925 he moved to Paris to design layouts for French Vogue. Then in 1928 he moved to Berlin and then London to work with motion pictures. Then 1929 rolled around and 12 of his photos were included in the groundbreaking exhibit. Film und Foto. Here come the 30's and with that came color photography. In 1943 Outerbridge migrated to Southern California and continued taking pictures and writing until his death in 1958.

Now before the death and the colors came a photo entitled Cheese and Crackers. This photo was taken in 1922 and carefully balanced dark against light and light against dark in order to portray a composition more about the forms and articulating the textures rather than the objects in the photo itself. Outerbridge had the ability to transform commonplace objects into semi-abstractions through keen sensitivity to light and pattern. His method consisted of sketching out his ideas on paper before taking it to the camera. Lastly, I would like to point out that Outerbridge had an extreme sense of control when it comes to everything in his life allowing him to explore spatial relationships which was groundbreaking for photography and often times compared to the Modernistic paintings of his time.

I personally love this photo. If you have been following my blog which I am sure you have considering you grade it all you will notice that I have a thing for taking the ordinary and making it beautiful. While I love abstracting my images this image portrays the image in a more realistic state. It allows the viewer to focus on the texture and forms in the image which was Outerbridge's intention. I love being able to look at the texture of the photo first and then what the actual objects are doing in the picture. This picture is beautiful and yet so simple.

For my images I wanted to do a lot of the same thing. I wanted there to be a start contrast of light and dark and I wanted the viewer to focus on the textures and colors of the picture rather than the actual image in the picture. While mine are a little more abstract I chose that type of approach because I wanted to add my twist on the picture. I am obsessed with how the marble of the cheese turned out and how the texture of the crackers was able to come through in the picture.