After some decent feedback from the last post, I decided to push on with the Sunday Photo-book slot but this time with a return to much safer territory for me personally with Mario Giacomelli’s The Black is Waiting for the White.

The Black is Waiting for the White

First of all, what a great name for a photography book, says it all in this case. The book in question is new to me and unbelievably, so is Giacomelli as a photographer. As someone who’s photographic tastes developed around the contrasty Japanese classic and contemporary photographers, and initially the early work of Roger Ballen, I find it incredible that I was unaware of this marvellous photographer who seems to bring everything I like and admire into his work, big thanks to JH Engstrom and Margot Wallard for bringing this to my attention as something I might like. The book being looked at here is an epic journey from Giacomelli’s very earliest photos in his home town of Senigallia through his incredible graphic landscapes, and on to the more widely recognisable priests in the snow, Lourdes pilgrims, hospice series and ending in what I can only say is a set of surrealist type psychologically derived photos that out-Ballen Ballen at his own game !!!

This is a meaty book and I don’t think it is digestible in one sitting. What I prefer to do is look at it in the respective logical sections which the book is broadly divided into, and each section is accompanied by a nice essay by various critics and writers who have admired and understood the context for Giacomelli’s art, and art it is believe me. There is an astonishing freshness and modernity to much of his more abstract and personal work that belies the simple background story of his life emerging as a photographic talent in post-war Italy.

One thing that has struck me most about this complete history of Giacomelli’s work is the consistency of approach almost from day one. Giacomelli is as merciless on mid-tones as Nakahira or Moriyama at their best, in other words they are mostly eradicated in favour of inky black and stark, blinding white. Throughout his work that is his signature stamp and, despite the apparently simple concept of using only these basic elements, I personally believe that this is an extremely difficult style to work with, let alone maintain through a lifetimes work. Especially when you consider the out and out, sustained quality of the imagery on show.

Given the size and scale of this collection I think its always easy to forget that this is a lifetimes work and what we are looking at is only a representative selection. For that reason however I think its a tribute to both Giacomelli and the books editors that this works so well and cohesively over the extensive period covered. By way of contrast, I have also been reading Chang Chao-Tang’s huge set which was issued to comemorate his recent Taiwan exhibition and for me, and please remember this is just my personal opinion, the work lacks that end to end consistency. There is a weak beginning of historical type photos and then the incredible 1962-65 period which just bursts with creativity and iconic photography and then the standard falls of again towards the current day. This might sound hypercritical as ‘the standard’ for these photographers is of course very high in the first place, the point I am trying to make is that Giacomelli is one of the few artists that seems to have been able to move through distinctly different subject matters over his lifetime without compromising the creative level of his work and thats’ what makes him so special in my eyes.

Bearing in mind that my objective with these short reviews is simply to highlight to my friends a book or artist that they may not be familiar with, I am not trying to do any in depth analysis of the artist or their motivations, this is done admirabley in this particular book by people much better qualified to do so than me . What I would like to do in this case though is simply choose some photographs from some of the distinct phases of subject matter or concepts that Giacomelli chose to work on in his lifetime to illustrate first of all the stylistic linkage and secondly, the out and out consistency of inspirational creative touch that he brought to whatever subject he was working on.

1954, Mia moglie & Il misantropo

This is a very early pair of images and the reason I included them is that you can easily see that even very early in his career Giacomelli was capable of insightful photography, particularly in the right hand image which for me has the seeds of many of the ideas that he was to develop later on.

1977-2000 Presa di coscienza sulla natura

I had a real challenge here to choose an example from Giacomelli’s incredible range of graphic landscape shots however I settled on this photograph which I think is a particularly nice shot that will give some idea as to the originality and creativity that he was capable of at that time.

1954-1968 Verra la Morte e avra i tuoi occhi

I think more than anything this shot begins to show the depth of Giacomelli’s sensitivity and range as a photographer. The translation of the title of this shot from his Senigallia’s hospice series is, as I understand it, Death will come and will have your eyes. I think when you begin to look at these images the landscape and surrealist shots begin to take on a new meaning and that is one of the beauties of a grand scale book such as this.

1960 Un uoma, una donna, u amore

Here we see a little bit of the more poetic side of the man. This shot is for me grounded in realism, but obviously tender and passionate and I included it as a direct contrast to the more surrealistic shots that were to come.

1964-1966 La buona terra

The good earth. I don’t think that I have ever seen any photographer shoot the rural countryside in this way. This is as close as Giacomelli ever gets to a more pure documentary style of photography and yet its somehow not, the graphical style and surreal structure of the photograph lifts it well out of that genre for my take on it.

1994-1995 La notte lava la mente

Night washes the mind. This shot is taken from a section that is one of my personal favourites in the book and its titled Photography as Poetry (and Philosophy) by Goffredo Fofi. Fofi’s interpretation is that as Giacomelli nears the end of the journey, he camly and quietly abandons the figurative for the abstract, for la notte che lava la mente, for the photography of thoughts, those “thoughts that are continually in motion”. I know what Fofi means and of course contributors to these books have the challenge of writing something dramatic and insightful to support their personal selections, however, I think that statement denies the utter beauty of these photographs which deserve to be recognised as such.

1977-2000 Presa di coscienza sulla natura

I wanted to finish this quick look at Giacomelli’s The Black is Waiting for the White with a return to the cover photo for the book. Taken from the ’ Awareness of Nature’ series what I particulrly like about this photograph is that it is a close as any in the book to merging a number of Giacomelli’s favourite subject themes, the land, transient thought and rural life with his usual bold, graphic tones. I don’t think this is the books strongest image by a long way and I have missed out whole sections from this snapshot including his more famous novices in the snow and Lourdes pilgrims, but somehow I think that the books editors choose this image wisely as it is very representative of the talent of this particularly unique photographer.

An image is soul, matter, time, space, a chance for us to look. Traces proving our existence and the sign of a culture constantly experiencing the rhythms that sustain memory, history and the rules of knowledge.
Mario Giacomelli

Well thats it for this snapshot of another recent book purchase. As before, my aim here is simply to raise awareness of a photographer and book that my friends may not be aware of so I hope it serves a purpose on that level at least. I have had an absolute frenzy of buying recently so have loads of new books to share over the coming weeks.

Colin Steel Sunday 20th July 2014