Exhibitions, United Kingdom, London, 07 September 2012
The Italian countryside, and, in particular, that of Tuscany, between the 1940’s and the 1950’s, underwent profound economic and social transformations. Much of this was tied to changes in the laws regarding a system of labor known as share-cropping, that (which?) evolved and took hold over the preceding centuries.
The system of share-cropping, which began in the Middle Ages,
governed relations between the land owners and the peasant-farmers, then, share-croppers, who worked on the farms. Under this system, the owner made
available the means of production; the land, the farm buildings, and
half of the seeds, while the farmer and his family supplied the
labour, which involved cultivating the land, raising the livestock, and maintaining the land and buildings. The products of this labour were divided in two and shared equally by the landowners and the peasant framers.
The work force had to be proportionate to the size of the farm. This meant that the landowner had control over the size of the nuclear family or families, which could become quite large, and would all live under one roof. Farm buildings were adapted according to changing needs regarding land cultivation in a gradual, progressive process of transformation to accommodate growth in size and to keep to a minimum any waste of energy. Built over a course of centuries, the various building units that made up the main farmhouse itself gave
rise to model buildings of great architectural substance and compositional clarity, demonstrating a high degree of skill in adapting to the morphology of the land and integrating successfully into the context of the surrounding landscape.
The farm was a microcosm of social life, involving relationships, traditions,
and skills handed down from one generation to the next. During crop
harvesting, the grape harvest, the slaughtering and butchery of
pigs, farmers from individual farms would come together to join
forces. It was a gathering together of different worlds where new relationships, relations and loves were formed.
In the 1950s, share-croppers’ financial demands, the beginnings of
the economic boom, the industrialization of Italy’s
economy, and the large-scale phenomenon of migration from the
countryside to the cities, led to a profound crisis in this
fragile economic and social system. Farm machinery replaced the human
and animal workforce on a massive scale. Whereas dozens of workers
were once needed to farm the lands, these could now be cultivated by a
single piece of machinery, and by a single farm worker.
As many people moved to the cities, their daily relationship with
nature, and their socialization, typical of the rural world, were replaced
by the impersonal experience of living on the outskirts of major urban agglomerates.
This was an epoch-making revolution; it had an impact on systems and
structures that had evolved and over centuries. In
a decade, thousands of buildings were abandoned
and the traditional forms of organized land management in agriculture
disappeared through lack of maintenance. Ancient crops and
plantations were lost through neglect. Cracks appeared in the walls of
the buildings, roofs collapsed, and ceilings began to cave in. Life(?)
was followed by silence, theft, and damage.
This is the universe that has been explored by Jacqueline Tune and
Rebecca Dyer Szabo, two photographers originally from London and the
United States, respectively, but who have been resident in Tuscany
for decades.
Their collection of images is not simply a documentation of what was lost. That would be misleading; theirs is a search into the lives of entire generations whose days were passed inside these walls, these buildings, now abandoned, and of what was left behind. Walls of rough-hewn stone, with their infinite range of tenuous chromatic variations; peeling plaster, and colours faded
by human activity and by time; wooden floors resting on twisted beams, or more modern, terracotta brick floors, and wildly irregular, beautiful, brightly painted wooden doors and windows. Rays of light filter through, like real, true, blades of life, alighting on these dim interiors, while outside that same light gathers and magically solidifies and unites the whole building and the
built environment set in its surrounding natural context.(?)
What these images manage to restore to our view is the material
dimension created by man, the creativity inherent in human activity. They
give back to us the smell of these neglected places, they invite us to
touch those walls, and to gaze out from that hill, suspended in the
sky; that dwelling, now abandoned, and to explore those ruins once full of life and human sentiment.
The choice of subjects presented in this exhibition is not incidental. They are examples of a spontaneous architecture which these photographers love and in which they have chosen to live themselves. It is an architecture rich with history and it is interesting and perhaps telling of who they are that they have turned to subjects so rich in memory, and meaning.
As stated above, the photographic work of Jacqueline and Rebecca is
grounded in an artistic purpose that goes beyond representing
what is immediately perceptible. The real, deeper desire
behind their work manifestly emerges in the rawness of the techniques
they use to capture their images. Jacqueline uses compositions that
appear to be absolutely “normal”, but which are profoundly dramatic,
and packed with feeling that borders on desperation. Rebecca
uses the pinhole technique, unconcerned if this alters the way her
subjects appear and modifies the way the light appears to fall upon the scene, thereby changing our perception of it.
Using different ways of framing her subjects, Jacqueline investigates
the volumes of the buildings, and the alternation of empty spaces and
solid spaces in the wall surfaces. Trees and vegetation, and the roads
and paths, often abandoned, are never secondary features. The result
is images of great compositional force.
In Rebecca’s work, the subject almost ends up dissolving and
disappearing, as it is translated into memory, a brief moment of
recollection, as if the important thing was to suggest, and give a
glimpse, of what lies beyond the visible. The photographer’s
curiosity, in exploring the outside world, translates into a freedom on
the part of the observer, as he stands before the artistic image.
The choice of subject-matter, the way in which the images are
captured, and the subsequent processing phases allow these artists to
put into motion an original process in which their emotional response, and
their sensibilities, “interact” with the chosen subject.
The final result is something vastly different from what happened to be present
in front of the camera.
