THE ARCHITECTURE OF PHOTOGRAPHY Ives Maes 1 CONTENT PAGE 1. Introduction 3 2. The Camera Obscura Pavilion 9 3. The Panorama Pavilion 13 4. Daguerre’s Diorama 20 5. Talbot’s Latticed Window 26 6. Delamotte’s Crystal Palace 35 7. The Philadelphia Photographic Pavilions 53 8. The Architecture of Photo-sculptures 65 9. Raoul Grimion-Sanson’ Cinematographic Panorama 74 10. Framing Pictorialism 87 11. El Lissitzky’s Photographic Environment 97 12. Charlotte Perriand’s Photographic Pavilion 105 13. Herbert Bayer’s Expanded Field of Vision 112 14. Richard Hamilton’s Photographic Palimpsest 130 15. Jack Masey’s Photographic Propaganda Pavilions 140 16. Peter Bunnell’s Photography into Sculpture 170 17. Dennis Adams’s Bus Shelters 189 18. Jeff Wall and Dan Graham’s Children’s Pavilion 205 19. Wolfgang Tillmans’s Performative Photo-constellations 223 20. Conclusion 240 X. Regressionism 247 BIBLIOGRAPHY 257 2 1. The architectonics of photography Architecture is inherently part of photography. The invention of photography presupposed the architecture of a dark chamber in order to project its naturally formed image. In the earliest known representations of the camera obscura principle, purpose built architectural spaces were drawn to explain the phenomenon. (Fig. 1) The bigger picture is that all photography exists only trough a miniaturized version of this obscured architectural space. The design of a photo camera is the reduced version of the camera obscura room; the name is an autonym. (Fig. 2) Since the inception of photography there have been numerous hybrid experiments between photography and architecture that exemplify a continuous influence of architecture on photography and vice versa. In The Architecture of Photography I will research the physical, sculptural, and architectural aspects of photography in a historical overview from the 16th century obscured chamber to the 21st century digital processes.1 The contraction of the words architecture and photography immediately evokes the idea of photographing architecture. The premise of this PhD in the Arts, however, is not to discuss what is depicted in the illusionistic window of the image, but to analyze the photograph as a spatial, sculptural, even architectural object. The illusionistic window into another world is indisputably more important than the photograph’s materiality. But because of this obliterating certain fact, there has always been a tendency to ignore that it is also made up out of matter. In this study, the content of the image is of secondary importance to its physical presence. The gaze through the viewfinder is regarded as the mere registration of light reflected from objects, while the photographic print is deemed palpable. Quintessential in understanding this research is the conceptual change in perception of the photographic print as a two-dimensional illusionistic window into a three-dimensional object with a physical consistency. The invention of photography was marked by capturing an ephemeral projection on a three- dimensional support. From its inception, the photograph has been inextricably tied to its materiality, endowed with weight and volume. The first photograph was physically imprinted in bitumen asphalt, natural oils, and pewter; a trace that light carves into a physical substance. (Fig. 3) At a time where analogue photography is being replaced by digital recordings, which has profoundly changed the relationship between the ephemeral image and its palpable support, I would like to look back at the amazing amount of matter photography has constructed over these last centuries. 1 The following lines were the original questions posed in the spring of 2012, copied from my application form for this PhD in the Arts. Each should be read followed by the words “if yes, then”: What is the effect of time, place and context on the architectural remains of world’s fairs? Is photography an adequate tool to prove this? How can these images be shown? What is the contribution of world’s fairs to the photograph as a three-dimensional exhibition model? Which relations do there exist between photography and the temporality of world’s fair pavilions? Is the modernist idea of a synthesis of new media still applicable today? What are the most important precedents? Does the photograph, despite its increasing dematerialization, still have a physical presence or has it superseded its materiality? How can a third dimension be gained from a two-dimensional photograph? To what degree will the image of newly recorded photographs be influenced when they are intended to become three-dimensional? How can a hybrid of photography, installation, and architecture manifest itself? What would be the architectonics of photography? What is the architecture of photography? Can photography be architecture? 3 The impact of photography on architecture is well known, but it is much larger than assumed. Because of its ability to deliver evidence, photography has strongly influenced the creation of newly built architectures. Photographing architecture will be discussed within the scope of this text, but the focus lies on the architectural construction of the photographic object. Architecture is here defined as an artificial construction or spatial environment, as a general term to describe buildings and other physical structures. This might sound reductive towards the high art of architecture, but the words construction or building are not sufficient. The style and the aesthetic meaning we attribute to the concept of architecture is often strongly reduced: to a pragmatic container to trigger a certain effect in function of photography, to describe the design of a photographic object, to discuss the profile of a frame. But as will be demonstrated in the following case studies, the influence of architecture on photography often leads to high architecture or interior design. An alternative history appears when the separate histories of photography and architecture are blended and treated as a unity. The camera obscura pavilion exemplifies this alternative history. The architecture of the camera obscura pavilion has always been described unilaterally in favour of the natural occurrence it provoked. This does not have to be justified, since the phenomenon was an essential evolutionary step towards the development of photography. Nonetheless, an uncountable amount of ornamented camera obscura pavilions have been built since the 16th century, as part of palaces or private homes, portable or on wheels. In architectural history, the purpose built black box with a pinhole was considered as pragmatic, rather than grand architecture. But the fascination for this pre-cinema pavilion persists until today as an experimental practice, signalling the importance of its architectural shell. The pavilion is, however, still treated as an empty shell, a folly experiment, assigning importance only to the construction of the pavilion itself. An interdisciplinary reinterpretation of certain details in these separate histories of photography and architecture is necessary to fully understand the dual importance of the camera obscura pavilion. An interdisciplinary reinterpretation also gives the concept of an ‘architecture of photography’ a multitude of meanings. It can refer to the interference of spatial structures with the camera obscura principle. It can refer to photographing architecture, if the creation of the architectural design is influenced by its photographic representation. It can refer to purpose built photographer’s studios, to photo-sculptures, to cinematographic spaces, to the architectural frame, to the influence of exhibition design on the photographic object, to photographic installations, etc. (Fig. 4-6) In order to fully grasp the concept of ‘architecture of photography’ an even wider scope is desirable, including that of the history of art, technology and politics. The particular history of world exhibitions embraces all of these aspects. World’s fairs reflect a microcosm; they are a representation of the real world. The exhibition grounds of world’s fairs proved to be fertile environments for experimental architecture and photography. Most of these world’s fair experiments have been forgotten, dismissed by the history of art and photography. (Fig. 7 & 8) Clearly caused by the poor display of contemporary world’s fairs today, they have been classified as low popular festivities. In the history of architecture this is somewhat different, as numerous grand structures have been built for world’s fairs. Their architects and commissioners were very well aware of the power of photography, as demonstrated by the assignments they have 4 given to photographers to highlight the aesthetic effect of its high architecture. But in the history of architecture this is again exclusively described merely as documenting architecture through photography. I will argue in the following pages that the ephemeral nature of temporary world’s fair pavilions vitally needed photography as proof of their short-lived existence and that it is no coincidence that the tradition of world’s fairs started immediately after the invention of photography. These temporary buildings were only constructed because there was the possibility of recording the proof of their transitory existence. They were built to be photographed. The history of photography is utterly intertwined with the history of world exhibitions and many of the following case studies have been part of these international expositions. From the beginning, world’s fairs