PJ’s Blog

Here is a tough one for me to decide : I’m not sure if I like Linda Broadfoot’s work… Who’s Linda Broadfoot ? She’s a photographer, using the Polaroid 20×24 system (I know, it’s turning into an obsession, this Polaroid 20×24 thing, I guess I’ll be cured when i get one for myself…:p). She is using this big huge camera, like the one you see here (this particular one is the camera from the polaroid studio in california, at Polaroid 20×24 Studio West, operated by Tracy Storer.) to take pictures of insects.

So the images she produces are 20 times life-size images of beautiful insects from around the world, with exquisite details, and furthermore she does them in image transfers, and not straight polaroid prints. Now, I’m a biologist, so I appreciate the simple documentary nature of her work. I am a book lover so I appreciate the look of her images which look somehow like the color plates from a 19th century biology book. I am a photographer, so I appreciate the technical difficulty in creating images which such magnification. I am a polaroid user myself (only 4×5 for now), so I appreciate the difficulties of the technique she chose.

Her images, in short, are stunning, and they tug at various chords in my own experience, so I happen to like them. I think… (Image by Linda Broadfoot) Or do I ? Her use of Polaroid transfer seems to be almost an artifice, something she wouldn’t need to produce such finely detailed images. Why not use straight 8×10 color transparencies, which would produce higher resolution images than the polaroid, at a lower cost…

Would her images be as interesting if there wasn’t the element of technical prowess linked to the polaroid 20×24 ? I would probably like her images as much on the biology and photography level just as much, but would her work be recognized as art ? Would she be represented by one of the most prestigious Galleries in the world , The Weston Gallery in New York ? Does it matter why I like her work, as long as I like it ? Can photography be interesting as a purely technical medium ? I’d like to have your comments on this question…