Thus, these photographs convey to us the richness of their own interior worlds, beyond the splendor of these abandoned Tuscan farmhouses, and it is this that is the most significant, the most meaningful feature of the work of Jacqueline Tune and Rebecca Dyer Szabo, because it is the most profoundly human.
The system of share-cropping, which began in the Middle Ages,
governed relations between the land owners and the peasant-farmers, then, share-croppers, who worked on the farms. Under this system, the owner made
available the means of production; the land, the farm buildings, and
half of the seeds, while the farmer and his family supplied the
labour, which involved cultivating the land, raising the livestock, and maintaining the land and buildings. The products of this labour were divided in two and shared equally by the landowners and the peasant framers.
The work force had to be proportionate to the size of the farm. This meant that the landowner had control over the size of the nuclear family or families, which could become quite large, and would all live under one roof. Farm buildings were adapted according to changing needs regarding land cultivation in a gradual, progressive process of transformation to accommodate growth in size and to keep to a minimum any waste of energy. Built over a course of centuries, the various building units that made up the main farmhouse itself gave
rise to model buildings of great architectural substance and compositional clarity, demonstrating a high degree of skill in adapting to the morphology of the land and integrating successfully into the context of the surrounding landscape.
The farm was a microcosm of social life, involving relationships, traditions,
and skills handed down from one generation to the next. During crop
harvesting, the grape harvest, the slaughtering and butchery of
pigs, farmers from individual farms would come together to join
forces. It was a gathering together of different worlds where new relationships, relations and loves were formed.
In the 1950s, share-croppers’ financial demands, the beginnings of
the economic boom, the industrialization of Italy’s
economy, and the large-scale phenomenon of migration from the
countryside to the cities, led to a profound crisis in this
fragile economic and social system. Farm machinery replaced the human
and animal workforce on a massive scale. Whereas dozens of workers
were once needed to farm the lands, these could now be cultivated by a
single piece of machinery, and by a single farm worker.
As many people moved to the cities, their daily relationship with
nature, and their socialization, typical of the rural world, were replaced
by the impersonal experience of living on the outskirts of major urban agglomerates.
This was an epoch-making revolution; it had an impact on systems and
structures that had evolved and over centuries. In
a decade, thousands of buildings were abandoned
and the traditional forms of organized land management in agriculture
disappeared through lack of maintenance. Ancient crops and
plantations were lost through neglect. Cracks appeared in the walls of
the buildings, roofs collapsed, and ceilings began to cave in. Life(?)
was followed by silence, theft, and damage.
This is the universe that has been explored by Jacqueline Tune and
Rebecca Dyer Szabo, two photographers originally from London and the
United States, respectively, but who have been resident in Tuscany
for decades.
Their collection of images is not simply a documentation of what was lost. That would be misleading; theirs is a search into the lives of entire generations whose days were passed inside these walls, these buildings, now abandoned, and of what was left behind. Walls of rough-hewn stone, with their infinite range of tenuous chromatic variations; peeling plaster, and colours faded
by human activity and by time; wooden floors resting on twisted beams, or more modern, terracotta brick floors, and wildly irregular, beautiful, brightly painted wooden doors and windows. Rays of light filter through, like real, true, blades of life, alighting on these dim interiors, while outside that same light gathers and magically solidifies and unites the whole building and the
built environment set in its surrounding natural context.(?)
What these images manage to restore to our view is the material
dimension created by man, the creativity inherent in human activity. They
give back to us the smell of these neglected places, they invite us to
touch those walls, and to gaze out from that hill, suspended in the
sky; that dwelling, now abandoned, and to explore those ruins once full of life and human sentiment.
The choice of subjects presented in this exhibition is not incidental. They are examples of a spontaneous architecture which these photographers love and in which they have chosen to live themselves. It is an architecture rich with history and it is interesting and perhaps telling of who they are that they have turned to subjects so rich in memory, and meaning.
As stated above, the photographic work of Jacqueline and Rebecca is
grounded in an artistic purpose that goes beyond representing
what is immediately perceptible. The real, deeper desire
behind their work manifestly emerges in the rawness of the techniques
they use to capture their images. Jacqueline uses compositions that
appear to be absolutely “normal”, but which are profoundly dramatic,
and packed with feeling that borders on desperation. Rebecca
uses the pinhole technique, unconcerned if this alters the way her
subjects appear and modifies the way the light appears to fall upon the scene, thereby changing our perception of it.
Using different ways of framing her subjects, Jacqueline investigates
the volumes of the buildings, and the alternation of empty spaces and
solid spaces in the wall surfaces. Trees and vegetation, and the roads
and paths, often abandoned, are never secondary features. The result
is images of great compositional force.
In Rebecca’s work, the subject almost ends up dissolving and
disappearing, as it is translated into memory, a brief moment of
recollection, as if the important thing was to suggest, and give a
glimpse, of what lies beyond the visible. The photographer’s
curiosity, in exploring the outside world, translates into a freedom on
the part of the observer, as he stands before the artistic image.
The choice of subject-matter, the way in which the images are
captured, and the subsequent processing phases allow these artists to
put into motion an original process in which their emotional response, and
their sensibilities, “interact” with the chosen subject.
The final result is something vastly different from what happened to be present
in front of the camera.
Thus, these photographs convey to us the richness of their own interior worlds, beyond the splendor of these abandoned Tuscan farmhouses, and it is this that is the most significant, the most meaningful feature of the work of Jacqueline Tune and Rebecca Dyer Szabo, because it is the most profoundly human.
Comments 4
Say something